Lili is wedded to a good man, which makes her think the system works. If she can have a happy marriage, anyone can. Any wife who can’t make her husband happy is responsible for her own misfortune.

When I lived here, I didn’t think the way she did, but I didn’t fight her logic hard enough.

The temptation to tell her that her mother’s closed-casket funeral was an utter sham because she was one of those women flits through my mind like a butterfly with razor-sharp wings. Finding out your mother didn’t die but left you, it’s not a cut I’m willing to make.

“I did meet another Colonia woman outside.” I look up from my open hem.

All eyes are on me. They’re living in a mirror world I used to fit into. Dario forced me to choose between a free life with him and a free life without. He taught me how to drive a car, how to talk to men without fear, how to use a cell phone.

Fingertip on the table, I tap out the shape of his number.

“She could do anything she wanted.” Subtly, I make the shape again with a crisscross of lines… like embroidery. I could thread the lines between the numbers and I’d know exactly what to dial. “She had her own apartment.” An arrow at the beginning and a French knot at the end. “Her own money. She took the subway places.”

They all speak at once. I barely hear them, because the phone keypad appears before my eyes with the tiny letters at the bottom of each button.

“But the men…”

“Outsiders…”

“Did they use her…”

“They’re animals…”

Only Denise doesn’t engage in the mythology that Colonia men are any better than outsiders.

“Good riddance,” Lili insists, silencing the others. “It can’t be that great if you escaped.”

Escaped? Is that what they’re saying about me? It’s completely false. The rest of the girls are the ones who escaped. They live on a tropical island. They have jobs and phones and freedom. I’m the one who’s trapped.

“She was rescued,” Amara snaps as if the idea of me doing something myself is ridiculous.

Ginny’s eyes go wide as she asks me about the mythology of my rescue. “Sergio Agosti said he had to shoot Lucari four times just to get him down.”

The story is so clean and clear it’s no wonder it has spread like an infection. Sergio beat Dario and rescued me. Sergio’s the hero. Dario’s conquered.

I open the pocket hem, wondering how much hidden embroidery I can fit in there. One word per shape.

“Imagine being married to that,” Ginny adds, sounding a little impressed.

“I’m sure Massimo will annul that for you.” Lili faces me. “I’m sure he’ll set you free of that monster.”

I clear the terror from my throat. If the marriage is annulled, they’re free to kill Dario.

Again, I make a monumental physical effort to keep the truth behind my lips, thinking nothing, feeling less. I’m a hollow shell with the picture of a phone keypad painted inside me.