Michael said Emily was being dramatic before he even looked at her.
That was the part I kept hearing later, after the hospital lights and the forms and the voices of strangers finally became one long blur.
Before he saw how pale she was.
Before he noticed the sweat on the back of her neck.
Before he heard the broken little sound she made every time her stomach tightened.
He had already decided what kind of girl she was going to be in his version of the story.
Dramatic.
Difficult.
Too sensitive.
Just like me.
It was 3:18 a.m., and my fifteen-year-old daughter was folded over our bathroom sink with her forehead pressed against the cold porcelain.
The air smelled like bleach because I had scrubbed the tile that morning, trying to clean away the smell of vomit that had been creeping through the hallway for almost three days.
Under the bleach was something sour and hot and wrong.
