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window. “Look, look.” Her voice sounded less beaten.
    Near the back of the RV, a little girl, about six years old, hopped barefoot in the knee-high grass. Her blond hair glowed golden in the dawn sunlight, fanning out in all directions, and her white T-shirt collar stretched halfway down her chest. A moment later she stopped bouncing, rubbed her eyes and smiled at the woman who stepped out of the RV.
    Emily's mother trembled, rattling the ice cubes around the glass. Outside, the woman lifted the girl as they both laughed. After she set down the child, they bounced a red ball to each other.
    Emily 's mother banged the glass on the table. “Why did this happen to us? Why do they get to enjoy today?”
    Emily stared at the floor, searching for the right thing to say. Her mother watched the street often, as if she waited for someone. Maybe she expected Emily 's father to walk through the park. Perhaps she saw squealing children and laughing parents, and imagined herself as one of them—complete.
    Her mother banged the glass again.
    “Mom?” Emily leaned back as her mother raised the glass. When the bottom of her hand came down, a shrill pop reverberated inside the dining room. Glass shards shot outward, sprinkling across the table and falling to the floor. Emily leapt forward and grabbed her mother's wrist. “You're bleeding.” She squeezed her fingers under her mother's grip. “Open your hand, Mom. Let go.”
    Then her mother 's eyes seemed to sink into her face. Her jaw quivered as if she wanted to speak. Now Emily's eyes watered from the pungent smell—burnt diesel fuel. An ancient, green military transport, something she thought only existed in history books, idled in front of the house.
    “ They're early,” her mother said. Her voice was low, almost inaudible.
    “ And they can wait.” Emily dug her fingers into her mother's closed fist and pried open the death grip. Blood-laced shards clinked on the floor. “The kitchen,” Emily said. She tugged at her mother's wrist, but she didn't budge. “You need a bandage. The hell with them.” Emily pulled harder, and this time her mother's feet inched forward, appearing to surrender to an instinct that wanted to maintain balance. In the kitchen, Emily flipped the faucet handle upward and guided her mother's hand under the spray. A threadlike string of blood slithered out of the gash.
    Then the first booming knock came. Sprinkles of ceiling tile snowed on the carpet. The windows rattled.
    Her mother's pinkish hue faded. “They're going to steal you away.”
    Emily 's knees wobbled, knocking into each other. Stay focused . She grabbed a clean dishcloth, placed it in her mother's palm and squeezed shut her hand.
    The knock came again. Emily gently released her mother and walked to the door.
    Where did three months go?

 
     
    He stood in the doorway, a young man of maybe twenty, Hispanic, not a wrinkle in his fatigues or a hair of stubble on his face. A black band etched with the letters MP adorned his right arm. Patched above his left pocket was his name, Vasquez. A blond-haired male MP, Douglas, lingered to the side and tapped his fingers against his belt, beside the handle o f a black pistol. A shadow soon crept over Emily until she felt the touch of her mother.
    Vazquez lifted a clipboard below his nose. “Emily Heath?”
    Emily swallowed hard. “Yes.”
    He spun the clipboard around and showed her a copy of the consent form she had signed in Washington. “Do you concur this is your signature?”
    Emily 's tongue crawled into the back of her throat, and she pushed her chin down to avoid choking.
    Vasquez nodded, apparently taking that as a Yes . “Do you agree that, although you may have been under a level of duress, you were of sound mind when you signed this form?”
    Emily turned to her mother. Level of duress ? she thought. Is he joking?
    “ No,” her mother said. “She was scared. She didn't get a chance to talk to someone beforehand.”
    Emily didn