Everyone Belongs to Someone

Victor saw it too. “Daniel?”

Anna looked between us. “Who is she?”

I couldn’t answer at first. Because the woman on the screen had been dead for twenty-three years. At least, that was what I’d been told.

“My mother,” I said. The words came out like they belonged to someone else.

On the tablet she lifted her face fully to the camera. Older. Thinner. Hair streaked with gray. But unmistakable. Then she held up a folded hotel envelope, the Wellington crest stamped in gold, and Marie zoomed until the four words inside filled the screen.

DON’T TRUST THE TWINS.