For several seconds, neither of us moved.
The dental clinic seemed impossibly quiet.
A television played somewhere behind the receptionist.
A child flipped through a magazine.
A printer hummed.
But all I could hear was my heartbeat.
The woman near the window looked exactly like me.
Not perfectly.
Ten years had changed both of us.
Her hair was shorter.
There was a faint scar near her temple.
Her face was thinner.
Her shoulders seemed permanently tense.
But the eyes were Evelyn’s.
My eyes.
Our mother’s eyes.
She took one step toward me.
I stepped backward.
Pain crossed her face.
“Rachel.”
“Don’t.”
She stopped.
“I understand.”
“No, you don’t.”
My voice shook.
“I buried you.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“I know.”
“I stood beside your coffin.”
“I know.”
“Mom collapsed at your funeral.”
Evelyn covered her mouth.
I continued.
“Dad stopped speaking for weeks.”
“I know.”
“How could you know?”
She lowered her hand.
“Because I found the obituary years later.”
My stomach twisted.
“You found your own obituary?”
“Yes.”
The receptionist glanced toward us.
I realized everyone could hear.
Evelyn noticed too.
“Can we leave?”
I almost laughed.
“You need me to drive you?”
“The dentist gave me medication.”
“Where do you live?”
“About fifteen minutes away.”
I stared at her.
She had a home.
A life.
An address.
For ten years.
“Fine.”
The word came out colder than I intended.
I signed the discharge form because the clinic required an adult driver.
Seeing my name beside hers made my hands shake.
Rachel Morgan.
Emergency contact for Evelyn Morgan.
Morgan was our birth surname.
She had kept it.
Outside, Evelyn walked slowly.
I unlocked my car.
She hesitated before getting in.
I drove without speaking.
She gave directions.
Left.
Right.
Straight.
Another right.
Finally, we reached a modest apartment building.
She lived on the third floor.
Inside, the apartment was clean but sparse.
Books.
A couch.
A small table.
Several plants near the window.
No family photographs.
No evidence of the ten years I had missed.
Evelyn sat carefully.
I remained standing.
“Start talking.”
She looked at me.
“I don’t know where to start.”
“The night you died.”
She flinched.
“Okay.”
I crossed my arms.
She took a breath.
“I wasn’t in the car when it crashed.”
That answer should have been obvious.
Still, hearing it made my skin crawl.
“Then who was?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No.”
“I expect you to let me explain.”
“Then explain.”
Evelyn looked down at her hands.
“That night, I was supposed to drive home from Charlotte.”
I remembered.
She had attended a friend’s engagement party.
Her car went off the road shortly after midnight.
“At a gas station outside Asheville, I stopped because I felt sick.”
“Sick?”
“Dizzy.”
“Nauseous.”
“My vision kept blurring.”
I frowned.
“Were you drinking?”
“One glass of wine at dinner.”
“Nothing else?”
