We’re about to reach the first landing when we start to hear voices bouncing against the walls of the stairwell. We stop, and Sophie turns to look at me. It’s not unusual for the hallways of our building to get loud, but there’s something about these voices that makes me a little uneasy. Staring into Sophie’s eyes, I can tell she’s thinking the same thing. I know right away it isn’t Jessie from the fourth floor speaking loudly to her mother on the phone, or any of our other neighbors talking among themselves. These voices are hushed, cautious. They’re voices that don’t belong here.

Slowly, we start climbing the stairs again. The closer we get to the third floor, the easier it gets to understand exactly what they’re saying.

“But this is the right address?”

“I mean, yes,” Mrs. Solís answers in her heavy accent. “But I haven’t seen anyone since the Garcias were detained. Haven’t even heard a sound coming from the apartment. I’m almost sure it’s empty.”

“What happened to the kids, then? Mateo and Sofía?” asks a different voice. It’s just as serious as the first one.

“I don’t know,” says Mrs. Solís, and I’m confused. Why is she lying? Of course she knows Sophie and I are still living here. We ran into her in the hallway just this weekend.

“Do you know how to get in touch with them?”

There’s a short silence, and I can just imagine Mrs. Solís shrugging. “They must have family somewhere else in the city. But no, I don’t know how to find them.”

“All right,” sighs the first of the two strangers. “Thank you for your help.”

The second we hear steps coming down the stairs, I signal to Sophie to get moving. We run down as quickly and quietly as we can, sneak out of the building, and immediately start walking across Fourteenth, trying to blend into the crowd.

We’ve walked only a few feet when I get the urge to look back, and I can’t resist it. I sneak a quick glance over my shoulder and see two people walking out of our building, a man and a woman, both of them wearing regular clothes. I can tell this much: They’re not ICE agents… but then, who could they be? What do they want? How did they know where to find us, and how did they know our names?

From the corner of my eye, I see them turn the other way, toward the subway, and I let out a sigh of relief. But even when I’m certain that they’re not following us, we don’t turn back home. We loop around the East Village slowly, still carrying all the things we got from the people who came by the store earlier.