Shaking it off, I murmur, “Sorry, I’ve been alone since I got here, so clearly I’m excited to be talking to someone. And most New Yorkers aren’t interested in conversing with strangers. I love the city so far, don’t get me wrong, I just… didn’t realize how lonely it’d be. Though I probably should have… I mean, that’s the whole point, isn’t it?” I huff a sort of self-deprecating laugh, and she offers a sympathetic curve to her lips.
“Trust me, I get it,” she sighs. “New York has a way of really hammering your emotions into you, which can be good and bad.”
“I’m so sorry, I’m tossing my baggage at you and I don’t even know your name,” I chuckle. “I’m Angel, by the way.”
Her face freezes.
Eyes wide, her smile has fallen away. And now she’sreallygaping at me.
I blink.
“I’m… Leah,” she says softly. “I’m sorry, are you… AngelAlvarez?”
Fear hits like an instinct. Because someone I don’t know is recognizing me, and that makes me nervous.
But something about this girl’s presence has been calling to me since I noticed her. It’s comforting, and that has me nodding reticently.
“Yea… how did you—”
“I know your sister,” she whispers.
My heart leaps so hard in my chest, it almost knocks me over.
Avianna. She knows…
And then it smacks me right in the face. Where I’ve seen her from…
I recognize her from my research. I think I saw her picture online, when I was scouring every corner of the internet for child trafficking victims, hoping to find my sister.
It was a while ago, and the picture was of a much younger girl. Just one image, buried deep in the graveyard of missing persons reports. But something about her face stuck out to me…
And now I know why. Avia was trying to tell me…
It’s her. Alleah Tilsen.
She knows my sister.
“You… you know Avianna?” My voice comes out small, like that of a scared three-year-old who misses his sister.
She nods, eyes sparkling with many poignant emotions, joy and sadness at the forefront. “I’ve known her for years. Iconsider her one of my best friends, and I knew she had a twin… You look just like her. I mean,wow. It’s incredible.”
I swallow hard, a gust of a shaky noise leaving my lips. I’m on the edge right now…
Avia… She’s alive.
She’s…
“Is sh-she… okay?” I croak.
Leah’s expression goes crestfallen. “I don’t know. I’m sorry…” She reaches across the table, startling me when her warm hands envelopes mine. “I haven’t seen her in almost a year.”
Like a rollercoaster, the slow rise to exhilaration, then fast drop into sorrow is making me nauseous.
“So she’s not here…? In New York?” I choke out the question.
She shakes her head solemnly, squeezing my hand tighter. “I’m so sorry, Angel.God, if she knew you might come here, there’s no way she would’ve left. But she didn’t even know if you were still alive, and after so many years of…” She stops abruptly to gulp. “She just had to get out.”
I’m crumbling. My insides feel like they’re made of weathered stone, falling apart bit by bit. I can’t believe in thirty seconds I went from thinking I might actually find my sister to finding out she isn’t even here. That flicker of hope was just puffed out, and now I’m in the dark… collapsing.
