I couldn’t concentrate. “She’s my sister. I have to know these things,” I mumbled. None of this was making sense.
Pound.
I massaged my temples harder. Her questions were ridiculous. I had the sense that she was trying to trick me, but I had no idea why. Everyone knew Mia was a straight-A student, and all the other stuff I had said too. Why would I lie about that? All she had to do was ask around.
Pound.
“Leah, honey, do you understand that Judy Lawson kidnapped you?”
Pound
Pound
Pound
My head was splitting open, making speech no longer possible. I could only gape at her. She was wrong. Mother took me in when nobody else wanted me. I shook my head defiantly.
“Sweetie, Judy changed your name. You are Mia Klein. There is no Leah.”
17
MIA
A SCREAM never left my throat.
The blackness I’d feared for so long seeped into my open mouth.
I could not breathe.
It was everywhere.
I could feel it spreading throughout my body.
Consuming me.
I tried to close my mouth to stop it, but my body no longer belonged to me.
The darkness filled every part of me.
And I ceased to exist.
PART TWO
18
“DOES YOUR head hurt?” Dr. Marshall asked sympathetically.
I couldn’t answer her. My world was spinning out of control. Didn’t she see that? Her lips were moving, but the roaring in my head allowed no sound to enter. I tried to process her words, but they made no sense. Mother cared for me all those years. How could she have … No, it just wasn’t possible. She told me time and again that Mom and Dad didn’t want the burden of me. Could she really have taken me from my family? I wanted to lash out. Lash out at Mother for what she had done. Lash out at Dr. Marshall for telling me.
I slammed my eyes closed, hoping for some sort of relief. Instead, images filled my head, playing like a movie. Images of me playing outside with Daisy and then suddenly being shoved in a car. Images of the days that followed of me screaming and crying for Mom and Dad. Images of the shots and the drugs that kept me medicated that she had given me and the sickness that had followed, which had been blamed on my allergy to the sun. Lies. All lies.
And Mia.
My Mia.
My twin.
It wasn’t possible.