Vera unfolded the paper. It was a drawing. Stick figures: a tall man, a woman with red nails, a small girl. Above them, a crayon sun, bright yellow and fierce. But the man had no mouth. The woman had no eyes. And the girl was standing alone, on the other side of a thick, black line.
"Don't tell me about cruelty," she replied, and the words felt good, like scratching a mosquito bite until it bled.
"Not now, filha," Vera had snapped, her voice a serrated blade. "Go to your room."