Weight of Responsibility (Hazel)

On my way home, I decided to look for the homeless man who had told me he saw Violet being taken to a hospital. Most of the hospitals I had checked didn’t have her admitted there.

It may have seemed biased but I needed to ask him again. I thought that maybe he was high when he told me that piece of information. My search seemed fruitless. I had to confirm what he saw.

I went back to the street I talked to him but he wasn’t there. When I gave the description to someone there, he told me where I was going to find him.

I never imagined the day would end like this, standing on a desolate street corner, talking to a man wrapped in rags. He had seemed so much put together when I saw him previously. His eyes, tired and distant, flickered with a strange knowing.

He had seen something—a girl, my sister, Violet—being carried away on a stretcher. "She looked like she needed help," he muttered, clutching his blanket tighter against the cold. It was too late to verify anything at the hospital;