Ava Maria

The truly horrifying nature of the situation did not occur to them until much later, when they had children of their own. Then, thinking of that little girl pained them almost beyond bearing, almost to the point of exterminating the thought. If memories could be erased like a mistaken tattoo, well.

But every now and again, something would remind them of her, a word, a photo, the surfacing of the copy of Alice in Wonderland they had purchased to entertain her the night that they babysat her. And then they would say, she must be 16 years old now, and, I wonder how she is doing -- not in a tone of curiosity, but with a shudder of grief for the childhood lost to neglect and paranoia, a shudder of grief for the inadequacy of their presence, so close as to almost touch her life, yet still, in the end, completely apart from her.