The Face on the Milk Carton

She was a mind floating in an ocean of confusion.

She had gradually changed her name. "Jane" was too dull. Last year, she'd added a "y", becoming Jayne, which had more personality.

I have no beliefs,” said her mother. “Only hopes.

The only evil is that I don't mind that it happened.

If she dreamed, she did not remember when she awoke.

I guess you've grown up anyway, Janie. Even with all the bricks I put on your head to keep you little.

She had a sense of herself being brain dead: running on tubes and machines.

It was like crawling on glass. No matter how firmly she resolved not to think such stupid things, she thought them.

Her parents kissed her on each side. Her mother took both her hands now and held them against her cheek, as if in prayer. “We tried everything to get Hannah out. We took her on long vacations, we sent her to live with my cousin in Atlanta, we tried traditional church. But she went to California to join the temple commune. There was nothing we could do. The law wasn’t on our side, Hannah wasn’t on our side. The cult even had armed bodyguards to keep parents like us from snatching our children back.

father knocked on her door. “Kitten? May I come