Ireturned home smiling, planning to surprise my parents, but when I walked in…

My mother’s silver wind chimes hung in silence, even though a thin spring breeze was drifting across the yard.

The house didn’t look empty.

It looked locked from the inside.

I rang the doorbell.

Nothing.

I knocked harder.

“Mom? Dad? It’s me.”

Still nothing.

For a second, I tried to make it seem normal.

Maybe they had gone out.