THE TRUNK

She slept in a room that wasn’t hers. Cried into the only thing that was

She was five when they left the grand house. She packed her belongings with pride into a brand-new wicker trunk, surrounded by the nurse, the maid, the nanny, the women who had raised her while her mother practiced being adored.

She smiled through their tears. Boarded the ship. America was waiting.

The voyage was too short to get used to the waves, too long to keep her excitement boxed in. She explored the decks, imagined adventures. She was told her father would greet them, but instead came a telegram. He had returned home for an emergency.

The message carried instructions: where to go, who to meet. A new address. A new name.

Her uncle met them with a handshake too firm and a mouth too sharp. He spoke quickly, weaving a story, but all she heard was, We have lost everything.

She didn’t understand what that meant until they reached the room for rent. It smelled of cabbage and regret. There were no servants, no music. The dresses never came. Her big-girl room became a mattress in the corner, a curtain for a door.

Her mother didn’t cry. Not once.

But she did. Quietly. Every night.
Into her trunk.
Until the day she no longer fit inside it.