Bel couldn’t breathe, but Rachel did, raggedy and hard, wincing from the daylight, from the pressure on her feet, holding her body at a strange, twisted angle. It must have hurt, coming back from the dead.
Rachel held one pale hand up to shield herself from the sun, her fingers giving her away, shaking and weak. She studied Bel across the road, swaying reed-soft in the breeze, like she might just blow away, disappear again. Real, definitely real, but impermanent somehow.
Her eyes narrowed, then widened, a hard blink like she was taking a picture with her gaze, recognizing something within Bel.
She stepped forward into the road.
A croak as she tried to talk, raw and inhuman. A voice from another world, where the lost things went. They weren’t meant to come back.
The sound shook Bel, brought air back to her in a panicked gasp. Brought her heart back, fight-or-flight fast against her ribs, drowning out her ears. Her feet moved before she could tell them to, terror taking over. Protecting her.
Bel ran.
She ran away.
Shoes slapping the concrete, racing her unchained heart, leaving Rachel behind.
Past the cemetery. Turn left.
She looked over her shoulder, searching, like you weren’t supposed to, in nightmares or in hell.
Rachel Price wasn’t following her. Gone again.
But Bel didn’t slow down, flying up the sidewalk. Fumbling for the keys in the front pocket of her jeans, a slick of sweat across her lip.
She veered off, jumping clean over her dad’s flower bed and up the stairs to the front door. She missed the lock, gouging a scratch in the green- painted wood. Got it the second time, twisting the key and falling through the open doorway.
Bel grabbed the door and slammed it shut, checking, double-checking, separating herself from the new world out there.
She dropped to the floor, sitting back against the door. Holding it in place.
Hiding.
Hugging her knees.
This couldn’t be happening. Couldn’t be. And yet it was. That was Rachel Price on the road, there was no doubt. None. If Bel tried hard enough, could she find some? She’d give anything for some doubt. Was she seeing things, the idea of Rachel implanted in her head by the reenactment? Could this be a scene Ramsey forgot to tell her about? No, don’t be stupid, there were no cameras. And how could an actress have stolen Rachel’s exact face, a nose that crinkled in just the same way as Bel’s?
The truth didn’t make sense. But it was the only thing that did. Rachel Price was back and Bel had lost her mind.
She’d have to find it again, soon, because she had to do something, right? She couldn’t just sit here against the door and wish this all away, could she? She damn well could if she wanted to. Rachel had gone away once before, for Bel’s whole life, maybe she’d go away again if Bel stayed right here, didn’t move, hardly breathed. Allowed mystery to step in again and take Rachel back.
Do something or do nothing. That was the choice. And which was the way that would hurt less? Nothing. That was what Bel wanted. Sit here and wish life back to the way it was five minutes ago. Bel and her dad, and a universe that spun around them. People might think it was sad and messed- up, but it was hers, it was what she knew and she was happy, she was.
But then she thought of her dad. Really thought of him. That was what all her choices came down to in the end: how to make him happy. He deserved it, after everything. He did the same for her, their forever-team of two. Which way would Dad choose?
Bel pictured him, fiddling his wedding ring, back and forth, an endless loop. Unshed tears in his eyes. His words when Ramsey asked, hypothetically, what he would do if Rachel ever came back. Not hypothetical anymore.
I would just want to hold her, her dad had said. Bel remembered that. Wrap my arms around her and just tell her how much I love her. How much I’ve missed her. Before any questions, those can come later. He’d had dreams about it: dreams, not nightmares. And he must have had plenty of the latter. A hard life, haunted by the terrible knowledge that people still thought him a killer. And yet there it was, the proof of his innocence, stumbling around outside. Indisputable proof at last: Dad did not kill Rachel.
Rachel made Dad happy. She lit up rooms for him. Rachel would make him happy again, make life better for him. Bel wanted that.
So she chose.
She was going to do something.
Go back outside. Find Rachel. Bring her home.
Bel got to her feet, knees cracking, and a knock sounded against the front door.
Three taps, knuckle to door, bone on wood. Bel’s heart spiking with each one.
A blurry phantom through the frosted glass, mirroring her. Bel knew.
She wasn’t ready, but it was time to pretend anyway. She reached forward, fingers wrapping around the lock, cold metal, warm skin.
She pulled the door open halfway and finally came face to face with her mother, long dead but undead.
Rachel Price.
Right there, across the threshold, separated by just inches now, not sixteen years, not life and death. Breathing hard and blinking harder. A metallic smell of sweat and something sharper. Rachel shuddered, holding on to the frame to keep her upright, leaving a grimy handprint behind.
A door creak in the back of Rachel’s throat, quiet and unsettling.
“You live here?” she asked, guttural and raw, a voice that had been used too little or too much.
Bel had lost her own, hiding against the back of her teeth. She nodded.
“Are y-you…?” Rachel asked, breaking off, eyes heavy and wet, studying Bel from her hair down to her hands. It was a full question, if you knew.
“Y-yes,” Bel said, her words cracking too, like she’d forgotten how. “I am.”
“Annabel,” she said in a scratching whisper, and it wasn’t a question this time. Like Rachel just needed to say it, to pair the two together. Face and name. Unlearning and relearning.
Rachel’s hand moved from the doorframe, floating in the air toward Bel, reaching for her, to touch, maybe to make sure she was real. Imagining each other and getting it wrong. The hand didn’t make it and Bel stepped back. She let the door open all the way, inviting Rachel in because she couldn’t find the words to.
“Dad’s not here,” Bel said, backing off. Rachel limped over the threshold, into the house. Her house. Their house. She looked around, eyes watering.
“Looks exactly the same,” she said, quietly, touching walls and leaving marks.
Bel skirted around her, keeping her eyes locked on, to shut the front door. Closing them in, together.
A dark trail from the entrance. Not just mud. Rachel was bleeding through her shoes, onto the wooden floorboards.
“New lamp,” Rachel said, at the entrance to the living room. “Should I—”
Rachel started coughing, a deep-down, wicked sound that bent her double.
“You should sit,” Bel said, avoiding her as she passed. “I’ll get you some water.”
Bel ran to the kitchen, hands shaking and clumsy as she pulled a glass down from the cupboard. She filled it and carried it back out, remembering to shut off the faucet.
Fresh blood and mud tracks on the rug, over to Rachel, now sitting slumped on the sofa.
“Here.”
Bel offered the glass.
Rachel reached for it, fingers touching Bel’s as she wrapped them around. Sharp overgrown nails. Bel shivered and let go, water slopping over the rim.
“Thank you, Anna.” Rachel raised the glass to her cracked lips, drinking greedily, like a child who’d played too hard, too long. She drained the glass and put it down on the table, the thunk making Bel flinch, echoing in her chest.
Rachel looked up at her, waiting, like she expected Bel to speak first. Or she was giving her a chance to. Bel didn’t know what to say to her, hardly remembered how to talk at all. How was this possible? How was Rachel Price sitting here, in front of her?
Ears ringing, heart hummingbird fast, a strange numbness sliding down Bel’s back. Was this what shock felt like?
“We should probably call someone,” Bel said eventually, wondering if that was the right thing. “I can call Dad; he’d be here in minutes.”
A flicker in Rachel’s eyes. Bel didn’t know what that meant. This woman was a stranger to her.
“I think we’re supposed to call the police first,” Rachel croaked, not sure what to do either, both of them lost.
That made sense, of course. Call the police.
Bel nodded. “I can do that. You stay here. You need more water?”
“I’m fine,” Rachel said, hissing as she pried off the oversized shoes that were stuck to her, falling apart in her hands. Her feet were a mess; swollen, bruised, dirty, bloody. One toenail hanging off to the side. Where had she appeared from? How long had it taken her to get home? Why had she come straight here, and not found help first?
Rachel saw her looking. “It’s not so bad.” She gave her a smile that was more like a grimace. “Don’t worry.”
“I’ll get help.” Bel backed up into the kitchen, pulling her phone from her pocket. Help for Rachel or help for herself? Wasn’t it the same thing? Bel couldn’t do this on her own, it was too much. So far beyond too much that her mind was shutting down around her, only able to think two seconds ahead and two seconds back.
She unlocked her phone. Five missed calls from Ramsey, oh fuck, was he in for a surprise. He and the rest of the world who—at this exact moment— still thought Rachel Price was gone forever, as disappeared as anyone could be. Only Bel and Rachel knew the truth. But not for long.
Rachel wanted her to call the police, and it sounded like the right thing, but it didn’t feel like it. What had the Gorham Police Department ever done to help? They’d had sixteen years and they never found Rachel. The police did nothing, spinning the blame on Dad as an easy out. But Dad, he’d know what to do, he was the one who did the worrying, the thinking, the planning, the helping. And if Bel called the police, then Dad would never get his moment with Rachel, the one he had dreamed about. Bel couldn’t take that away from him.
She deleted 911 from the keypad and dialed her dad’s number instead. He picked up on the fourth ring.
“Hey, just with a customer,” he said, his voice like a warm blanket: safe, familiar. The inverse of Rachel. “I’ll call you back in—”
Panic rose up, snatching away the warm blanket.
“No, Dad. You need to get home now. Right now. It’s an emergency.” Bel whispered, so Rachel couldn’t hear.
it.
“What’s going on?” He was worried now, good thing he was the best at
“I can’t tell you on the phone.” She couldn’t, she didn’t want Rachel to
overhear, and she didn’t want to ruin Dad’s moment. He’d waited sixteen years for it. “Just please, come home right now.”
“Bel, what is—”
“Dad, please!”
“I’m coming,” he said, and she could already hear the sound of his boots pounding the ground, the slam of a car door. Of course he was coming; she’d asked him to. “Can you stay on the phone?”
“No, I can’t. Hurry.”
“Are you in danger?” he asked.
“No,” Bel answered, though she wasn’t entirely sure that was true. Her body didn’t believe it, heart hammering down her ribs. “It’s not like that. Just come, as fast as you can.”
“On my way, kiddo.” “Anna?”
Bel spun on her heels, hanging up the phone. Rachel was standing there, a dark silhouette in the doorway, eyes glowing, red footprints on the black- and-white tiles.
“I just called the police,” Bel said. “They’re on their way.”
One small lie. But Rachel didn’t know her, she couldn’t read Bel like a mom should have.
“Thank you,” Rachel croaked, shuffling forward, pulling out a chair at the kitchen table, falling into it.
Bel stepped back, against the counter.
“You don’t have to be scared, Annabel,” Rachel said, clean tear trails through her dirty face. “Everything’s going to be OK now, I promise.”
How could Bel tell her that everything was already OK?
“I can’t believe I’m home.” Rachel blinked in the room, taking it in, Bel with it. “New refrigerator.”
Bel swallowed.
“I know you must have a lot of questions for me, Anna,” Rachel said, steepling her hands together.
“It’s Bel,” she said quickly, before she lost the nerve. “Sorry?”
“Bel. My name. It’s Bel now, not Anna. Hasn’t been Anna for a long time.”
“Oh.” Rachel stared ahead, far into the middle distance, seeing something Bel couldn’t. Maybe only those who had disappeared could. “I called you Anna. I’ve been thinking of you this whole time as Anna.”
“Sorry.”
“Wondering what you look like at each age. What you were doing for your birthdays. What you were good at and bad at. Whether you’d like the same foods as me. What made you happy. I had this whole picture of you in my head, that’s what kept me going.” Rachel shook off that other place, wherever it was, looked at Bel instead. “You’re better than I ever could have imagined. I’ve missed you so much, Anna. Sorry. Bel.”
“That’s OK,” Bel said, which was good, because she didn’t have to respond to that other part. If Rachel had truly missed Bel, did that mean she wasn’t able to come back until now? Such a mountain of hard questions, Bel didn’t know where to begin: at the start, on that snowy day in February when Rachel disappeared not once but twice, filling in where Bel’s memory could not, or today, sixteen years later, and those torn-up feet? “Where…” She took a breath, steeled herself, locked her jaw. “Where were you?”
Rachel nodded, glanced down at her grimy hands. Voice just a rasp when she spoke again.
“I don’t know.”
