At 13, I was so poor, I never had lunch. A classmate noticed and started bringing me food every day. That same year, she vanished without a word, and I never saw her again. Fifteen years later, working at the police station as an investigator, I froze when I saw her name on the schedule for questioning: Lena Rivera. When she walked in, my heart stopped. Same kind eyes, but older now, shadowed, carrying years of pain. For a moment, recognition lit her face, but then she quickly looked away, her shoulders tense.
I opened the file, my stomach churning. She was listed as a suspect in a human trafficking investigation. My mind rebelled — Lena, the girl who once shared her only sandwich with me when I had nothing? Impossible. I asked her to sit, and when our eyes finally met, she mouthed silently: “Help me.” A chill ran down my spine. I glanced at the officer behind the glass; he hadn’t noticed.
I cleared my throat and began the questioning like normal, but my hands trembled under the desk. s she answered, I realized something: her statements were careful, rehearsed. She wasn’t hiding guilt — she was hiding fear. Her every word was laced with caution, as if someone outside the room was listening.
Then she slipped me a folded napkin from her pocket while pretending to cough. Inside, scribbled in shaky handwriting, were three words that made my blood run cold: “They own me.” I had two choices — follow protocol and risk handing her back to the people who controlled her, or break every rule I’d sworn to uphold and find a way to protect the girl who once saved me from hunger.