Interchangeable

Instead of her usual dry red, Lara paced back and forth with a glass of whiskey in hand, impatiently waiting for the answer. There was no turning back now. So, she concentrated all of her charm, which usually worked like magic on other people, to convince herself that she was not a bad person. She needed to. The evidence–pointing its big, fat finger at her in the form of a text thread–stared back from her phone, judging her, making that job harder than she wanted to.

She had just taken a sip of whiskey when a quiet knock on the front door startled her. Her nerves–stretched and tense as guitar strings–almost snapped at the sound of three gentle raps.

Nearly choking on her drink, she tried to stay as quiet as humanly possible. Her heart hammered almost audibly, and mind raced a million miles per hour, trying to figure out who could be at the door at this hour, today of all days. She had deliberately made sure everyone thought she’d be out of town and unavailable this weekend. The last thing she needed was an unexpected visitor.

Frozen in place, she stared at the direction where her front door was. It wasn’t visible from where she stood and was obviously closed, but Lara didn’t dare to move herself. She held her breath and tried to listen to the sounds from the hallway.

Nothing.

Everything was completely still. Even the wind outside seemed to have taken a break. Almost like the knock had never even happened.

Lara started to think her mind was playing tricks on her, that the pressure was too much, and that her guilty mind had imagined the knock.

Or maybe it had been a loud knock at her neighbour’s door. It wouldn’t be the first time she heard people going in and out of other apartments in the hall.

Now certain that the knock wasn’t real, she continued her mantra, assuring herself she was not going to hell for this. That she was the victim of lifelong injustice and had simply taken the matters into her own hands. Only a small part of her–much smaller than she would have thought–was dreaming of what to do with the money.

She checked her phone again, fully expecting to see that one-word confirmation, but the text thread still only had the picture and the information she had provided earlier.

Lara had just exhaled in relief and was scolding herself for being ridiculous and imagining things when the knock recurred, much louder than earlier. Again, three raps, but unlike the first time–loud and certain. This time there was no doubt it was on her door.

She quickly checked her phone once more on her way to the door and stuck it in her pocket.

Just for a moment, she thought she saw something out of the corner of her eye–moving outside the window, in the blackness–but a double take only revealed her own reflection.

It was dark, the rain was pouring down, and the wind was now whistling wildly. It seemed as if the weather was in sync with these knuckles.

Lara always stood tall and confident, but the woman in the window reflection was nothing like that. A little voice in her head told her it was guilt. That’s what guilt does to a person. It shrinks them.

She quickly drowned that voice with another sip of whiskey and took the final step. Her heart pounding in her throat, she unlocked the door.

Uncertainty almost unbearable, she forced her tense, trembling fingers to grab the doorknob and pulled it open. Her hammering heart skipped a beat before racing on. Out of all the people who could've been at the door, it was the worst possible option.

Her own face looked back at her. Almost. It was her twin sister–an identical twin so alike, they had gone through life interchangeable in the eyes of everyone they met.

The only difference between the sisters at that moment was that Lucy was clearly relieved to see Lara opening the door.

An avalanche of feelings swept over Lara–jealousy, sadness, and anger–but what quickly took over were still guilt and shame.

No words felt good enough to say out loud. No words could undo what had already been done. Lara, a woman who never struggled to find words, had somehow lost the ability to even say hi.

Her hand instinctively reached for the phone, as it had a hundred times that night, but she was able to stop that reflex just in time, before the wrong set of eyes landed on that screen.

With a sigh of relief, and without even stepping inside, Lucy began talking as if a dam had broken and the words were pouring out.

"I just got back an hour ago, and I saw the documents! I'm so sorry, Lara! You have to know it wasn’t my doing. I had no idea mom would do this! Over a simple disagreement, no less! Even if mom wants to leave everything to me, I want you to get half, as discussed before. It’s only fair. I don’t know why she would do this. Again, I am so sorry! We can go and get a second contract drawn up and get it all notarised tomorrow. Maybe it’s even better if we don’t tell mom. Again, I am so-so sor..."

A deafening bang cut through the room, throwing Lara on the floor. The glass flew out of her hand, splattering whiskey everywhere and finally shattering into pieces on the floor between the sisters.

The dark golden-bronze liquid mixed with the crimson blood flowing out of Lara’s chest created a view that burned into Lucy’s mind even before she could fathom what had happened.

Four seconds–that felt like an eternity–later, finally able to move again, she kneeled down by her sister, frantically scanning the room to see what had happened.

Her panicked gaze stopped on the large living room window, which now had a clear, round hole in it–surrounded by hundreds of cracks spidering out in every direction. A shiver ran down her spine.

With one hand pressing on the wound in her sister's chest, Lucy patted down her pockets with the other and realised she had forgotten her phone when she'd darted out of her apartment to see Lara. Luckily, Lara’s phone was right there, sticking out of her pocket. Lucy grabbed it to call 911.

As soon as she did, Face ID unlocked it. Just like people, the phone didn’t see any difference between the sisters.

The screen revealed an open text thread to an unknown number, and at that same moment a notification appeared. Just one word.

"Done."

Lucy’s eyes jumped between the text, the hole in the window and her sister, who was trying to mutter something.

Dizzy and drifting on the line of here and elsewhere, Lara heard the text notification she'd been waiting for whole evening. She felt it in her chest.

Lucy’s blood curdled and ears began to ring when she noticed what the "Done" was an answer to.

Her full name and home address were just above it.

Barely able to hold the phone in her shaking hand, she scrolled up an inch in the text thread, revealing a familiar picture.

She locked eyes with herself, smiling carefreely in the photo, just before the phone slipped from her grasp.