Page 54 of Cracked Doll

Amara’s expression softens, just a fraction. "I can help you. Today's my day off anyway." She walks over to the door of the Tin Heart, shuts it with a firm click, and turns the lock. "Shop's closed. No customers, no distractions. Just us and whatever ghosts you've got hiding upstairs."

It's my day off too, so I wasn't really planning on opening.

As we start walking down the narrow hallway, a sound stops me dead in my tracks. A low, rumbling sound—like a dying engine.

Snore. Snore.

My Papa. He's home. I hadn't even noticed he'd returned, probably passed out in some chair or bedroom, oblivious to the world. I feel a surge of anxiety, a fear that he'll wake up and catch us poking through the ruins of my mother's life.

We move silently, stepping carefully over the creaky floorboards until we reach the attic door. Amara pushes it open, and the smell hits me first—stale air, old paper, and the lingering scent of damp wood and mothballs.

The attic is a graveyard of forgotten things. It's a cavernous, dusty space with slanted ceilings and heavy wooden beams that look like ribs arching over us. Shafts of grey light filter through a single, grime-streaked window, illuminating millions of dust motes dancing in the air.

Everywhere we look, there are piles of junk. Broken chairs with stuffing leaking out like guts, old trunks bound in rusted iron, and stacks of yellowed newspapers that look like they'd crumble if I breathed on them. There are headless mannequins draped in rotting fabric, looking like corpses waiting for a burial, and crates of old toy parts—wooden limbs and porcelain faces staring blankly from the shadows. It's cluttered, suffocating, and smells of decay.

Amara shivers, wrapping her arms around herself as she looks around the dismal space.

"Bloody hell, Ophelia," she whispers, her voice echoing. "It looks like a fucking ghost lives here.”

"It really does," I whisper, the words barely leaving my throat. The attic feels like it's breathing, the stale air pressing against my skin like a damp shroud.

We begin to sift through the wreckage of my mother's existence. I move with a cautious, trembling hand, but every time I spot a photograph—any image of me as a child with my sisters—I quickly slide it toward Amara. I can't do it. I can't look at those frozen smiles and feel the crushing weight of their absence. I can't afford to have a fucking panic attack right here, not in front of the only friend I have in this godforsaken world. I need to stay composed, or I'll shatter into a million jagged pieces.

Amara notices my avoidance but doesn't push. Instead, she picks up a dusty ledger and glances at me. "What was your mum's name, love?"

"Marguerite Hansburg," I reply softly.

Amara whistles low, her eyebrows shooting up. "Hansburg... sounds like proper old money, that. Like the kind of people who have estates with more rooms than they know how to use." She pauses, looking at me curiously. "What did she look like? Your mum?"

A hollow feeling opens up in my chest. "I've never seen a picture of her. Not one. My Papa... he got rid of everything."

Amara stops moving, her expression shifting from curiosity to genuine confusion. "Jeez. Why the fuck would he get rid of every single photo of the love of his life and the mother of his kids? That’s not just sad, Ophelia, that’s suspicious. It’s properly weird."

I shrug, though my heart is starting to hammer against my ribs. I don't have an answer.

"How did they even meet?" she asks, her voice softer now.

"Papa always told me they met while he was taking over the toy shop from his dying father," I explain, the story sounding like a rehearsed script in my head. "He said it was love at first sight. They went steady, and he proposed almost immediately. But her parents... they were rich, and they didn't want their daughter marrying a lowly toymaker. They told her if she went through with it, she’d be cut off and disowned. And she chose him. She chose Thomas Sorrell. After that, they never spoke to her again. They didn't even reach out after she died."

Amara scoffs, a sharp, cynical sound. "Right. Because rich people are known for being so fucking forgiving and kind. Absolute tossers, the lot of them."

I ignore the comment and keep digging, my fingers brushing against cold metal and rotting fabric. Amara continues to sort through the photos, her face focused, until she reaches a stack of yellowed, brittle newspapers. She freezes. Her entire body goes rigid.

"Ophelia," she says, her voice tight. "Get over here. Now."

I walk over to her, my boots clicking softly on the wooden floor. She’s pointing to the front page of a newspaper, the ink faded but the headline still screaming from the page.

January 4th, 2007.

The headline reads: Marguerite Hansburg, Heiress of Hansburg Family, Missing.

Below the text is a photograph. I feel the air leave my lungs in one violent rush. The woman in the photo is a mirror image of me. She has the same facial structure, the same delicate curve of the jaw. Her long black hair is swept up into a beautiful, intricate bun, and her eyes... they are a piercing, ice-blue, staring back at me from twenty years ago with a haunting intensity.

She wears modern clothes that look quite expensive. The white gloves she has have a Chanel logo.

I snatch the paper from Amara's hand, my fingers shaking so hard the newsprint rattles. I read the article, the words blurring before my eyes. It describes her disappearance, claiming she had been kidnapped by a man she had complained was stalking and harassing her. The police had a main suspect, though his identity remained unconfirmed.

The suspect is described as approximately 5'8" with brown hair and brown eyes.