Aimee

Aimee showed up hemoraging from the abortion she attempted with OTC drugs, barely eighteen, and one month out of an orphanage. She was two months pregnant. She doesn't dare talk about it, because in her culture she should be killed if anyone found out that she had been expecting. But behind her wall of fearful silence is the reality that someone fathered that child before she left a girl's orphanage. Was it because she was a refugee that she was raped?

Was this some escapade of her own invention?

The fact that she's a refugee because she was fleeing murder at the hands of her cousin adds to her current insecurity. Orphaned early, she was living in Dubai with her aunt, but returned to native Somalia when this kind woman also passed on. Not knowing that she needed to arrive in a certain type of burka to protect her life, she ended up loosing all chance to connect with her extended family forever.

We placed Aimee with another single mother. She was glad of a friend. They have pledged to look out for each other.

But yesterday Aimee disappeared.

We can only pray she will come back.