Son Locks Mom in Cellar & Goes on a Date, He Receives Call From Hospital Later – Story of the Day

Kyle, upset over his mother's grounding before a date, locks her in the basement. But an urgent hospital call interrupts his date, forcing Kyle to confront the life-changing consequences of his selfish actions.

Kyle was fixing his hair in the bathroom when Mom entered.

"You look nice! Going somewhere?"

"It's a date," Kyle replied and turned to leave, but Mom stopped him, eager for every detail of the girl he was dating.

Her jaw dropped when Kyle revealed he was going out with a nerd because he wanted good grades in his Social Science project. Without her help, he would fail.

Mom was furious when Kyle said he didn't even know the girl's name.

"The ends here don't justify the means, Kyle!" she said. "You can't do this!"

Kyle marched to his bedroom and shut the door to mute Mom's rant. But Mom kept banging on the door until he opened it.

"Look, Mom, you told me I needed to graduate with good grades or else I wouldn't get a new car!"

"Well," Mom crossed her arms. "I was going to reward you for the hard work and effort you were supposed to put into studying to get those grades. But that's not the case here! You're grounded for the rest of the month, Kyle!"

"What? You can't do that! The project is due next week!"

"And now you'll have enough time to finish it, won't you?"

Kyle was furious as Mom walked away. He saw her going to the basement and locked her there. Then Kyle ran to her bedroom and took money from her pocketbook to pay for his date and bus fare. He knew Mom would be mad, but it would all be worth it on graduation day.

At the coffee shop, Kyle was regretting the date. He was so relieved when his phone rang. "Hi there!" he answered brightly.

But blood drained off Kyle's face when the caller introduced herself as Nurse Patty and said Mom had had a heart attack. A neighbor had visited Mom for milk and heard her cry for help. She'd found Mom unconscious in the basement and called the ambulance.

"Your mother is lucky. If the paramedics had arrived just a few minutes later, it would be too late…" Kyle listened in horror as Nurse Patty revealed Mom needed surgery, which cost about $100,000. But Mom didn't have insurance. "So, how soon can you get down here to discuss details with the doctor?"

Kyle froze. He didn't even know Mom had heart problems. He told Nurse Patty he'd go home first, then visit the hospital.

Kyle ended the date abruptly and rushed home. As he arrived, he raced to Mom's room and took out the envelope where she kept her money. But it was empty.

Kyle guessed Mom would've deposited the money in her bank account. He spotted her phone on the nightstand and called the bank's number, only to learn she had used the money to pay for his college.

Kyle was devastated. He didn't know how to arrange money for her surgery until…he thought of the online gaming tournament with a huge cash prize. But it only started in a month.

Kyle didn't have enough followers on social media to make money as an influencer. Even if he worked as a waiter at his friend's aunt's cafe, it would take ages to earn the money he needed.

Kyle noticed his PC and had an idea. He packed it into a bag along with the action figure his friend had given him for his birthday. Kyle then searched the house for more valuables. He packed everything, including antique silver candlesticks and porcelain figurines Mom had inherited, in a tote bag.

Kyle took everything to a pawnshop.

"Only $17,000? I need $100,000!" he told the man at the pawnshop.

The man threw back his head and laughed. "Son, you've got some nice items here, but nobody's going to give you 100k for them!" Kyle didn't have an option, so he sold the items and took the money.

Dejected, Kyle left the shop. But the antique shop across the street gave him an idea. He found the number he had not used for years and called Dad.

Kyle felt out of place as he entered the bar where he was supposed to meet Dad. When he was just 11, he had been woken by the sound of his parents arguing. He'd tiptoed to the sitting room door and listened in shock as Mom told Dad she was filing for divorce.

"I won't stay married to a thief!" Mom had hissed. "And if you ever think of contesting the divorce, I'll tell the police everything!"

After that day, Kyle never saw Dad again. But now, he spotted him at a table, and Dad looked like hell.

"Kyle! Look at you, all grown up!" Dad stood to hug him.

"Mom's in hospital, Dad," he said. "I want to…rob the antique store on 2nd Avenue."

"What? No, Kyle!" Dad shook his head. "After your mother kicked me out…I couldn't bring myself to steal anything! Sure, the money was good, but it meant nothing to me without family."

"But Dad, Mom needs $100,000 for heart bypass surgery, and I've tried everything I can think of to raise the money! Please! If you don't help me, I'll do it myself!"

"No, you won't!" Dad glared at him. "The cops will catch a greenhorn like you…Fine! I'll help you only if you swear you'll never rob again after this and that you'll follow my directions exactly."

After Kyle agreed to Dad's condition, they drove to 2nd Avenue and parked across from the antique shop.

"All we need to do is break the windows and take everything in the display," Kyle said.

"An easy ticket to jail, yeah. You don't just walk into stores and rob them or smash the windows and steal the display items," Dad said. "We've got to see what the security setup is like, the employees' routines...I shouldn't be telling you all this. Your mom would kill me...might kill me anyhow when she finds out about this."

"Only if she's still alive," Kyle snapped. "Can you please just focus?"

Dad sighed. "You wait in the car. I'm going in to check the place out."

When Dad returned, Kyle listened carefully to the plan he laid out. That evening, they lurked in the alleyway near the store. They wore gloves to prevent leaving fingerprints and had ski masks to cover their faces. Dad carried a backpack filled with tools. They watched as the antique store owner exited the store with a young woman and locked up.

Kyle kept watch while Dad picked the lock. Soon, they were creeping into the antique store. They each had a large duffle bag, which they started filling with various items packed out on the store's shelves.

Dad and Kyle were busy on opposite sides of the store when the sound of a key jiggling in the lock startled Kyle. He glanced at the door, spotted a man's silhouette there, and then turned to Dad. Dad was ducking behind the counter, and he beckoned Kyle to join him.

Kyle glanced back at the door. The man appeared to be struggling with something, so he quickly scurried over to join Dad. He crouched as low to the floor as he could and barely dared to breathe as he heard the door open.

"... makes no sense at all. I'm sure I locked that door," the shopkeeper mumbled. "What a stroke of luck that I forgot my hat."

Footsteps rapidly approached the counter. Kyle stared at Dad in terror. Dad raised a finger to his mouth to signal silence.

"That's not right..." the shopkeeper's footsteps sped up.

Kyle turned just as the shopkeeper rounded the end of the counter behind him. He locked eyes with the older man and saw his shock turn to fear as he processed the sight of two people dressed in dark clothes and ski masks hiding behind his counter.

"Stop him!" Dad yelled as the shopkeeper reached under the counter.

But Kyle was frozen in place. The sound of an alarm going off in the shop snapped him out of it. He stood and stared in shock at the security grille lowering over the front part of the store.

Dad sped past him and rammed into the shopkeeper. The man let out a cry and fell to the floor.

"We have to go now!" Dad shouted. He held his loot bag tightly and raced to the door.

Kyle grabbed his bag and ran after Dad. But the shopkeeper grabbed his ankle.

Dad was crouching under the security grille with his loot. He dropped his bag on the sidewalk and then grabbed the bottom of the grille. Dad let out a harsh cry as he tried to stop the grille from lowering any further.

Kyle eventually scrambled away from the old man and raced for the door. He threw himself to the floor, but the gap was already too narrow. The grille slammed shut in front of his face.

"Hang on, son, I'll get you out." Dad removed a crowbar from his backpack and tried to break the grille. Suddenly, he froze. He lowered the crowbar as he turned to his right. The police sirens became audible to Kyle. Dad grabbed his loot bag and ran away.

"Dad!" he screamed, but Dad was gone. Kyle was arrested.

Kyle sat in the interrogation room with his head hung low.

"You're old enough to be tried as an adult," the detective informed him. "And they will find you guilty. But…the State would rather not waste time on you when we know from the shopkeeper's statement that it was your accomplice who assaulted him.

"He's the one we want to put away, so we're willing to offer you a deal. We know about your mom...In fact, with her weak heart, the stress of finding out her son has been arrested could have a serious impact on her health..."

"You can't tell her!" Kyle pleaded.

"She'll have to find out sooner or later unless...if you accept the State's deal and give up your accomplice, you'll be listed as a witness in the case. And…the shopkeeper is offering a sizable reward for one of the stolen items," he continued.

"If you helped us catch your accomplice, I could probably convince him to award it to you. You'd easily be able to pay the hospital then."

Kyle squeezed his eyes shut. He thought of Mom and how he had played a role in her heart attack. Then he remembered Dad fighting to break the security grille so he could escape the store. But then Dad had left him. Mom would never have done that.

"I'll accept the deal," Kyle said. Tears stung his eyes as he looked at the detective. "I'll tell you everything you need to know."

One week later…

Kyle paced the length of the empty hospital corridor. He still battled with the guilt of snitching on Dad, but he'd had to do whatever was necessary to save Mom.

The police released Kyle soon after he told them everything they wanted to know about Dad. Kyle knew they'd caught him because he got the reward money the next day.

The swinging door leading to the surgical theaters opened, and Mom's doctor appeared. Kyle rushed forward to meet him, but the grave expression on the doctor's face stopped him in his tracks.

"I'm sorry, Kyle. We did everything we could to save your mother, but…her heart failed during the procedure. She didn't make it."

"The ends don't justify the means," Mom's words echoed in Kyle's head.

There was no doubt Mom's life had been worth fighting for to the bitter end, but he'd done terrible things along the way. He'd have to live with the guilt of that and the pain of losing Mom.

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