Chapter 2 - THE PEDIATRICIAN
Emily called the pediatrician.
Then she called the police non-emergency line and asked what she should do.
The dispatcher sent an officer because a very young child had been placed inside an appliance by an adult.
No sirens.
No dramatic arrest in front of Ethan.
Officer Laura Chen arrived.
She checked the washing machine.
Unplugged.
No water.
No signs it had activated.
No visible injury to Ethan.
Good.
Emily kept him on her lap.
Laura asked Michael:
“Did you place your son inside?”
Michael said:
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To scare him away from the machine.”
Laura’s expression did not change.
“How long?”
“Under a minute.”
“Were you in the room the entire time?”
Michael paused.
“I stepped into the hallway.”
Emily looked at him.
“How long?”
“Maybe ten seconds.”
Now the story changed again.
Then Laura asked:
“Why?”
“My phone rang.”
Emily almost laughed from disbelief.
“You answered a call while he was in there?”
“I thought he was safe.”
Ethan began crying when Michael’s voice rose.
Emily held him tighter.
The pediatrician later examined him.
No physical harm.
No breathing issue.
No bruising.
But when the nurse mentioned “laundry room,” Ethan clung to Emily and said:
“No washer.”
The doctor wrote:
acute distress associated with appliance confinement.
Not trauma diagnosis.
Not yet.
Just observation.
Then the pediatrician asked Emily:
“Has he become frightened of anything else at home recently?”
Emily thought.
Closet door.
Bath drain.
Garage.
She had called all of it toddler fear.
Then she remembered a phrase Ethan had started saying three weeks earlier.
“Daddy dark.”
May you like
She had assumed bedtime.
Now she was not sure.
