On my wedding night, my wife told me her period had started and went to sleep without letting me near her. At 12:43 I woke up, and her side of the bed was empty. Seconds later, I heard intimate noises in my father\u2019s room and saw a woman enter with the same dress, same hair, and same silhouette as my wife. Five minutes later, she lay back down next to me as if nothing had happened.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen Arthur made a mistake last night\u2026 because that woman was never supposed to let you see her left hand.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt ice run down my spine.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas looked around before answering.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause she\u2019s missing her pinky finger.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stood frozen.<\/p>\n
I mentally went back to the crack in the door.<\/p>\n
The hand lifting up.<\/p>\n
The ring.<\/p>\n
The fingers.<\/p>\n
And then I remembered it.<\/p>\n
I hadn\u2019t thought about it in the moment.<\/p>\n
I had only seen the sparkle of the ring.<\/p>\n
But yes.<\/p>\n
The hand had looked strange.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho is she?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n
Silas gripped the keys tightly in his fist.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomeone your father swore had disappeared twenty-eight years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t understand anything.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen explain it to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
My uncle took a deep breath.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen your mother died, you thought she was the first woman Arthur had lost.\u201d<\/p>\n
I frowned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wasn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt a sharp sting.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mom was married to him for thirty years.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen what are you talking about?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas pointed toward the main building.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore he married your mother, Arthur was engaged to another woman.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe never told me that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo one told you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas lowered his voice.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause officially, she died.\u201d<\/p>\n
The word landed heavily.<\/p>\n
\u201cDied?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what they said.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you\u2019re saying she was the one in his room?\u201d<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t answer.<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t need to.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat was her name?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas closed his eyes.<\/p>\n
\u201cElena.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt something strange.<\/p>\n
The name sounded familiar.<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t know from where.<\/p>\n
\u201cElena what?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cVance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then I remembered.<\/p>\n
I had seen that last name.<\/p>\n
In my father\u2019s old documents.<\/p>\n
In a notebook.<\/p>\n
And once, as a child, on the back of a photograph that my mother snatched out of my hands way too fast.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened to her?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas sighed.<\/p>\n
\u201cYour father says one thing. I believe another.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTell me both.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cArthur says she had an accident. That her family took her away. That she died weeks later.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe she never died.\u201d<\/p>\n
I looked toward the windows.<\/p>\n
My father was still eating breakfast.<\/p>\n
Maya had just come downstairs.<\/p>\n
She smiled at him.<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t smile back.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy did they hide her?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas stared at me intently.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause Elena knew something about your father.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLike what?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know the whole story.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cUncle.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDamian, if I knew, I would tell you.\u201d<\/p>\n
He pulled the antique key from the ring.<\/p>\n
He held it out to me.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I do know where the answers are.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat does this open?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cA room.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn your grandmother\u2019s old house.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt something click into place.<\/p>\n
The house had been boarded up since my mother died.<\/p>\n
My father never wanted to sell it.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd why do you have the key?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause your mother gave it to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
I was speechless.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mom knew about Elena?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
That hurt.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd she never told me anything?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wanted to.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen?\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas looked at me with deep sadness.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight before she died.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt my chest tighten.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cArthur never let her be alone with you.\u201d<\/p>\n
I remembered my mother\u2019s final days.<\/p>\n
My father always hovering nearby.<\/p>\n
Always answering for her.<\/p>\n
Always saying she was too tired to talk.<\/p>\n
I thought he was just protecting her.<\/p>\n
Now, everything looked different.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere is the house?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cForty minutes away.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s go.\u201d<\/p>\n
Silas shook his head.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot today.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause your father already knows you saw something.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHow?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s been staring at you for five minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n
I turned around.<\/p>\n
Arthur was standing behind the glass.<\/p>\n
Holding his coffee mug.<\/p>\n
Watching us.<\/p>\n
Silas put the key away.<\/p>\n
\u201cAct normal.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNormal?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf he knows I told you something, he\u2019s going to move whatever is left in there.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd Maya?\u201d<\/p>\n
My uncle looked toward the door.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst, find out if she actually left your room last night.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cShe said she went to get water.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThen ask the staff downstairs.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was exactly my first test.<\/p>\n
I walked into the kitchen and found one of the estate\u2019s employees.<\/p>\n
\u201cExcuse me, did my wife come down for water last night?\u201d<\/p>\n
The woman thought for a second.<\/p>\n
\u201cMrs. Maya?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNot that I saw.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWas anyone down here after midnight?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cJust me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll night?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cUntil two in the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n
My stomach tied in knots.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd nobody came down?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOnly Mr. Arthur, right before midnight.\u201d<\/p>\n
I went back to the patio.<\/p>\n
Silas was gone.<\/p>\n
My father appeared behind me.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat were you asking about?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt looked like something.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t sleep well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arthur held my gaze.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s normal for the first night.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
He gave a faint smile.<\/p>\n
\u201cToo many emotions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then he placed a hand on my shoulder.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t confuse exhaustion with imagination.\u201d<\/p>\n
I felt a shiver.<\/p>\n
I hadn\u2019t told him anything.<\/p>\n
\u201cImagination?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI know you.\u201d<\/p>\n
He walked away.<\/p>\n
That morning, Maya acted just like she always did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On my wedding night, my wife told me her period had started and went to sleep without letting me near her. At 12:43 I woke up, and her side of … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4779,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life-story"],"yoast_head":"\n