“Come get your worthless daughter and take her back,” my mother-in-law shouted my father as I lay broken at the bottom of the stairs after my husband shoved me down. “Your family will answer for it if she has even a scratch,” was the sole warning Dad offered her. They had no notion who my father really was, so they made fun of him.

You sent a letter?I asked, confused.

“No,” Dad said, quietly.

“Then who did write it?“I sucked in my breath.

Dad reached into the pocket of his coat, took out a clear photograph and put it face up on my hospital blanket.

The picture was of a plain white envelope on the dark hardwood floor, right next to the bottom stair of my house.

The edge of the paper was a little smudged, but the name was perfectly legible.

Rachel Callahan.