My family was eating dinner in the dining room when I got home, giving me the perfect opportunity to sneak upstairs and into my room without running into anybody. I just wanted to be alone.

I started to sob the moment my body hit my bed.

I cried for a long while, until I eventually fell asleep, only waking up sometime late in the night when I heard a gentle knock on my door.

My mom stepped into my room. “Dorothy?” she asked. “I didn’t hear you come home.”

I could barely make out her figure in the darkness. She was wearing her pajamas, so I supposed she must have...