I know it is only fiction, but it is hard to witness, nevertheless, and their stories get under my skin. Is it because I experienced the same, albeit only briefly? No running water, no sanitation, no heat, and the shame of it. It’s all there in those stories. He tells me to forget it, to not revisit it, that it was a long time ago. And it was, but it is never far away and my fear of its returning is ever present.
