It was a cold room and the air was stale. The smell of pills and disease filled the air. Hospital rooms are not so pleasing to be in. Everything is so cold and full of metal. And this particular hospital room was not very pleasing at all. Screams from the person in the next room kept repeating. Mario laid in the hard hospital bed trying to block the noise out. It was hard to do. He tried to cover his ears with a pillow, but that didn't help. Finally, the nurses went in and sedated the person.

"Finally.", Mario thought. "At least now I can have some quiet. It's the only thing I have left anyway. I don't have my daughter, I'm losing my sons, and this mental ward took all the darn clothes I have." It was a struggle to lay there with nothing on except a hospital gown that doesn't close and to only have a small TV to watch. But after all the screaming was over, who would want to watch TV or do anything anyways? At least he felt better. And that he was thankful for. After getting some anxiety medication, his blood pressure down and his heartbeat regulated. But the temporary lack of memory would put him in the hospital for a bit for evaluation.

"Where are my boys at?" Mario asked himself sullenly. "I've been in here for almost 24 hours and neither of them have showed up. I know Isabella said that they would be here, but was that just a lie to make me feel better?"

During this time Mario had been thinking what would be crazy thoughts if anyone were to hear them. Maybe that's why he didn't tell anyone how he had felt. Nobody would take him seriously, he was sure. He had always been the lucky family man with a career and a lot of loving people around him. What could possibly make him feel worthless or depressed? The simple, harsh, answer was this: that his one and only daughter had been missing, potentially dead, the past 10 years.

It's not something anyone would understand unless they were put in a related situation; no, the exact same situation. Nobody knew the heartache of losing a child and not being able to find them unless they had experienced it themselves. And now that Mario might find out exactly what happened to his daughter, that she could possibly be dead, well, that was too much to bear."

"I don't know how I am expected to cope with this. My daughter could be held hostage in an animal cage somewhere. Or she could be buried 6 feet under. And I can't do a single thing."

____________________________________________________________________________________

The drive on the way to the hospital was neither short nor pleasant. As Tino drove as fast as he could, with his brother and their mother in the car, the air was thick and the car dead silent.

Tony rode in the back seat, wondering if he should say anything or just keep quiet. He was even careful how he breathed. A slight sigh could be heard in the seemingly muted car.

Isabella was riding in the passenger seat, her arms folded, and her nostrils flared. Her long dark hair wasn't freshly washed, she had on no makeup, and her eyes were puffy; all signs that she had been under too much stress to care about her personal appearance, which was not like Isabella at all.

"You could've picked up the phone when I first rang last night.," Isabella said, breaking the silence like shattering glass in a mirror.

Tino stared straight ahead at the road as he drove, and his face kept a serious look. "Mom, we had no idea. And we were busy. I told you that already."

"Your father has a mental breakdown and your too busy to pick up the freaking phone for the next 24 hours?!", Isabella screamed. She stared at Tino with a dead serious look, tears welling in her eyes. "Since when did we quit being a family?"

"Mom we've never quit being a family," Tony answered from the back seat.

"Oh really?" Isabella asked rhetorically. "Because the last time I checked, when me and your dad would call at an unpleasant time, one of you would make sure everything was okay, then would excuse yourselves. Now you just ignore us."

"Mom", Tino said calmly. "Trust me we're both sorry we didn't answer. But we weren't trying to ignore you all. This is the start of our careers, and we had a major break in the case yesterday. We've been up for over 24 hours now investigating. We planned on calling you as soon as we were done tonight."

Tony reached his hands over to his mom's shoulders, rubbing them gently. "Mama, we love you both very much. We're sorry. We can't even imagine what you've been going through alone."

"You're right, you can't", Isabella snapped. "I walked into our garage with your father having his heart racing, in cold sweats, and his blood pressure scary high and not knowing where he was. Do you know what that felt like? It scared the crap out of me. Then not being able to get a hold of our boys?"

"Mom, we're sorry," Tony repeated, feeling sick to think of his father could have been in an even worse state and they were so lucky he wasn't.

"Antonio, when was the last time you've talked to Vanessa?" their mother asked sharply.

Tony was taken aback. His mother never liked, nor talked, about Vanessa. And he was sure she would try to catch him in a trap. "Don't worry, I haven't even talked to Vanessa even longer than talking to you and dad," he reassured her.

"Don't you ever do that again," she warned him.

"What?" Tony asked confused, knowing how jealous his mother gets of her.

"As much as I don't like any girl my son has, you should never ignore her or anyone you care about."

Tony took a second to pause. He really wasn't for sure what to say. "Mom, me and Vanessa had a squabble about this once. But don't worry, we've come to an agreement. I try my best to always be with her, but she now understands now that I can't always be there."

Isabella took her hands and brushed Tony's off her shoulders.

"Pull over Valentino.," Isabella demanded.

"What?! Why?" Tino asked surprised.

"Because you boys are going to listen to me."

Tony pulled over to the side of the road, wondering what his mother was about to say. It was always so hard to tell. He looked at her, preparing himself to get chewed out. He knew from his mother's tone that it was about to happen.

Isabella moved in her seat to where she could look at both of her boys. "Now I might just be your mother, but you two need to listen to me. The whole time your father was a cop, he always made time for the people that was most important to him. And not answering any calls for over 24 hours when someone has called you at least 50 times...." Their mother paused, getting a dead serious look in her eyes again "that's something your father would have never done. And I know, you're not your father. And I know you're both adults, so don't try to remind me of that either. But when you ignore the people, you care about like you boys have been lately, then you are not acting like grown men. You're acting like selfish boys. And if you continue on that path then you are going to lose everyone you care about." Isabella stared Tony in the eyes." That means Vanessa." She then looked at Tony in the eyes. "That means your father." Isabella lastly looked between both of them. "And that means me. And you've already lost your sister, so you know what it feels like to lose someone. So, I suggest you two think about it."