“Monique?” Her breathing reached me before her voice did.

“Kiki.”

I sat upright.

“Where are you?”

A pause. Then another. “In Dubai.”

The answer landed with its full weight.

She had gone.

While I had been filing papers and checking boxes and holding a line at my kitchen table, my sister had gotten on a plane and flown to the other side of the world to be near a man with one face and many names.