One day I come home from school, I was in 6th grade, I was twelve years old.
It was towards the end of third grade for me.
I can kind of remember my mom telling us, like, right when she picked.
Us up from school, and I'm just sitting at the table.
My mom, you know, we start talking and she said, so we're probably gonna have to move soon.
Hey, we're moving, and tomorrow is your last day of school.
And I said, okay.
I told my friends, just real casual, like, I'm leaving, I'm moving.
Where are you going?
I don't know where I'm going, but this is my last day at school.
I remember just sitting there, like, I didn't know what to say.
And she sort of instructed me, this is what you have to tell people.
This is what it's going to be like.
We don't know where we're going to move yet.
We're going to have to change our last name, and we're going to need to do it in the next few days.
I didn't understand the full scope of what was going on at all.
I understood that we were leaving.
I didn't understand, like, not coming back.
It didn't hit me.
My mom explained to me that they were working for the government.