As I hurried toward the elevator, the receptionist gently warned me that even if the woman was my mother, she might not recognize me. I barely heard her. When I reached the third floor, I saw the older couple through the narrow window in room 318. The woman’s green dress was wrinkled, and her husband looked exhausted. They stood beside a hospital bed, watching someone beneath a white blanket. I pushed open the door, clutching the plastic bag. The woman noticed the ring immediately. “That ring,” she whispered.

I stepped between them and the bed, demanding to know where they had gotten it and what they had done to my mother. The man raised his hands, asking me to lower my voice because the patient needed rest. Then I looked down at the bed. Every angry word disappeared. It was my mother. Evelyn lay pale and fragile, with an IV taped to her hand and her gray hair spread across the pillow. “Mom?” I whispered, gripping the bedrail. Before I could ask another question, the woman began crying. “We didn’t hurt her,” she said. “We found her.”