Sixteen Years I Didn’t Speak to My Mother. Then I Went Missing, and From Her Sickbed She Said “Go Find Her”

Collins,” she said.

“She’s with your mother right now.”

I was more frightened of that phone than I had been of my own wound in the truck.

I dialed, and Mrs.

Collins answered on the first ring, and the moment she heard my voice she started to cry and scold me in the same breath.

“Cora!

You impossible girl, you scared the life out of every one of us!” And then, softer: “Hold on.

Hold on, now.”