Pictures of her in her track uniform and me in my soccer uniform.
Pictures of us hugging each other.
Pictures taken of us at school lunch one day. I had a bag of Cheetos, and she was eating a carrot. A goddamn carrot.
Pictures of us before school: Willow was in a dress. I was in jeans.
Willow wore a skirt, and I had holes in my shirt. Willow’s hair was always perfectly styled, and mine was pulled into a messy ponytail.
I got the message Stephanie wanted to send, and I looked at her, wiping some of my tears away. “What? Are you going to follow this presentation with your decision that she shouldn’t have killed herself, and I should’ve? That she was the twin who shined, and I wasn’t? That I’m drab, and dull, and boring? And she excelled at almost everything?”
I had crossed the living room so my shadow hit the projector. Images of my sister continued to play over my face, but I kept staring right at Stephanie.
“Do you think I don’t think of that every day since I found her?” I whispered. “Do you think I’m not haunted by her? By the thought that if I had—maybe she wouldn’t have?”
My voice broke at the end.
Someone sniffled behind me.
I heard another whisper.
And I felt a presence at my back. I thought it was Willow at first until a hand—a real live hand—touched mine. It was Ryan. He didn’t pull me back, though. He was just there for me.
I latched on to him, lacing our fingers together, and he moved a step closer so I could feel his heat against my back. His other hand rested on my hip.
Stephanie’s malice had started to wane, and her forehead wrinkled as she began to frown. “I mean, come on.” She glanced around for support.
There was none.
I didn’t look, but I could feel the somberness creeping over the room. Anyone who had thought this was going to be funny didn’t seem to anymore, and if it wasn’t because of me, it probably had to do with Ryan, and the whole group that stood behind us.
“It’s obvious your sister was popular, and you’re . . .” She tried to sneer at me. And like everything else, that too failed.
“I’m what?” I raised my chin higher. “Mourning such a deep loss that I hope even you will never feel anything like it? Healing? Trying to keep going? Forcing myself to go forward because my family needs me? Because I’ve found people here who love me and support me, and I need to keep going for them? Is that what I am?” I raised my voice, grating out, “Does that somehow make me less than you? Less than anyone else in this room? Or maybe, just maybe, that makes me stronger than you? That makes me a goddamn survivor, when trust me, the thought of joining my sister is sometimes easier than breathing.”
I was letting everyone see my insides.
All these months of not talking, and it was spilling out.
I could feel their surprise. It was in the way Ryan tightened his hold on my hand before letting it relax. The way the whole crowd seemed to waver, and the way Stephanie’s eyes widened, and the blood drained, finally, from her face.
I turned to my two ex-friends and burned them with the same look of hatred I had for Stephanie. “How dare you come here. How dare you bring that video to a party. How dare you befriend someone you knew wasn’t reaching out with my best interest at heart.”
Zoe and Gianna blanched, but their mouths opened. I didn’t let them speak. I kept going.
“How dare you turn your back on me? How dare you—just, how dare you?”
I didn’t care why Duke or Serena were there, but I turned to them anyway. “Willow would hate you for this, and you know it.”
Serena hung her head, but Duke surged forward again. “It isn’t like that. I mean . . .” He gestured to Stephanie. “She said she was your friend.”
Zoe and Gianna stepped forward, right behind him.
Zoe tried to smile at me. “We felt bad after you left, Kenz.”
“And what Duke said is right. She reached out to us, saying she was your friend.” Gianna glanced at Stephanie. “You haven’t been on social media. I’ve been sending you messages almost since you left, but you haven’t been getting them.”
Because I was using Willow’s account.
“We didn’t know who you were friends with. Honestly, we had no idea. We aren’t here to hurt you.” Zoe started crying. “We really aren’t.”
I shook my head.
Ryan spoke over my head, “You thought showing a video of her sister at a high school party was a good thing?” His tone was hard, biting. “How the fuck do you make that right in your head?”
“We didn’t—” Duke started.
“The laughter should’ve been the first clue!” Ryan cut him off, moving ahead of me. “Her face should’ve been the second.” He jabbed a finger in the air toward Stephanie. “She looked goddamn evil when we first came in. If the other stuff hadn’t sunk in, that look should’ve had you scrambling to turn the goddamn machine off!”
“We—”
Zoe interrupted Gianna, her shoulders sinking down. “We weren’t thinking. You’re right. We weren’t thinking.”
“I was hoping it’d all be okay,” Duke said. “That’s what I was hoping. But I swear, Mackenzie, we didn’t come to hurt you. We came to apologize.” He glanced to the others before placing his hand to his chest. “Or I came to apologize. You tried to talk to me after the memorial service, and I blew you off.” He gestured to Willow’s ex-friend. “Serena and I both did.”
“It’s just hard—”
I nodded, speaking before Serena could say more. “To see her when you look at me? To hear her when you talk to me? Trust me. I get it.”
“You didn’t expect her to stay, did you?” Erin stepped out of the crowd and folded her arms. She looked right at Stephanie, who had tried to blend in with her friends. “You thought she’d come in, see them, see the video, hear the laughter, and then run away crying? That was what you thought would happen, wasn’t it?”
Stephanie’s friends melted away, leaving her standing alone. She glared at them before facing Erin and then me. “To be honest, I was going to say everything Mackenzie guessed. That the wrong sister died, that Willow seemed like the better of the two. It’s obvious from the pictures. So yeah.” She jerked her head higher. “I was going to use the weapon she gave me, and destroy her with it.”
She turned to me. “Imagine my surprise when I found out you hadn’t been talking to your friends from home, and that Willow’s boyfriend and best friend were dating. I mean, you were asking for it.” Her eyes trailed to Ryan, pausing a beat before looking away.
“Because of him?” I dropped his hand, moving around him.
“Yeah!” Her head flared up again. “He’s ours! He should be dating one of us, not you! Not someone who . . . you’re mental! I’ve heard you talking to yourself in the bathroom. You freak out in the classrooms like you’re nuts or something.” Her hands went to the sides of her head. “You don’t deserve him. You . . .”
My head tilted to the side. “I what?”
“You . . .” She gulped and then shrugged. “You aren’t good enough for him.”