It all started when I was much younger. I was at that age where all I wanted was to play with my older sisters.
That night, we'd gathered in the family room for "family time," which usually meant Dad would put something on the TV to watch with my older brother while my sisters tapped away at their phones. If they thought they could get away with it, they'd sneak in a conversation with someone.
That evening, I wanted to play hide and seek.
I asked Tori first, but she shook her head, her eyes squinting at something bright on her screen. I tugged at Mom's leg to get her attention, but she was too absorbed in the rom-com she and Dad both loved.
Last, I tried Liv. She smiled down at me and told me to go hide, and she'd count.
I'm not sure she ever actually started counting. But that's why I was in the closet when they came.
I had my eye pressed to the crack between the door and the floor. That's when I saw them.
Four men. Dressed in layers of ragged black and grey clothing. The only reason I knew they were men was their voices—deep, like Dad's had been. Their faces were covered, only their eyes visible through the fabric.
What happened next felt like watching a movie—someone else's life, not mine.
I pulled away from the crack and curled myself into a ball. And then I waited to be found.
There was shouting. Pops that sounded like fireworks—gunshots, I understand now. The ones that ended their lives.
Liv screamed, high-pitched and desperate. There was shuffling, more pops. Then silence.
I stayed like that until I went numb. Still, I waited.
Another set of footsteps entered the house. Muffled voices. Then more people.
"The whole family?"
"Looks like it. They never had a chance."
"Robbery gone wrong?"
"Worst I've seen in forty years on the job…"
I listened without really understanding a word.
But I started paying attention when their voices shifted. Grew more urgent.
"Hey—over here. How old did you say the youngest victim was?"
"Ten, I think."
"There's a set of dolls here. And some picture books…"
"We've got a missing child."
They had noticed me.
I heard boots on hardwood. Closer. A new kind of seeker. And this one wasn't giving up.
Finally, someone opened the closet.
I blinked up into blinding lights and the face of a man in a blue uniform.
"We found her. I repeat, we have a child, maybe five years of age," he spoke into a little black box. "Female. Appears to be unharmed. Found hiding in a closet."
I tried to stand, to see around him.
Where was my family?
I watched his face shift from relief to horror.
"Sweetheart?" he said softly—gentler than I'd ever heard a man speak. "What's your name?"
"June," I whispered. "What's yours?"
He didn't answer right away. Finally, he said, "Aaron."
Then a woman arrived. She knelt so we were face to face.
"June, I'm a police officer, but you can call me Brenda. I'm going to take you someplace warm. Does that sound okay?"
She spoke so kindly I just nodded.
"Are you hungry?"
I touched my stomach and felt it rumble. I nodded again.
"Where's Mom?" I asked. "Why are they all sleeping?"
Aaron and Brenda smiled for my sake, but something in their eyes cracked.
"We just need to take you to see some friends of mine," Brenda said. "They're going to make sure nothing hurts."
"Okay," I said.
Brenda's friends turned out to be paramedics. Their bright, white van made my eyes ache. They asked questions. They put a tight band around my arm.
Then I was back with Brenda.
"She's unharmed. It's a miracle," someone said.
"The press will be all over this. Worst massacre we've seen—whole family gone, except this little girl."
"How do you reckon she ended up in the closet?"
That would be the question I'd have to answer for years.
No, no one had heroically hidden me there.No, the gunmen didn't spare me.No, I didn't know what was happening.
No. No. No.
Everyone wanted a better story than mine.They wanted to believe my mother saved me.Or that there was some cinematic reason the men who killed five people didn't kill me.
But the truth was simple. Silly, even.
I was lucky.
That's what they finally printed. Right place, right time.
They tried to keep my name out of the papers, but it was useless. I was the miracle child in one of the city's top unsolved cases. The media hounded me even after I was adopted.
They came on anniversaries, showed up at school, or whenever they needed something dramatic to print.
So who really were the lucky ones?
At least they spared me the press at the funeral.
There wasn't any family left to stand beside me as I faced the coffins—bought with donations from gawkers and "well-wishers."
They gave me five roses. Dutifully, I placed one at the center of each coffin and spoke their names in my head:
Victoria. Olivia. Gabe. Mom. Dad.
And then I made my vow.
I would see each killer punished.
I sealed that vow with the first fistful of dirt.In hindsight, I wish I could have painted it in blood.