“Your period. Blood,” he said pointing to his own crotch, hidden beneath a white coat. At the mention of blood, all of mine rushed to my face and I lowered my head.

“I’m sorry,” he said, but I was still mortified. “I have to ask.”

I wish it could have ended there. Stripped bare by a barrage of questions, I was then handed a thin cotton gown and told to undress. The doctor left the room. Ann motioned for me to remove my clothing. When I hesitated, she stood up. Reluctantly, I did as I was told, knowing that only Ann could get me to Tilly.

The doctor returned and began his examination. He placed the cold bell of his stethoscope on my chest and my back and peered into my ears and mouth with a scope. He tapped on my knees and elbows with a rubber hammer and then instructed me to lie down.

I looked to Ann. She pointed first to my head and then to one end of the exam table. The doctor put two hands on my belly, one on top of the other, and pressed down, moving a couple of inches at a time. I wondered if he thought I’d hidden something inside my abdomen. Then he moved to the end of the bed and said he needed to look at something.

I was almost certain he’d said the word “gentle,” so I thought everything would be okay. He lifted my gown and I brought it back down with my two hands, pulling my knees up to my chest and trying to sit on the table. I looked to Ann, who hadn’t moved from her seat, as if she’d known all along what this doctor was going to do.

“Has anyone hurt you there?” he asked.

“You, no!” I shouted, hot and angry that he would dare to look down there. I could not bear it. “You, no!”

You know, he had heard. You know.

He looked at Ann, who pressed her lips together in the first display of real sympathy I’d seen from her. They looked unsurprised, as if they’d been hoping for a different answer.

I was told to dress, but then made to urinate into a cup. They tied a rubber band around my arm and drew blood. The doctor handed me a lollipop and patted my shoulder. I jerked away from him, and he and Ann exchanged another resigned look.

“At least she’s safe now,” the doctor said once I was dressed. She thanked the doctor and led me back into the twist of hallways.

“Tilly. Where Tilly is?” I said when I realized we were exiting the hospital.

“Not here,” Ann said, and my amorphous feelings about her gelled into something very close to hate.