When Mila was five years old, her mother had taught her how to read. In fact, her mother had taught her absolutely everything she knew. Her mother had been her sole companion all her life. The housekeeper was forbidden to speak to Mila, although that didn’t matter. She found ways to make sure Mila understood their quiet friendship. She made Mila’s favorite dessert when Mila seemed sad. She prepared her favorite meals on special occasions without having to be asked, and every now and then, Mila would find a hand-made chocolate hidden beneath her pillow. This woman who did all the grocery and other shopping even tried to boost their meager acquaintance with the clothing she purchased on Mila’s behalf. Of course, Mila thought, her intentions were wasted, but they were still nice. She wished the woman spoke English, though. She couldn’t help Mila with her plot to escape, not really.

But she was going to help whether she knew it or not. Mila was counting on her leaving her purse on the kitchen counter long enough for Mila to steal money out of it. Sheltered though she was, Mila knew she would need money and lots of it. After her brother Michael had run off, he drained his trust fund, and their mother was so furious that she altered the terms of Mila’s inheritance. Now Mila would only receive money after her mother had passed away; this was just one of the many ways that Mila’s mother controlled her daughter’s life.

What else would she need? She read a book once where Nancy had proved someone’s identity using a birth certificate. She would need to get a hold of hers, but it was in the safe in her father’s—now her mother’s—study. And Mila did not know the combination. She had been thinking about this for months, possibly years, and last week when the gardener had come in from digging up a troublesome shrub, she had sneaked the crowbar from his tools and quietly took it upstairs. This she hid under the quilts with her precious friendly words, and waited for the moment she knew she could make her escape.

She had been patient all this time; she could wait a little while longer.

“God weeps for us even now,” her mother said melodramatically one night. They were seated across from one another at the highly polished chestnut dining table. Mei had just brought in the soup course, and Mila dipped her spoon in for a taste. The creamy cucumber soup tasted as good as mashed cucumbers could taste, and Mila ate it dutifully. Cold dishes were always her mother’s favorites.

“Those black clouds gathering on the horizon make me nervous,” Peggy Lee confided to her daughter as she sampled her soup. “Weather like this always shows God’s unhappiness with us, with our choices. Don’t you think so, Mila?”

Mila nodded, keeping her eyes on her cold, green soup.

“Hm,” her mother said, and Mila sat stock still, feeling numb as her mother’s gaze searched her. “You wouldn’t have any sins to confess, now, would you?”

“No, mother.” Not yet, anyway. Unless plotting was a sin. Mila wasn’t quite sure about that.

The main course came out and Mila cut her chicken as quietly as she could, and then chewed it even more quietly. In the distance the thunder rumbled through the sky. Mila looked out the tall picture windows in the dining room and watched the dark gray clouds begin to cry. The moisture soaked the greenery in their backyard, touching everything for as far as Mila could see.

“I despise the rain,” Peggy Lee sniffed distastefully. “Can’t see anything in it, makes everything all dirty and muddy… Isn’t it just awful, Mila?”

“Yes, mother,” Mila replied, but she didn’t think so secretly. Secretly she loved and cherished the rain. It was going to be her friend, she just knew it.

The storm raged on for hours after dinner and finally Mila’s mother went off to bed, urging her daughter along ahead of her. Mila changed into her nightgown, went and bade her mother goodnight, walked back to her room, and changed back into her clothes. This time she put on the jeans and tank top that Mei had bought for her. She stashed the money she’d stolen from Mei’s purse that morning in her pockets, and put on her black shoes with the flat heels. Her mother didn’t allow any sort of sports shoe, so Mila wasn’t sure how she was going to manage in the rain, but she was determined to make the attempt.

Carefully she pulled the crowbar from its hiding place along with her favorite Nancy Drew book. She replaced the window seat and turned out the light. She waited for a particularly vicious rumble of thunder before she opened her bedroom door and slipped out into the darkened hallway. No light came from under her mother’s door, and Mila could only hope that Peggy was already deep asleep. She sneaked downstairs to the study and quietly pushed the portrait away from the safe front. She wouldn’t get another chance at this, and she knew it. Mila raised the crowbar high above her head and waited. A flash of lightning and a thunderclap guided her hands straight down as she swung the tool against the heavy metal. It dented the dial with a clang, but otherwise did nothing. Mila’s heart thudded as she waited, certain her mother had heard and would be coming down the steps momentarily. But nothing happened. The only sounds were from the rainstorm outside. Mila breathed again.

She raised the crowbar once more and struck the safe as hard as she could. Six was her lucky number once again, and the dial collapsed under her concentrated efforts. She dropped the crowbar on the floor by her feet and pulled open the broken safe door.

Inside were a variety of envelopes and a few piles of cash. Mila’s heart thumped wildly as she pulled out the money and stuffed it into her jeans and her empty bra. Then she rummaged quickly through the papers. Life insurance, no; property deeds, no; and then there it was: an envelope marked birth certificates. She pulled it open and leafed through it quickly just as she heard a creak overhead.

Mila looked up, terrified. Her mother was moving around upstairs; she was going to be down here any second. Mila flipped past her mother’s and father’s birth certificate and grabbed the last one in the envelope. She hurriedly shoved the papers back into the safe, closed the broken door as quietly and quickly as possible, and pushed the painting back into place. She picked up the crowbar and made her way toward the door.

She slipped into the dark hallway and began her trek toward the kitchen and its salvation known as a back door. A creak on the staircase and the sound of a shuffling slipper made her turn and run. She said a silent prayer of thanks that the thick carpeting in the hall absorbed her running footfalls.

Her heart flew wildly around inside her chest as she reached the kitchen door. She twisted the handle and forced herself over the threshold, pulling the door shut quickly behind her. Then Mila crouched down in the cold and the rain, and ran across the side yard, toward the neighboring property. She had been thinking about this for years. The Carmaks had two large oak trees just on this side; she could see the tops of them over the dividing wood fence. Mila ran toward that fence with all she had, her feet slipping in the flimsy shoes that slid slickly over the wet grass. She reached the fence and threw the lip of the crowbar onto the top of the fence. Without it, she would have been too short, but with it, she was just able to pull herself to the top and swing one leg over the side. She dropped down into the neighbors’ yard just as the kitchen lights went on inside her house. Mila shrank back, clutching the crowbar till her skin threatened to assimilate it. She circled the largest oak tree and crouched down behind the trunk. She didn’t think her mother could see through the wood fence, but Mila didn’t dare let a single movement betray her, not now, not when she was almost free.

She crouched in the dark with the wind and the rain whipping her face for long minutes until the kitchen light was extinguished. Even then she sat a few minutes more, in case her mother was watching in the dark. Then, when she didn’t dare wait any longer, Mila ran, keeping low, across the Carmaks’ front yard and let herself silently out through their garden gate.

Her feet touched the sidewalk for the first time in years and Mila wanted to laugh and cry and scream with relief. Instead she forced herself to walk as quickly and confidently as she could down the street, across the corner, and off onto the side street she hoped would lead her into town. She’d walk all night if she had to; she was free, and there was no more potent energy booster than that.