Page 60 of My Twin Sister

“Geny won’t answer the phone.”

He glances at me. Then he’s blurry on the other side of my unshed tears. He reaches across the middle of his truck and squeezes my leg. “Hey, it’s okay. Geny is fine. Whatever is going on, it has nothing to do with her.”

“You don’t know that,” I say. “Find where they’re going.” I sit forward in my seat. “Hurry. Please.”

To my surprise he doesn’t try to reason with me or argue. He pushes his foot down on the accelerator and we speed down the road. It doesn’t take long to find the location of the emergency. Small town and nosey people. When I see where everyone is congregated, my stomach coils tight.

The beach. The one where we hung out at as kids. The one where I was supposed to have drowned. The one where Morgan died. And now the place of some other tragedy. I hold my breath and get out of the truck.

Thirty-Five: Grace

As I walk closer to the beach, people step aside, their faces a mix of sadness, bewilderment, and unadulterated entertainment. The next thing I see is Geny’s SUV. My legs nearly give out on me. Why is her car here?

“Please, God, let her be okay,” I say as I stumble forward on shaky legs. Murphy is beside me in an instant, and his arm wraps around me, steadying me.

There’s caution tape stretched across the walkway leading to the beach and the water. People crowd around it, and I want to scream at them all to get out of the way.

“Grace,” someone says. I spin around to find the owner of the voice. An older woman I know but can’t place. “Oh, God. You were her friend,” she says.

Friend? I was whose friend? Surely not Geny. She wouldn’t have said that if it were something to do with Geny.

“What happened?” Murphy asks, and I’m so thankful because I can’t find my voice. Only my eyes work for me right now as they scan the growing crowd for my sister.

There’s a white sheet flapping in the wind by the police and bile bubbles in my stomach. A white sheet usually means a body.

“Oh, it’s awful,” says someone.

I don’t hear what she says next. I don’t need to. I don’t hear anything but roaring water. The same noise is burned into my memory from my own unforgettable night on this beach. The wind flips the sheet up and I see the awful thing. Though, I don’t quite understand what I’m looking at.

A head. That much I know. Long brown hair, soaked. Before I can make out a face, an officer wrangles the sheet back down.

“Fuck’s sake, Holt!” Frank Gibbs shouts at his deputy. “Weight it down with some rocks or something!”

A loud ringing in my ears replaces the sound of rushing water.

“Grace.”

My sister has dark hair. The same as mine.

“Grace.”

My sister’s car is here.

“Grace! Hey.”

Why would her car be here? Why would she be here?

“Gracie!”

I look up, being shaken by someone. Murphy.

“Look.” He points. “Geny is there. Right there.”

I follow his finger. His words don’t quite register. Geny is there. Where? Under the sheet? No. She’s standing. Alive. Fifty feet away from me.

I don’t think anything except Thank God as I fly through the crowd of people, ignoring the remarks and noises of annoyance when I shove through them. Her eyes lock with mine just before I reach her, and I don’t care if she’s mad at me. I don’t care what she said the other night. I wrap my arms around her as soon as she’s in reach and I squeeze her.

I’m shaking and crying and holding my sister tight. “I thought it was you,” I sob. I thought it was my sister. My twin. My other half who I’ve spent half a lifetime missing and unable to talk to.