She stopped at the restroom on her way out of the building and found herself, for the third time in as many days, gazing at her reflection with an odd feeling. A feeling of puzzlement, perhaps.

She arrived early for her next appointment with Dr. Kirkland, giving her time to settle the long overdue bill. Finally, the Lindsey Price on the credit card was really her. Part of the court ruling had been that she repay the credit card bills sent to her mother since leaving Yale. Linda had been fine with that—it severed the last claim her mother could make on her.

She now had the eager attention of the trust department of two financial institutions, as well as the lawyers who had probated her father’s and grandfather’s wills. They were relieved, they said, to finally be able to work with her. Still, it was to Ted Jeffers she turned for advice.

“If you’re not foolish, you’ll never have to work,” he’d explained. “This wasn’t an enormous sum of money, in today’s world. Your mother is worth many, many times this in her own right.”

“So she wanted to control it simply because it let her control me.”

He’d nodded and Linda had set about understanding how investments, dividends, fixed income instruments and annuities worked.

“I guess I can self-publish it,” Linda told Dr. Kirkland, after she asked how the meetings with publishers over the last several days had gone. “I would like to move on.”

“How so?”

“I was thinking of going back to Yale. Just to finish those classes and get my MBA. It can’t hurt.” She found herself fidgeting in her seat. The sun was setting into a gray horizon. It might technically soon be spring but not in this part of the world.

“That’s an excellent idea.” Dr. Kirkland smiled her approval. “You’ve always regretted not finishing.”

“It wasn’t my fault.”

“I know.”

Linda gazed out of the window and she saw a woman in the glass looking back at her. She leaned closer. The figure was too vague to see the eyes but the general shape of the other woman’s features—the hair, the way she sat—twisted up like a girl who didn’t know what to do with her legs—were clear. Linda felt as if she ought to know who that was but she didn’t.

“Linda? What are you thinking about?”

Considering her words for a long time, Linda finally said, “That when I look in the mirror I don’t know who that is.”

Dr. Kirkland nodded slowly. “Adult Linda hasn’t really focused much on herself. She spent a lot of energy keeping herself together.”

“Yeah, I get that, but that’s not what I mean. I’m not talking metaphorically. I mean literally. I don’t know who the woman in the mirror is. She’s not me.”

Dr. Kirkland cocked her head to the left. “What would be different about her, if you wanted to be able to recognize her?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m supposed to look like. My ears should stick out, I guess, and I ought to have a hair or two on my chin. My nose ought to hook. My waist should be thicker. But . . . to get back to the woman I would have been if I hadn’t had those surgeries I’d have to have more surgeries. And undo . . .” She had an unwelcome thought.