My name was Juliana Perry, and the parents listed on my household registration were absolutely not this woman.
Half-believing, half-doubting, Effie called the records office. The answer came back quickly.
My name was indeed Juliana Perry, and the woman standing before us was not my mother.
But even under Effie's razor-sharp stare, the woman insisted she was my birth mother.
"Sweetheart, I divorced your abusive, cheating father when you were three. I raised you all by myself."
"You can't change your surname just because that bastard promised to buy you a car and a house—you can't just throw your own mother away!"
"He's lying to you! Nobody in this world loves you more than your mother does!"
The woman sobbed through every word, then pulled out a DNA test—and it confirmed she really was my biological mother.
Only then did I remember. When I was little, my father had told me the woman living with us wasn't my real mother.
My birth mother was a gambling addict who'd gotten so desperate at the card table she tried to wager me as her stake.
My father couldn't stomach that kind of depravity. He divorced her, packed us up overnight, and cut her off completely.