I saw the photograph of my mother again.
Liam brought it to me. The stains were gone, and it looked exactly as it had on the day I took it.
"Mia, I didn't know it meant this much to you. I'm sorry. But look, I had it restored. It's just the way it was."
I looked at the photograph, and a hot ache pressed behind my eyes. My fingertips moved slowly across the face of the woman in the picture, and inside me I apologized, again and again.
'I'm sorry, Mama. I couldn't keep this safe. I let it be defiled.'
The seven days came back to me. My mother letting those men do whatever they wanted to her, only to win a little dry bread and water so I could stay alive. And then she had starved to death in the dark.
I was useless. I was nothing.
A wave of self-loathing rose with the pain that ate at
