I wake up feeling like shit. They were fucking all night. And this morning.
Thankfully, they’re both gone when I come out of the bathroom. I make a mental note to get some damn earplugs.
But not right now. Right now, I need to search Alexa’s room. Something’s bothering me about what she said last night. I hid it. I’ve never not found something Lex has hidden. We are twins. We are inside each other’s brains. It’s nearly impossible to keep things hidden from each other. I hid it. If she hid it, I will find it.
I tear into the boxes again, knowing from past experience that I should have at least a few hours before they return.
When I find nothing, it dawns on me that maybe she hid it somewhere else in the apartment. That would be smart, actually. No one hides important things in plain sight. Unfortunately, the bathroom yields nothing, and the kitchen only bears the remnants of last night’s Indian feast. By the time I finish combing through the living room, I’m growing desperate. Where the fuck is it? My instincts lead me back to the bedroom. I move slowly through the room and all of its nooks and crannies before finally giving up.
Collapsing on the bed, I let my head drop into my hands. What if she gave it to Dr. Greer? No, she would never do that. What if she hid it at work? Couldn’t someone find it? Jesus, that would ruin her career. But maybe she has one of those locked drawers for important files? Is that still a thing? I’ve never been to her office. I drag myself up and am taking one last look under the bed when I hear the front door close loudly. I must have been so wrapped up in my thoughts I didn’t hear it unlock.
Scrambling to get to a standing position, my face no doubt red, I turn to see Curt in the doorway holding two coffee cups.
“What are you doing?” he asks, setting the cups down on the dresser. “I got your coffee.”
“I was just looking for something,” I tell him, willing him to leave. How long have I been searching? Maybe they decided to skip the gym after all. He doesn’t respond but instead moves his messenger bag around from his backside to his front and digs something out. Then my heart stops. He pulls the diary from his bag and places it on the dresser.
“Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me,” he says.
“You took it? How much did you read?”
“Don’t worry,” he assures me. “I don’t care, Alexa.”
“I’m not Alexa. What the fuck. Why did you take it?” I try to stand, but panic makes me too dizzy. I slump back down.
“I told you, I love you and I don’t judge either of you.”
I can’t speak. He starts back on his shtick about how he doesn’t care and we all have issues—but if that were true, he certainly has done a lot of work to figure out what issues not to care about. I quickly try to discern a plan. This is what we’ve feared, and yet I have no idea what to do.
“Just tell me everything you know,” I demand.
“I read it all. Cover to cover. Over and over.”
I feel sick.
“It’s really interesting, honestly. It could be a book or a movie or something. Or a television show.”
“Well, it’s our fucking life,” I snap without thinking, my hands running over the bed covers. “Not a TV show.”
“So, you guys were born conjoined?” he asks.
What happens next can only be described as animal instinct. Fight or flight—and my nervous system only fights.
As he starts to retell our horrible story, I run my hand under the mattress and pull out the gun. Understanding crosses his face just before the bullet pierces his abdomen. I didn’t see Mom’s face when the bullet hit, so I’m not sure if his expression is a universal one everyone has in the instant before they die. But as he stumbles back and the blood begins to flow, he does something that’s shocking even to me. He smiles, and I swear I see him laugh. It lasts only a moment before he turns angry.
“I knew you would fuck this up. You moron,” he gasps as he reaches into his bag. “Where’s my camera?”
I fire two more bullets into his torso. His body releases the oxygen that is left and more blood.
He is dead.
The first thing I do is grab the diary off the dresser and put it under the mattress. Then I think back to all the episodes of Law & Order I’ve watched and try to stage the scene. I didn’t expect this, so his gunshot wounds definitely don’t appear to be self-inflicted. Fuck. Careful not to disturb the blood spatter or the body, I try to piece together a puzzle of how he could have done this to himself.
Then it hits me. Alexa’s words: “I’m not going to be a sitting duck with all the psychos out here.”
This was a break-in. I start to mess up the room and look for valuables to take when suddenly my eyes are drawn back to the body.
I look at his light green eyes, now glassy.
And I start to scream.