At 20 years old, Emily found herself in a situation she never imagined. A quiet girl from a working-class family in Bakersfield, California, she was studying accounting at a local community college while helping support her family. Her mother worked long hours as a waitress at a diner, ever since Emily’s father passed away when she was thirteen. Emily had always been the responsible one—studious, kind, never the source of worry.
That summer, everything changed.
