And now I was thirty-six, and pregnant with a daughter of my own, and I had finally decided to drive home and end sixteen years of silence.

I packed clothes and water and my old field-medical backpack into the truck, and before I pulled out I put my hand on my belly.

“We’re going to go meet your grandmother,” I told her.

Chapter 5 — The Tire Tracks

The last stretch of the drive ran along a rural road that days of heavy rain had chewed half to pieces.

Near sunset, I came around a bend and found an enormous fallen tree lying clean across it.