Black garbage bags hide. She has uncovered family photos, kid's art projects, broken devices, uneaten food, and soiled tissues—no decomposing flesh. Dru was found spilling out of one when the winter snow melted. Caylee's skull rolled out when the plastic could no longer stretch and tore. Women and girls are thrown out, easily overlooked as trash. Her car is parked on the side of the road. The phone's flashlight guides her down the steep bank. Light casting erratically from an unsteady hand. Could this be her daughter? Hope carries her ever forward. History and precarity tell her where to look.
Beth Vigoren was born and raised in rural Minnesota. She writes from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where she is pursuing her PhD as a first-generation student while raising her son as a single mother.