While I Was Stationed Overseas, My Family Sold My House—Or So They Thought

you, Maria,” he said, the words sounding hollow and late. “I know I never said it. But you’ve always been a damn good Marine.”

“I would have preferred it if you had just been a damn good father,” I said.

The sirens began to wail in the distance, a low, mourning sound that signaled the end of the life they had tried to build on the ruins of mine.

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