Part 3: The Girl at the Gate
Part 3: The Girl at the Gate
I froze. The world seemed to stop spinning. I looked at my mother, then at my father, whose face had gone a sickly shade of grey. I didn't wait for an explanation. I bolted out the front door, my heels clicking loudly on the marble steps. The evening air was biting, and the long driveway of my parents' estate was shrouded in mist. I ran toward the iron gates, my heart hammering against my chest. I didn't know what I was looking for, but then I saw her.
A woman was standing just outside the bars. She was wearing a thin, tattered coat that looked like it belonged in a different decade. She wasn't moving. She was just... watching. As I got closer, the breath left my lungs in a painful gasp. It was like looking into a distorted mirror. She had my eyes. She had the same slope of the nose, the same curve of the jaw. But where I was polished and well-fed, she looked hollowed out. Her hair was lank, and her skin had a translucent, sickly quality.
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'Elise?' I whispered, my hand trembling as I reached for the gate. She didn't smile. She didn't cry. She just looked at me with a profound, terrifying emptiness. 'They told me you were dead,' I sobbed, the tears finally overflowing. 'They told me I was alone.' She didn't speak for a long time. She just reached through the bars and touched the sleeve of my expensive wool coat. Her fingers were ice-cold. 'They didn't tell you I was dead, Elena,' she finally said, her voice a raspy echo of my own. 'They told me you were the one who died. They told me you died so they could give me to the 'System' while they kept the 'perfect' one.'
I felt a wave of nausea. My parents hadn't just hidden a tragedy; they had traded a human being. They had chosen which twin to keep based on some sick criteria of 'perfection' and discarded the other. Before I could say another word, a black SUV pulled up behind her, its headlights blinding me. Two men in suits, the same kind of men who worked as security for my father’s firm, stepped out. They didn't say a word. They just grabbed her by the arms. Elise didn't fight. She just looked at me as they pulled her toward the car. 'Check the basement of the summer house, Elena,' she screamed as they forced her inside. 'Check the floorboards!'
