“Jesus, fucking Christ.” My hands come up, swiping down my face, and I shake my head. “He wasn’t yours to take. She loved him. You... you tricked him.”

Amy nods, her face slowly caving as every inch of her tightens in anguish and her cries grow uncontrollable, her words hiccupped through tears and chokes. “I just wanted to see if he would know, if he really loved her because if he did, he would know, right? I didn’t mean to keep going, I... and when she walked in...”

“Oh my god, she saw,” I breathe, my stomach threatening to empty itself.

“Dax, he... he broke down, fell to his knees and Jules she felt like ... like nothing. She started to wonder if maybe he didn’t love her like she thought, but he did. He loved her so much. I... I had the lights low, the wig. Her clothes, but none of that mattered to her. Something happened in her mind that day and...” she wails. “Oh my god, I killed my sister. My twin. How can I ever look at myself in the mirror again? I did this. I’m a fucking monster!”

She jumps up suddenly, running to the railing, and my eyes shoot wide.

“Amy!” I throw myself forward, grabbing a piece of her shirt, and it tears from its threading. “Amy, Stop!”

I grab her around the waist and yank her backward as she kicks and screams and then she too cracks.

Breaks.

She falls to the floor, desperate screams echoing around us.

The only thing I can do is hug her back, so I do.

I want to tell her it wasn’t her fault, that she must have been dealing with things she didn’t know how to share or maybe feared to try.

There are so many things that could have contributed to the tragedy of this morning, but we may never know what those are, and we may never understand. All we can do is love her for who she was and miss her for the girl we knew.

My chest aches, but I push it away.

Dad.

I’m seconds from a mental breakdown, ready to run.

Thankfully, her parents are flying around the corner in the next moment, pulling her into their arms.

I back away, rushing down the stairs and out the door. I don’t pause when Cali calls my name, and I don’t look around for Charles.

I charge out the front door, down the driveway and into the street, but I’m flanked, stopped dead in my tracks. All the air is lifted from my lungs, yet in a senseless twist, I somehow feel like I can finally breathe.

And I fall into him.