She promised herself she would not stop. If the hospital files and insurance records wouldn’t give her answers, she would dig deeper. Somewhere, hidden in the folds of forgotten history, the scar’s story was waiting. And she intended to find it—no matter what it revealed.
Linda pulled out a shoebox of printed photographs from her teenage years, flipping through images of beaches and pool parties. In each one, she scrutinized her abdomen. Smooth skin, unbroken by lines. The absence of anything stung as fresh evidence. The scar was not a trick of memory—it was undeniably new.