Page 183 of Under Story

After this, she becomes still, turning inward. Laurel has attributed Gloria’s melancholy to her years at Sunrise. But perhaps she also shares a taproot with Gloria One, who lived most of her life alone, and whose parents vanished when she was the same age Laurel is now.

“You knew her, then?” Gloria asks. “My double?”

Laurel smiles. “She was one of the people I loved most in the world.”

She expects that Gloria will have questions about her counterpart. Louis Two wanted to know what became of Louis One, and Riordan was elated to learn that, in Laurel’s world, the Renaissance really existed. In fact, Laurel is eager to say more—to share Gloria One with the person to whom she matters most. Before she can speak, Gloria Two holds up a hand.

“No,” she says. “Please. I want to find out on my own.”

“I thought you were upset that I didn’t tell you sooner.”

“I am. I wish I’d known about you and Laurel Two. I would have tried to help. But I don’t want anyone to tell me who I am.”

That was fitting, Laurel thought—and very like Gloria One, though she didn’t say so.

The wind whistles outside; in the light of a streetlamp, snow blows erratically. Paul crosses his legs.

“What are you thinking?” Eli asks him.

Paul smiles. “I suppose I’m being philosophical.”

“In what way?”

“Well, I’m familiar with your work. I notice that you talk about these worlds—these people—as though they’re separate. Even the word Duoverse implies two parts, not one.”

Eli leans forward with interest. “As opposed to…?”

“Let’s define your concept first: two universes, and two versions of you—each contained in their world, like twins in separate sacs. That could very well be true. But there’s an equally plausible alternative: a single person, who moves across…” He raises an eyebrow, teacherly.

“A two-part timeline,” Eli says.

“Exactly. In that case,” says Paul, “the timeline wouldn’t be a line at all. A person would turn”—he traces a circle—“from one life to the next. Each universe would not be the other’s antithesis but its continuation.”

Laurel’s mind whirls. If Paul is right, then death is merely an intermission between acts.

“The other Laurel would be…my afterlife. My ghost,” she says. “Or I would be hers.”

She must remind herself that words like beginning and end, one and two, are a matter of perspective. A line implies before and after; a circle says, And then, and then…

Paul smiles. “We can’t know, of course. And maybe the distinction doesn’t matter. But you came here for a reason,” he says. “How can we help?”

Laurel tells Gloria and Paul about her theory of the unconscious. Eli describes the group dream and the letters they found in the bulbs. Finally, Laurel explains how genus twig led to the other Laurel’s letter—and that guest wing brought her here, to the room at the end of the hallway.

—

The guest wing contains a bathroom and a bedroom; a third door leads to the yard. In the bedroom, a tufted rug squishes under Laurel’s socks. Embroidered folk art hangs on the wall, and a quilt drapes over the bed. Laurel recognizes squares from Gloria’s black linen dress and the bandanna she wore during the Spark.

Laurel sets her candle down and flexes her hands. It feels as though her body is preparing for an athletic event. The others watch as she wanders through the room, passing a wooden desk and a family of matryoshka dolls. The closet contains a decorative tin and two pairs of slippers. Nothing feels charged or portentous.

No, she pleads, silently. This can’t be the end of the road.

“Laurel,” says Eli, “do you think that the Twos could be trying to go home, too?”

“They could be,” Laurel says. Then: “They must be,” she adds, with more conviction. In Kenji’s office, she had asked whether she made her own choices. You both do, he said. You make them together.

Eli steps forward. “Maybe, if you try to tune in to her…”

Laurel closes her eyes and slows her breathing. She tries not to feel self-conscious, pretends that no one is there but the two of them. It almost feels like running roll call at Happy Camper School.