The Record Keeper

“We landed on the Spanish island of Majorca. Here it registered to Frank and me that we were a long way from nowhere and the message was clear—if you scream, no one will hear you. By design and decision, we had been separated from our identify, from the only thing that linked us to something beyond ourselves. A birth certificate. The effect on both of us was profound. We did not know who we were, and more importantly, we didn’t know whose w were—forever proving that identify precedes purpose. Before you’re rescued, you first have to be lost, and to be lost you have to be someone. We had become unborn.”

“In the years since, I’ve come to understand, no know, through the hundreds of people I’ve rescued, that nothing matters more than a name. It’s why it’s always been the first thing I’ve asked them. Because no matter what they’ve endured, a name can call them back out. When you’re in slavery, nothing matters more than a name. A name is the singular ting that separates us from the ninety-nine. A name makes us the one. Without a name, there is no record.”