My family locked me in the basement to give birth. Days later, they returned to find a dark red liquid seeping from the door. As my mother screamed, a voice whispered behind her, “Looking for me?”

us?”

I didn’t dignify the absurdity of her victimhood with an immediate answer. I placed my right hand firmly over my lower abdomen, a quiet reassurance to the life surviving within me. “We survived,” I said softly. “Now, we are going to relocate to the living room. We are going to have a civilized conversation.”

The transition from the dank cellar to continue reading …