The Shadow Girl

21




We follow Jake to a hotel. He insists on paying, and we don’t argue. While Jake talks to the lady at the front desk, Ty and I sit on the sofa in the lobby, holding hands, our bags and Iris’s violin case at our feet. A few minutes later, Jake walks over, slipping one card key into his pocket and holding two more out to us.

“I’m in three-twelve. You guys are in three-oh-eight and three-oh-nine. Get some sleep, then give me a call and I’ll take you to lunch.” He laughs. “Or dinner. I’m exhausted.”

We reach our rooms and part ways. I miss Ty the minute I close my door.

I draw the curtains to block out the day. Placing Iris’s violin in the corner chair, I carry my bag to the bathroom and take a quick shower. Minutes later, propped up against the pillows on the bed, I text Sylvie: In okc. Mom & Wyatt know I’m w/Ty. Will call w/details soon.

I lower the phone, worried about Wyatt and wondering if he’ll ever forgive me. Knowing I won’t get any rest until I touch base with him, I text him and tell him we made it and that I’m okay. I ask about my mom and Cookie, then wait five minutes for a reply, staring at the phone. When he doesn’t respond, I make up excuses for his silence: It’s early and he’s still sleeping; he’s in the shower; he stayed at the all-night party even after what happened, and he’s having breakfast with friends.

Just when I’m about to give up on him, he texts: Gran is w/ your mom and Cookie. They r ok.

I text back: Thanks.

I stare at the painting on the opposite wall—a vase of red flowers. What am I going to say to Mom? I’m sort of mad at her about everything—especially the cloning, which is totally weird, when you think about it. If she hadn’t gone behind Dad’s back, I wouldn’t be here. I should probably thank her for being a liar.

But what if I had been born with health problems, deformities, or other terrible defects, instead of an amazing ability to play the violin and communicate with my “original”? Would she deserve my thanks then?

Original. The word gives me a sick feeling inside.

To steady my nerves, I picture Ty in the next room and imagine looking into his beautiful dark eyes. They’ve calmed me so many times since we met, and just the thought of them calms me now. Taking a breath, I lift the phone from my lap and call Mom.

“Lily!” Her relief flows through the phone. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Mom. Ty and I are in Oklahoma City.”

“Oklahoma? But why?”

“Is Addie there?” I ask.

“Yes. And Wyatt. What’s going on?”

“We made a short side trip so I could meet Jake Milano.”

“Jake?” Mom’s voice drops. “Oh, no.”

“Iris and I needed to find him and talk to him so we could finally know the truth about what happened. She’d forgotten everything, Mom.” I pause to gather my nerve, then add, “Even what you did to her.”

I hear her quick intake of breath, and then she says, “There are things you need to know.”

“I know what you and Ian Beckett did to Iris against Dad’s wishes. And against Iris’s wishes. I know what I am, Mom.”

“Please come home and we’ll talk about this,” she says in a broken voice.

I take a moment to get control of my emotions, then say, “I think I finally understand why you’ve always been so unhappy. You wanted Iris back, but instead you got me.”

“No! No, Lily. I love you more than anything. I just— losing Iris destroyed something in me.”

I stare at the ring she gave me for my birthday. The one she and Dad made especially for me. I know Mom loves me. But I can’t help feeling bruised.

“I haven’t been fair to you,” Mom continues. “I know that. I didn’t give you what you needed from me. What you deserved. I tried, but I couldn’t let go.”

I suddenly hurt so much for her. For all of us. Mom and Dad. Iris and myself. “I don’t know how to help you,” I whisper. “How to make you happy.”

“It’s not up to you.” I hear the tears in Mom’s voice and Addie in the background, asking if everything’s okay. “What are you going to do now?” Mom asks. “Will you come home? We need to talk face-to-face, not over the phone.”

“I’m still going to Baltimore with Ty to see his brother. After that, I don’t know. I need you to answer my questions first. I’m so tired of secrets.”

“Anything,” she says. “Anything . . . just ask me.”

My voice is strangled and harsh. “Are Iris and I the same person or two separate people or what? I mean, if I was reproduced from her cells, is she my sister? My mother? Jake called her my original. God—am I even human?”

“Lily, listen to me.” Mom sounds steadier now. “You’re the same as everyone.”

“Then why did you and Dad run away from Winterhaven and change your names before I was born? Was it just to hide me from Beckett? I mean, you didn’t even let our family or your closest friends get to know me. Were you ashamed of me?”

“Ashamed? No! Your father was sure that Beckett had ulterior motives. That’s why we left,” she says, confirming Jake’s thoughts. “Adam was convinced that if I carried you to term, a healthy baby, Beckett would try to turn you into a specimen to be studied and probed, with no privacy or anonymity. We had to create a new life for ourselves. A normal life for you. We had to protect you. And that meant not even trusting our closest friends to keep the secret. You were too important to take that risk.”

I want so much to forgive her, to understand, but I’m still so confused. “Why didn’t you tell me when I was older?”

“For the same reason we left our past behind. We wanted you to feel normal. And we were afraid you wouldn’t. But you are normal, Lily,” she says firmly. “Please believe that.”

With an incredulous laugh, I say, “How is my relationship with Iris normal? Or the way I play the violin? How is it even possible when I’ve never had a lesson?”

“I can’t say why you have the connection to Iris that you do, but as for the violin . . . Ian had been dabbling in genetic engineering. He told me he might be able to transfer Iris’s abilities to you. I said I only wanted a healthy child. I didn’t care about the music. I only wanted you.”

We grow quiet, and when I finally speak again, I sound calmer than I feel. “Today is the anniversary of Iris’s death, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Eighteen years ago today,” she murmurs.

“Did you plan for us to be born on the same day, eighteen years apart?”

Sounding regretful, she says, “Yes. At the time, I was so obsessed with everything being as much the same as possible, and Beckett encouraged that. We tried to time the pregnancy, but of course babies only come when they’re ready, unless they’re induced. So, I told my doctor in Pueblo that I wanted to have you on the sixth of May, and he agreed to it because I was far enough along and he didn’t think it was risky.”

“And Dad was okay with that?”

“He thought it was completely obsessive of me, and it was,” she says with a note of self-derision. “But I’d made the appointment and I refused to change it. I worried about doing everything just right, but I should’ve listened to your father. I should have trusted that he knew what he was talking about.” After a quick pause, she says, “Please come home.”

I hear a bump against the wall in Ty’s room. “No, Mom. Not yet. Ty saw me through this, and I’m going to see him through the hard stuff ahead with his brother.”

“And after that?”

“I’ll come home and spend some time figuring out where to go from here.” My last ounce of energy drains away. I yawn. “I need a nap, Mom. I’ll call you before we get on the road again, okay?”

“Okay.” Softly, she adds, “I’m sorry, Lily.”

I don’t say anything. I can’t. Not yet.

“Before you go,” she says, “if you have Jake’s number, I’d like to call him.”

“I’ll only give it to you if you promise not to get mad at him. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Mom makes the promise, so I give her the number, then put the phone aside.

Iris’s sigh soothes me as I lay my head on the pillow and curl into the fetal position. We sleep.



Exhausted from their night of driving, Jake and Ty sleep the day away, giving me some time to myself. After a two-hour nap, I try calling Wyatt a few times, but he never picks up. I watch television in my room, then call Mom again. There’s so much we still need to say.

“I talked to someone today,” she tells me. “This may come as another shock to you, but we didn’t hide you from everyone. We have family in Massachusetts, and they know about you.”

I can’t help smiling. “You mean Dad’s sister? Gail and her husband, Matthew?”

“How do you know them?”

“We have a lot to talk about when I get home,” I say.

“That’s what Gail and I discussed—you coming home. She lives in—”

“Winterhaven, I know. And she owns a bookstore, right?”

I hear a hint of humor in Mom’s voice when she says, “I suppose you know what Gail and I decided?”

“Nope. I don’t have a clue.”

“Since you’re going to be close to her, anyway, we thought that when you’re ready to leave Baltimore you might go to Winterhaven and I’ll meet you there. We could stay for a week or two. I think we both need a change of scenery, and Gail and Matthew are anxious to meet you.”

“Wow,” I say, more than a little nervous about meeting my extended family for the first time.

“Gail and I also talked about me selling the cabin and moving there.”

“You’d sell the cabin?”

The thought of it is like a punch in the stomach. My first instinct is to worry about Iris, because it’s hard for me to imagine her living anywhere else but in the mountains. I used to be afraid that when I left home, she’d stay behind. But maybe I’m Iris’s home. She lives where I live. She goes where I go.

I feel her at this very second, as warm as the sunlight sifting through the window. She’s extra quiet though. Iris? I say. Am I right? Will you go with me if I move? I listen and hear her steady hiss, but she doesn’t answer. Maybe she’s trying to sort everything out, too.

“I know how much you love it here,” says Mom, breaking into my thoughts. “You could always come back to visit.” She’s talking fast, as if to convince me. “But I think I’m going to need family around me when you go away to college.”

I nibble my fingernail, happy and sad at once, wanting so much to reach out to her like she’s trying to do with me. “We’ll talk about all this at Aunt Gail’s, okay?” I say. “We’ll figure out the best thing to do.”

Sounding hopeful, she says, “Okay, Lily. We’ll decide together.”

I tell myself that maybe she can change. Maybe our relationship can. Maybe my mom can finally move on and be happy again.

“I love you, Lily,” she says. “Call me again when you’re on the road. And be careful.”

“I will, Mom. I love you, too.”

I end the call, torn between excitement about the possibilities for a new life in Massachusetts and sadness over what I’d be leaving behind. The peaks. The forest. My home, and all the places that remind me of Dad. And, most important of all, Wyatt.



Jake takes us to an early dinner at the Spaghetti Warehouse in Bricktown, a refurbished area of Oklahoma City with a river walk and old brick buildings that now house bars and restaurants and shops.

“Your mother called me,” he says.

I glance at Ty and raise my brows, then ask Jake, “What did she say?”

“She thanked me for telling you the truth. She said she could never find the courage to do it.”

“I want to thank you, too,” I say. “And so does Iris.”

Jake’s face pales. Coughing, he shifts in his chair. Maybe someday I’ll convince him I communicate with Iris, and he’ll cast his doubts aside. But not yet. That much is clear from his uncomfortable reaction.

Still, when the waiter brings our iced teas, Jake toasts Iris for bringing us together, and we make a promise to stay in touch.

After dinner, we say our good-byes, and Ty and I start off for Baltimore. We have a twenty-two-hour drive ahead and want to put as many miles behind us as possible before we stop again to sleep.

By silent mutual agreement, for the next few hours we don’t discuss any of what we learned from Jake and my mom. Instead, we listen to the radio and sing along.

And we talk about his brother.

As Ty describes him, I begin to think Kyle has a lot in common with Wyatt, which makes me feel close to him instantly. They’re both funny, both well liked. Kyle can dribble a basketball like nobody else, and he likes to tinker on cars, just like Wyatt. He loves the mountains. And his family.

We stop for gas a few hours into the trip, and when I come out from the restroom and climb back into the car, Ty hands me a sack. “Room service. The midnight snack you ordered is ready.”

I open the sack. “It’s only eleven.”

He starts the car and pulls out of the station. “I had a craving for something sweet. I hope you like Fudgsicles.”

I take the wrapper off one and hand it to him. “Here you go.”

“So,” he says. “It’s been a wild couple of days, huh?”

“Yeah. It’s not every day a girl finds out she’s a modern-day Frankenstein’s monster.”

He scowls. “I wish you wouldn’t talk about yourself like that.”

A drop of chocolate plops onto my knee. I wipe it off and lick my finger. “Don’t tell me you aren’t blown away by the whole clone thing. You wouldn’t be human if you weren’t.” Though nothing about being a clone seems funny to me, I force myself to grin and add, “You’d be like me!”

“There you go again.” He finishes his Fudgsicle and stuffs the stick into the car’s old ashtray. “I’ve never met anyone more human than you,” he says. “Thank you for deciding to come to Baltimore. It means a lot to me.”

“You’re welcome. Thank you for trying to help me understand all this crazy stuff about myself. I’m sorry I had my doubts about your intentions. You’ve really been someone I can count on from the first day we met.”

“That’s because I fell for you the minute I saw you.”

My Fudgsicle isn’t the only thing melting. I wipe another drop from my knee and study his profile. “Did you fall for me at first because I look like Iris? You said you were intrigued by her music. So maybe it’s her, not me.”

He shrugs and smiles. “She’s part of you, so I guess that’s true in a way.” I almost stop breathing when he lifts my hand from the seat and kisses the back of it.

Glad all of our secrets are out, I say, “Today there were times when I thought I understood all this and I was okay with it. Then the next second, I’d get this panicky feeling, like I don’t know who or what I am anymore. That’s how I feel now. Am I Iris? Is that voice in my head I’ve been hearing all my life really mine? And if I’m not her, what do I owe her? I mean, the only reason I’m alive is because of her.”

“Maybe you should think of Iris as your identical twin. Twins have a lot in common, but they’re two different people.”

I consider that. But then it occurs to me that maybe the answer of what I am and how I was made doesn’t matter. Maybe it’s more important that I just enjoy this life Iris gave me and be happy for it. In a way, wouldn’t that be giving her a second chance? It’s the only way I know to repay her.

Sighing, I say, “Iris has been so quiet since we met Jake and found out the truth. It’s like she’s pulling back or something. What if what we talked about before is right? What if her purpose for staying around is finished? What will I do if she goes?”

“I can’t believe she would leave you. Have you asked her?

I nod. “She didn’t answer.” Ty brushes my knuckles with his fingertips. “First thing in the morning, we’re going to watch the sunrise together. You, me, and Iris. After seeing Jake, she probably needed some time to herself.”

I nod at him, hoping with everything in me that he’s right.

At three in the morning, we get a hotel room. I’m so tired I don’t even know what town we’re in. Ty opens the curtains over the window so we can watch the sunrise, like he promised. Then he sets his “mental alarm clock,” as he calls it, and stretches out on the bed. I lie down beside him, tucked into the crook of his arm, my head on his chest. My pulse slows to match his heartbeat, and soon I can tell that he’s fallen asleep.

Even though I’ve never been this exhausted, I lie awake, staring at the window. Afraid to close my eyes. Afraid to stop listening for Iris’s faint hum.



Ty is snoring softly when I slip from beneath his arm a few hours later and tiptoe over to the corner chair where I propped the violin case when we arrived. I think I must’ve dozed for a while because I feel more rested. It’s almost morning, and I realize I sense Iris more strongly than I have all day.

The city lights flowing in from the window make it easy for me to see without turning on a lamp. I stare at the violin case. I haven’t held the instrument since I played for Mom, and I’m suddenly afraid to try again. I don’t want to wake Ty, but I need to talk to someone to settle my nerves.

I grab my cell phone, then slip into the bathroom, leaving the light off and closing the door. I lean against the sink and text Wyatt. He won’t see the message for a couple of hours, but I just need to make contact with him. I can’t leave for Baltimore with so much left unsaid between us.

I text: Guess Mom told u our plans. Miss u. So much more to tell u. Pls call. Luv u.

As I’m starting to leave the bathroom, my phone buzzes. I guess Wyatt can’t sleep, either.

Your mom told me more than your plans. Always knew something not rt abt u. Crazy stuff. U ok?

I choke back tears and smile, relieved by Wyatt’s teasing tone. Then I text back: I’m ok. All the times u called me a freak u were rite. Who knew? I send the text, then before he can respond, send another one: U still upset?

A minute passes. Then another quiet chirp sounds. I’ll get over it.

Wincing and biting my lip, I text: I’m sorry, Wy. U are part of all my best memories. Pls call.

Need time.

I swallow my disappointment, then text: I can’t lose u.

Five full minutes pass without a response. Feeling forlorn, I reach for the door just as my phone chirps. I look down at the display.

90% of male students @ Columbia develop chronic halitosis by age 20. That’s serious bad breath, in case you don’t know. Tlk soon. Nite, Lil.

A half sob, half laugh bursts from my throat. G’nite, Wy.

I slip back into the room. It’s quiet.

Too quiet.

Going still, I whisper, “Iris?” I listen for her, exhaling my relief when I hear her sigh. Why did I ever take her for granted, like my heartbeat, my breath? I was wrong to think she was my shadow. The truth is, in so many ways, I’m hers. Without Iris, I would’ve been nothing.

Gathering my courage, I ask, Iris, you’re staying, aren’t you? Tell me nothing’s going to change between us.

I’ll always be here, she whispers. You’re strong enough alone now, but if you need me, look inside. Listen . . . the west peak can’t exist without the east. We’re a part of each other.

I understand what she’s trying to tell me. I think that, all my life, Iris has been haunted by a lost love and a past full of secrets she couldn’t remember. Secrets she feared might hurt me. She stayed alert to watch over me, while struggling with the vague notion that she had to find her way back to the boy she’d once loved. Now that she knows Jake’s happy and we’ve uncovered the truth and I’m okay, Iris can relax. She’s not going away, she’ll only be sleeping.

Forgetting that Ty is in the room, forgetting I’m in a hotel and everyone is asleep, I cross to the corner and take the violin from the case. Tonight, I’ll play for Iris, so she can experience her music again through me, like I’ve experienced so much through her.

I walk to the window, lift the bow to the strings. The music in me unwinds and the violin cries out, one joyous note bleeding into another, then another. The song is a new one I’ve never heard in her memories or my dreams, one she’s never hummed in my ear. It comes from a place deep in my center where Iris resides, where she always has and always will.

The melody expands, and the air stirs slightly. I feel Ty at my side and end the song. Lowering the bow, I lean against him.

As light peeks over the eastern horizon, he puts his arm around my shoulders, and Iris pulses next to my heart. We’ve never seen a more beautiful sunrise.