After a moment, she asked, “Do you think she ever thinks about me?”
“I think she does,” I said. “I don’t think you forget a baby you carried.”
Lily nodded and moved on, but I saw her shoulders tense like she’d swallowed something sharp.
As she got older, she learned to answer people without shrinking. “It’s a birthmark,” she’d say. “No, it doesn’t hurt. Yes, I’m fine. Are you?” The older she got, the steadier her voice became.
“I want kids who feel different to see someone like me and know they’re not broken.”
At 16 she announced she wanted to be a doctor.
Thomas raised his eyebrows. “That’s a long road.”
“I know,” she said.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I like science,” she said, “and I want kids who feel different to see someone like me and know they’re not broken.”
She studied hard and got into college, then medical school. It was a long and difficult road, but our girl never gave up despite setbacks.
Then the letter came.
By the time she graduated, we were slowing down. More pills on the counter. More naps. More doctor appointments of our own. Lily called daily, visited weekly, and lectured me about salt like I was one of her patients. We thought we knew her whole story.
Then the letter came.
Plain white envelope. No stamp. No return address. Just “Margaret” written neatly on the front. Someone had put it in our mailbox by hand.
Inside were three pages.
When Lily was born, they saw the birthmark and called it a punishment.
