CHAPTER 2 — The Secret Hidden Inside the Wall
At first all I saw was darkness.
Broken insulation spilled onto the nursery floor like dirty snow.
Pieces of drywall surrounded Daisy's bleeding paws.
She stood between the hole and Lily's crib, growling low in her throat.
She had never growled at us before.
Never.
Jake grabbed a flashlight.
The beam disappeared into the opening.
Then he froze.
"What..."
He whispered.
"...is that?"
Inside the wall was a thick black layer covering the wooden studs.
It wasn't dirt.
It wasn't dust.
It spread across the inside like living ink.
Some sections looked wet.
Others looked fuzzy.
The smell hit us seconds later.
Rot.
Moisture.
Decay.
It was so overwhelming my eyes immediately began watering.
Jake pulled out his phone.
He searched one phrase.
Black mold inside wall.
Every image looked identical.
My stomach dropped.
Suddenly everything made sense.
The endless coughing.
The breathing problems.
The unexplained illness.
Our daughter's crib had been placed directly against a wall filled with toxic mold.
But why hadn't anyone noticed?
Jake grabbed a screwdriver and removed more drywall.
The hole became larger.
Much larger.
Behind nearly the entire nursery wall...
There was mold.
Everywhere.
Then we noticed something even worse.
A slow drip.
Water.
Somewhere deep inside the wall.
A hidden plumbing leak had apparently been soaking the insulation for months.
No one knew.
The previous homeowners had painted over the damage before selling us the house.
They had covered everything with fresh paint.
Hidden it.
Buried it.
Our daughter had been sleeping inches away from poisonous spores every single night.
I picked Lily up immediately.
She was coughing even in her sleep.
Daisy pressed herself against my legs, finally stopping her frantic scratching.
Almost as though she knew we had finally seen the danger.
Jake called an emergency mold inspection company.
The technician arrived within an hour.
He walked into the nursery.
Looked once.
Then turned pale.
"You need to leave this house."
"Now."
"What you're seeing on the surface is only a fraction of it."
He pointed the moisture meter toward the ceiling.
Then toward the adjoining wall.
Every reading flashed bright red.
The contamination had spread through multiple rooms.
Then he asked a question neither of us expected.
"Has anyone here been experiencing headaches... dizziness... breathing problems?"
We both nodded.
Then he looked at Lily.
"You shouldn't wait until morning."
"Take her to the emergency room."
"We've seen babies become critically ill from prolonged exposure."
Within minutes we were racing toward the hospital.
I held Lily in my arms while Daisy watched from the front window as our car disappeared into the night.
We thought the nightmare was over.
We were wrong.
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Because the doctors were about to discover something inside Lily's lungs...
That made them immediately call 911 themselves.
