When he stepped into the hallway, a nurse showed him the preliminary search results. No missing child report matched her description. No one had filed anything. She was a nameless child, a ghost walking among the living—misplaced, unaccounted for, and lost.
Manny sat outside her room long after his shift ended, elbows on his knees, forcing himself to remember training: officers couldn’t get attached. Still, the thought of walking away felt unbearable, like abandoning her a second time.