I Found My Neighbor’s Twin Toddlers Hiding in My Empty Trash Can—Then Their Mother Told Me Why They Had Been Sent to Find Me

Hannah paused to listen, then returned to the call.

“They understand bits of it,” she said.

“Not the whole thing.”

“They don’t have to understand the whole thing today.”

“I keep wanting to explain it until it stops frightening them.”

I thought about the promises I had nearly made in my kitchen: no one would ever get them, nothing bad would happen again, police would always arrive in time.

“I think all of us want that,” I said.