Turn the page and continue with Chapter Two...

We found it twenty minutes later behind a stack of rotting wooden pallets in the far corner of the furnace room.

It was a small, square iron door, no larger than two feet by two feet, covered in deep rust and thick spiderwebs. Above it, a faint, barely perceptible draft of cool, wet night air blew inward, carrying the fresh scent of rain.

"It's too small for me," Arthur said, shaking his head as he looked at the rusted latch. "I'll never fit through that."

"You don't need to fit through it," I said, grabbing a heavy iron crowbar that was leaning against the old boiler. "I'm going through. Once I'm outside, I'll go to the alleyway and unbolt the main fire escape door for you."

I wedged the flat edge of the crowbar into the rusted frame of the coal chute door. I put every ounce of my weight into it, screaming through my gritted teeth as the old iron groaned, resisted, and finally burst open with a loud, metallic snap!

A cloud of black coal dust rained down on my head, but through the opening, I could see the dim, amber glow of a distant alleyway streetlight.

"Emma..." Arthur said softly, reaching out to touch my arm.

I turned to look at him. In the yellow light of the flashlight, my father looked older than ever, covered in soot, tears streaking through the dirt on his face.

"I spent ten years hating you because I was too weak to hate myself," Arthur whispered, his voice trembling with a profound, crushing sorrow. "If... if you get out of here... if you save Leo... don't ever come back to this house. Don't ever look back at me. You are a hundred times the person I ever was."

I looked at the man who had thrown me out into the cold ten years ago. The anger that had burned inside me for a decade didn't disappear, but it shifted, turning into a solemn, cold acceptance.

"Help me up, Dad," I said quietly.

Arthur cupped his hands, boosting my feet up into the dark, narrow tunnel. I squeezed my shoulders into the tight space, the cold, wet iron scraping against my jacket, coal dust filling my nose and eyes. I clawed my way upward inch by inch, dragging my body through thirty feet of narrow pipe, until my hands broke through the rusted outer grate into the cool, rain-slicked alleyway outside.

I tumbled out onto the wet asphalt, gasping for air, rain washing the black soot from my face.

I didn't waste a second. I ran down the alley, found the rusted fire escape door, wedged the crowbar into the outer latch, and popped the deadbolt open, letting my father out into the night.