“What’s the damage?” I asked, my neck stiff from tension.

Amy answered, eyes downcast. “Altered personality, memories not connecting. She came over with a friend and he said she was different after. There was a gap and the passenger wedged itself in there.”

“When the passenger butts in, it saves over your work, and the undo button on the metaphysical keyboard stops working,” Chris said.

“She,” I said. “At least tell me it’s not some blonde girl—”

I saw the way both of my parents looked at Amy, how Amy seemed confused for one second, then processed what I’d said.

Holy shit. I’d guessed right.

I’d have been lying if I said I didn’t feel some justice in seeing the pain in Amy’s face.

“—that you’re not being that redundant while you’re repeating old mistakes.”

Unnecessary. Maybe the only thing I’d regret saying so far. Words just to cause her more pain.

“That doesn’t have anything to do with anything,” Amy said it in a hollow way, with no energy or emotion backing the words.

And I really hadn’t wanted to be right, to have any character trait to put on this victim—not yet.

“Suddenly I’m really glad I didn’t ask her to look after my battle scars,” Vista said.

“That’s not—” Amy started. Her expression changed. Wounded. “I thought we got along, Vista.”

“A long time ago,” Vista said.

“You guys are making this out to be like I haven’t changed, like it’s a repeat incident, and it’s not,” Amy said, and her voice was firmer, almost angry. “I’m handling this, okay? It was one mistake—”

“That erased a person’s personality?” I asked.

“One mistake, and I have a support structure in place. I’m not spiraling out. I recognized when it started to affect my work, I stopped, took a break, stepped back, got centered again. It’s why progress with Mom is slow.”

The word ‘mom’ sounded so alien from her mouth.

“It’s affecting your other work?” I asked.

“It was. So I stopped,” she said, like it was the simplest thing in the world, like she was explaining things to someone who wasn’t listening.

“Affected it how?”

“Minor slip-ups.”

“Slip-ups like minor personality erasures, or—”

“No. Things in my subconscious crept in, or I got placements wrong, or I… colored outside the lines a bit. But I recognized the pattern, I stepped back, recovered, and fixed the superficial errors.”

She’s not well, my mother had said.