I’ve been in a wheelchair for 20 years, believing I was a burden. Yesterday I came home early from work and heard my mother laughing as she said, ‘She doesn’t know yet’.

I approached them. I stopped right in the center of the rug, in front of the three of them. “Mom, Dad, Emily… I had a really strange dream today. I dreamt I could walk. I dreamt that all of this”—I pointed to my chair—”was a lie.”

I saw them tense up. Emily exchanged a quick glance with my mother. “Oh, honey, you know those dreams are normal,” my mother said in her sweet, venomous tone. “It’s your subconscious wishing for impossible things. Take your medicine and go get some rest; you’re agitated.”

My father took the bottle of pills from his pocket. He always carried it with him. “Here,” he said, handing out two blue capsules. “They’ll help you sleep.”

I looked at the pills. Then I looked at them. At the people who gave me life and then took it away. “No,” I said. “What?” my mother asked, her smile faltering. “I said no. I don’t want to sleep. I want to walk.”

I placed my hands on the armrests of the chair. I felt the trembling in my arms, the weakness in my legs, but I also felt the fury. Fury is a powerful fuel. “Amelia, what are you doing?” my father asked, standing up, alarmed. “You’re going to hurt yourself!”