MY STEPFATHER BROKE DOWN MY DOOR AT 2 A.M. — UNTIL ONE TAP UNDER MY KITCHEN TABLE TURNED HIS RAGE INTO TERROR

Chapter 2

The phone was six feet away, and my body was a machine that had stopped taking instructions.

I measured the distance again anyway, the way I had been trained to measure: reach without stretching, breathe on the count, protect the airway, minimize movement that would open the shoulder further. My training had a voice, and the voice sounded like a corpsman I once knew, calmly telling a nineteen-year-old that he was going to be fine because he was going to do exactly what she said.

There is no fine, I thought. There is only the next six inches.