She’s got this sort of Lisa Marie Presley vibe going on, or a pre-sobriety Drew Barrymore thing. Those great lips, sleepy eyes, and haunting voice.

She’s got true darkness about her.

When I told her I envied her that, she told me, “You’ll never be the night, Serena, you’ve got so much warm light inside of you. You’re burning bright.”

She said it like it was a blessing, like she was the one who envied me.

Then she sang Shinedown’s “Burning Bright” like a lullaby. God, it sounded so cool drawn out of her ethereal throat. So poetic and perfect, just like Kori herself. The first time I heard her sing, it was pure, flesh-chilling awe, like hearing The Sundays’ version of “Wild Horses” after years of the Stones.

“You could use it, you know … if you ever have need,” Kori said as I handed her fake ID back. “If anyone questions you on it, just remember it has my address and we were born in ’87.” Kori and I have the same birth date. Twins separated at conception. That’s my theory at least.

She scrutinized me. “And, of course, you’d have to remember that you’re me.”

Ever since Kori and I became friends, ever since she’d spoken those simple words—“We’re more alike than you think”—I’d been trying to find anything inside of me, anything at all, that resembled her.

Even with her fake ID, I don’t think I could ever forget that I was not her.

After all, she was the kind of girl who could get a fake ID, get up in front of a club full of people and sing, and I was so not that girl.

In fact, today I was the girl whose mother couldn’t even bother to have a verbal conversation with her. The girl who had to crack Da Sticky Note Code.

In my experience with things like this, I’ve found it’s a good idea to have a defense strategy already in place. First I needed to figure out exactly what she knew. In English class, when Mrs. Talaber and her Aqua Nest hair started in on part five of her thirty-part series on sonnets, I decided to make a list of all the possibilities. Not that I’m all that big on lists or anything, but I’m not big on sonnets either.

I decided to classify my crimes into three categories: Petty Offenses, Misdemeanors, and Felonies.

With pen poised as if hanging on Mrs. Talaber’s every overly enunciated word, I gave it some thought.