Chapter 2 - The Girl Who Wasn't There
I don't remember falling.
I remember the floor.
Cold tile against my cheek.
Laura shouting my name from far away.
Vale kneeling beside me.
And Sonia standing halfway down the stairs.
Watching.
Always watching.
When I opened my eyes again, I was on the sofa.
Morning light had started leaking through the curtains.
Vale sat in an armchair across from me.
Laura stood by the window holding untouched coffee.
I turned my head.
“Sonia?”
Laura's shoulders tightened.
I closed my eyes.
“She's gone.”
Neither answered.
“I mean right now.”
“Yes,” Vale said.
I looked at him.
“You don't see her.”
“No.”
“Laura doesn't.”
“No.”
“But I do.”
“Yes.”
I rubbed my face.
“And yesterday morning?”
“You were alone in the car.”
My chest hurt.
“Did you follow me?”
Laura answered.
“The first few times.”
“How long have I been doing this?”
“Eight months.”
I laughed weakly.
“Eight months.”
“You stopped for a while when your medication changed.”
“My sleeping pill?”
“Partly.”
I reached into my trousers.
The tablet I had pretended to swallow was still in my pocket.
I placed it on the coffee table.
Vale stared at it.
“You didn't take it.”
“I wanted to catch you.”
He leaned back.
“That explains why tonight developed differently.”
“Different from what?”
Vale glanced at Laura.
I noticed.
“What?”
“Usually,” he said, “your episodes begin between twelve forty and one thirty.”
My mouth went dry.
“Usually you leave the bedroom before I arrive.”
“And come back.”
“Yes.”
“Like the video.”
“Yes.”
I stared at the pill.
“So Sonia sees me.”
Laura's fingers tightened around her mug.
“Maybe.”
“She said a man enters our room.”
Neither corrected me.
“She said he walks slowly. He carries something.”
I looked at Vale.
“What do I carry?”
“We don't know.”
“You showed me a video.”
“The camera only covers the bedroom.”
“Then put one in the hallway.”
Laura looked at me.
“We did.”
That frightened me.
“And?”
She didn't answer.
Vale did.
“You removed it.”
“When?”
“During an episode.”
“I don't remember.”
“We know.”
I stood.
My legs felt weak.
“How convenient.”
Laura turned.
“Don't.”
“What?”
“Don't make this into a conspiracy.”
I laughed.
“You tell me our daughter is dead, my job is gone, I attack you in my sleep, and there's a neurologist sneaking into our bedroom while I’m unconscious. What would you call it?”
“Hell,” she said.
The word shut me up.
Laura put the coffee down.
“I would call it hell.”
Her voice had changed.
No fear.
No gentleness.
Just exhaustion.
“Do you know what it's like waking up next to someone you love and not knowing which version will open his eyes?”
I stared at her.
“Do you know what it's like hearing you ask Sonia what she wants for breakfast?”
She wiped her face angrily.
“Watching you pour orange juice into an empty glass?”
I looked toward the kitchen.
“No.”
“Seeing you open the car door for her?”
“Stop.”
“Setting three plates for dinner?”
“Laura.”
“Laughing at things nobody said?”
“Stop.”
“I lost my daughter too!”
Her scream cracked through the room.
Then she broke.
Not elegantly.
Not quietly.
She folded forward, both hands pressed to her face, and sobbed.
“I lost her too.”
I couldn't move.
“I lost my little girl, and then I lost you while you were still standing in front of me.”
I took a step.
She moved backward.
That reflex.
Again.
I stopped.
Laura noticed.
The two of us stood there with years between us.
I whispered, “Why didn't you leave?”
She looked at me.
“I tried.”
My stomach twisted.
“Twice.”
“What happened?”
“The first time you found the suitcase.”
I waited.
“You cried. You begged me not to leave. You were yourself.”
She swallowed.
“So I stayed.”
“And the second?”
She looked away.
Vale answered.
“You broke her wrist.”
I stared at Laura's left hand.
I had seen the faint scar.
She told me she'd slipped in the garden.
“You said you fell.”
“I did.”
She looked at me.
“After you pushed me.”
Something inside me wanted to defend itself.
To insist this wasn't me.
But that was the horror.
If I didn't remember doing something, how could I swear I hadn't?
I sat down again.
“Take me somewhere.”
Vale leaned forward.
“What?”
“A hospital. Clinic. Prison. I don't care.”
Laura's eyes filled.
“I can't stay here if I'm hurting her.”
Vale studied me.
“You've said that before.”
The room became colder.
“How many times?”
“Four.”
I lowered my head.
“What stopped me?”
“By morning, you didn't remember why you wanted to go.”
I covered my face.
For several minutes nobody spoke.
Then I heard humming.
Softly.
From the hallway.
The tune Sonia used to hum in the car.
I looked up.
She was sitting on the stairs.
Vale followed my gaze.
“She's there?”
I nodded.
Laura's face tightened.
“What is she doing?”
“Humming.”
“What song?”
I listened.
Three notes.
Pause.
Three notes again.
My stomach clenched.
“I don't know.”
Laura did.
Her face went white.
“What?”
“That's what she hummed the night of the accident.”
I stared at Sonia.
She looked at me.
Then lifted one finger to her lips.
“Why is she doing that?”
“I don't know.”
Sonia stood.
She walked upstairs.
“Where are you going?”
Laura flinched.
I barely noticed.
I followed Sonia.
“Michael,” Vale called.
“She wants me to see something.”
“She isn't real.”
“Then my brain wants me to see something.”
That silenced him.
I climbed the stairs.
Sonia reached her bedroom.
She didn't open the door.
She continued down the hall.
Toward our room.
At the threshold she turned.
“Every night,” she said.
My heart pounded.
“Every night what?”
“The man goes away first.”
I frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“He comes out.”
“From our bedroom?”
She nodded.
“He goes downstairs.”
“Then?”
She pointed toward me.
“Then he comes back.”
My mouth went dry.
“Is the man me?”
She looked sad.
“Not all of you.”
Behind me, Laura whispered, “What did she say?”
I couldn't answer.
Sonia walked toward the stairs.
I followed.
Down.
Through the kitchen.
Past the laundry room.
Toward the basement door.
My hand stopped on the knob.
The basement smelled of concrete, dust, paint, and the faint metallic dampness old houses collect underground.
I turned on the light.
“Sonia?”
She stood at the bottom.
She pointed behind the furnace.
There was nothing there except shelving.
Paint cans.
Christmas decorations.
A rolled carpet.
I moved the boxes.
Behind them was a narrow cabinet recessed into the wall.
I had never seen it.
Or I didn't remember seeing it.
The cabinet was locked.
Laura and Vale had followed me downstairs.
Laura whispered, “What is that?”
“You don't know?”
“No.”
I looked at Vale.
He shook his head.
The lock was small.
Cheap.
I grabbed a screwdriver from the workbench and forced it.
Inside was a black coat.
A pair of shoes.
A set of keys.
A flashlight.
And a narrow leather case.
Exactly like the thing the figure in Vale's video had carried.
My hand hovered over it.
Laura said my name.
I opened the case.
Inside were six objects.
A scalpel.
Surgical scissors.
A small bottle of antiseptic.
Latex gloves.
A silver mechanical pencil.
And a photograph.
I picked it up.
The picture showed our car after the accident.
Crushed against a tree.
Windshield shattered.
Passenger door bent inward.
I dropped it.
Laura made a broken sound.
“Where did you get that?”
“I don't know.”
She knelt and picked it up.
On the back, in my handwriting, were four words.
SHE HAS TO REMEMBER.
Laura stopped breathing.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
She shook her head.
“What does that mean?”
“I don't know.”
Vale crouched beside the case.
“Don't touch anything else.”
I laughed.
“Now you're worried about fingerprints?”
“I'm worried about what seeing this will trigger.”
Something shifted at the edge of my vision.
Sonia was standing behind the furnace.
“Sweetheart?”
She pointed toward the wall.
There was a second panel.
Smaller.
I pulled it open.
A phone lay inside.
Old.
Cracked screen.
Not mine.
Except it recognized my thumbprint.
The battery was nearly dead.
There were no contacts.
No messages.
Only videos.
Hundreds.
All recorded at night.
I opened the latest.
My face filled the screen.
But something about it was wrong.
I was sitting in the basement wearing the black coat.
Timestamp: three nights earlier.
My eyes looked awake.
Not sleepy.
Not vacant.
Awake.
I leaned toward the camera.
And I spoke.
“If you're watching this during the day, you found the cabinet.”
Laura gripped my shoulder.
I barely felt it.
Video-me continued.
“You're going to think you're sick.”
A faint smile.
“You are.”
My skin crawled.
“But not the way they told you.”
Vale stepped closer.
On-screen, I glanced toward something outside the frame.
“They keep saying you don't remember because your brain is broken.”
A pause.
“They're wrong.”
Vale whispered, “Turn it off.”
I pulled the phone away from him.
The man wearing my face smiled again.
“You don't remember because I don't want you to.”
Laura staggered backward.
On the screen, I lowered my voice.
“She's lying about the accident.”
I looked at Laura.
She stared at the phone.
“Michael, stop.”
The recording continued.
“Ask her who was driving.”
Everything in me went still.
I turned.
“You said I was.”
Laura's lips parted.
Vale stepped between us.
“Do not interrogate her.”
I laughed.
“Move.”
“Michael—”
“Move.”
Laura whispered, “You were driving.”
The phone spoke again.
“She's going to say you were.”
I froze.
Recorded-me leaned closer.
“She has been saying it so long that sometimes you believe her.”
Laura shook her head.
“No.”
“Ask her why there is no scar on your chest.”
I looked down.
“What?”
“Michael—”
I ripped open my shirt.
No scar.
Recorded-me said:
“The driver's seat belt broke your collarbone.”
I looked at Laura.
At the thin white line disappearing beneath the collar of her nightshirt.
She covered it instinctively.
My pulse exploded.
“You told me that was surgery.”
“It was.”
“For what?”
She couldn't answer.
On the recording, my other self whispered:
“She was driving.”
Laura ran.
She made it three steps.
I caught her wrist.
She screamed.
The sound stopped me.
Immediately.
I released her.
Vale shoved himself between us.
“Back away.”
“I didn't—”
“Back away.”
I obeyed.
Laura pressed herself against the wall.
I looked at my own hands like they belonged to a murderer.
“I'm sorry.”
She was crying.
“I'm sorry.”
Vale took the phone.
This time I let him.
He stopped the video.
“Michael, listen carefully. Dissociative states can construct narratives that protect themselves.”
“Protect themselves from what?”
“Guilt. Trauma. Fear.”
“So the video could be lying?”
“Yes.”
“Could Laura?”
Silence.
Laura looked wounded.
That answer was worse than yes.
I picked up the photograph again.
The crash.
Our blue sedan wrapped around an oak tree.
Then something caught my eye.
A detail I hadn't noticed.
The driver's side airbag was dark with blood.
The passenger side windshield was spiderwebbed.
I turned the image.
Another photograph had been stuck behind it.
Police evidence.
Interior view.
On the driver's side floor was a woman's shoe.
Red.
Laura owned a pair like it.
Or had.
“Laura.”
She shook her head.
“Those weren't mine.”
“How do you know?”
“I was wearing boots.”
“Can you prove it?”
Her face hardened.
“Yes.”
For the first time, she looked angry instead of afraid.
“There are hospital photographs.”
“Where?”
“Nathan has them.”
I looked at Vale.
He exhaled.
“I didn't bring them.”
“Convenient.”
“Michael.”
“Everybody stop saying my name.”
Sonia suddenly appeared beside Laura.
She stared up at her mother.
Then at me.
“Dad?”
My throat closed.
“Yes?”
She whispered:
“Mom doesn't remember either.”
I stopped.
“What?”
Laura said, “What is she saying?”
I looked at my wife.
“She says you don't remember.”
Laura's expression changed.
Not disbelief.
Recognition.
Vale went pale.
“What?” I demanded.
Nobody spoke.
“What aren't you telling me?”
Laura stared at Vale.
“Nathan.”
He closed his eyes.
“Oh my God.”
“What?”
Vale looked at me.
“There is one thing about the accident we've never been able to establish conclusively.”
“Who was driving?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
He looked toward Laura.
“Whether either of you remembers the accident accurately.”
That night, nobody slept.
By sunrise our dining table was covered in boxes.
Hospital files.
Police reports.
Insurance photographs.
Therapy notes.
Printed emails.
Vale had apparently kept copies because I had destroyed the originals during one of my episodes.
Laura sat across from me, pale and hollow-eyed.
For the first time in sixteen months, we examined our marriage like a crime scene.
The official report said the vehicle had been traveling north on Bellwood Road at approximately 10:42 p.m.
Rain.
Poor visibility.
No alcohol detected in either adult.
No mechanical failure.
The car crossed the center line, corrected sharply, left the road, and struck an oak tree.
Sonia had been in the rear seat.
Her seat belt had been fastened.
She suffered catastrophic internal injuries.
Death was nearly instantaneous.
There were conflicting witness statements.
One driver remembered seeing a man behind the wheel.
Another thought it had been a woman.
The windshield had been destroyed.
Both front airbags deployed.
Laura had suffered a fractured collarbone, broken ribs, and a deep laceration to her left thigh.
I had suffered a concussion, fractured wrist, and severe head trauma.
Neither of us gave a reliable statement for six days.
Then I told police I had been driving.
Laura agreed.
Case closed.
“Why would we both lie?” I asked.
Vale didn't answer.
Sonia stood near the window.
Looking outside.
I whispered, “Sweetheart?”
Laura stared at the empty corner.
Sonia turned.
“She was crying.”
“Who?”
“Mom.”
“When?”
“In the car.”
My hands went cold.
“What were we talking about?”
She frowned.
“I don't remember.”
“You were there.”
“I was little.”
My heart twisted.
“Try.”
Laura began shaking her head.
“Don't make her relive it.”
I looked at her.
“You can't hear her.”
Her face broke.
“No.”
It was cruel.
I regretted it immediately.
Sonia walked to me.
She placed her small hand on my arm.
I felt warmth.
That was what terrified me most.
Hallucinations were not supposed to feel warm.
“Mom said she was leaving,” Sonia whispered.
Laura's face drained.
I stared at her.
“You were leaving me?”
She looked down.
“Before the accident.”
“Why?”
No answer.
“Why?”
“I was scared of you.”
My stomach knotted.
“Before the episodes?”
“They didn't start after the accident.”
Silence.
I heard the refrigerator humming.
A car passing outside.
My own heartbeat.
“What?”
Laura folded her hands.
“You had blackouts before.”
“How long?”
“A few months.”
Vale watched me.
Laura continued.
“They were shorter. Ten minutes. Twenty. You'd forget conversations.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“I did.”
“When?”
“Over and over.”
She gave a bitter laugh.
“You'd promise to see someone. Then you'd forget promising.”
I felt sick.
“The night of the crash,” she said, “I told you I was taking Sonia to my sister's.”
I looked at Sonia.
She had gone very still.
“You followed us outside.”
Laura closed her eyes.
“You wanted to talk.”
“Did I get into the car?”
“Yes.”
“Was I driving?”
“I don't know.”
“You just said—”
“I don't know anymore!”
Her fist hit the table.
“I woke up in a hospital. You said you had been driving. The police said you had been driving. I believed you.”
Sonia whispered, “You were in the back.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
She looked toward the basement door.
“The man.”
My pulse slowed.
“What man?”
May you like
Sonia's eyes filled with tears.
“The man was in the car.”
