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Left a few things out of your story, didn’t you, Tom?
I’m folding the report when I see the photograph again. This time, I realize there’s someone else in the picture. I catch a glimpse of the face and pull back with a sharp inhale.
It’s Daisy.
I shake my head. No, that’s impossible. I must be just seeing a girl who resembles her.
There’s a magnifying glass on the desk. Liam had been examining this photo before he came over. He’d seen what I do, and he wanted a closer look.
I turn on the desk light and move the photo under it.
If this isn’t Daisy, it’s a very close relative.
I lift the photo. As it catches the light, I notice black marks showing through. I flip it over and read “CeCe & Tom, July 1988.”
In my mind, I see Maeve, sitting on the sofa. Liam had just stepped into the kitchen after introducing us.
“Celeste,” she says. “You don’t go by CeCe anymore, I take it.”
I wrinkle my nose. “No, that’s a little girl’s name.”
“And you’re not a little girl anymore.” Do I detect disappointment in her voice? “All grown up.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Maeve cackles. “Well, at least that hasn’t changed. You always were a polite little thing.”
That was the real trick to assuming another persona. All the research in the world wouldn’t help me become the girl that Maeve remembered. Yet I’d learned that when I took on other identities, what mattered weren’t the facts of someone’s life but the things others remembered about her.
You always were a polite little thing. Time to start remembering my p’s and q’s, then.
You still run, Miz Turner? You used to run everywhere when you were a girl.Time to take up jogging.
How’s that ankle doing, Miss Celeste? You sprained it pretty bad back in the old days.Why, yes, Doctor, it’s as good as new—I never get so much as a twinge in it these days. You fixed it up right.
CeCe.
While I didn’t need to use the ridiculous little-girl name, I had to be prepared to respond to it, like the real Celeste Turner would have, back when...
My gaze rivets on the photo.
Daisy.
CeCe.
No. No goddamn way.
The scene in my mind shifts as I remember a photograph on Maeve’s mantle. It’s a young man, no more than twenty, good-looking with a killer smile and the slightly unfocused eyes of an addict. That smile, though...
He holds a little girl on his lap, and he’s beaming like the gods rewarded his sorry life with a gift beyond measure. A cherub-faced toddler, smiling sweetly up at the man.
“You sure did love your daddy, girl,” Maeve says as she catches me looking at the photo.
“I did.” I sigh, as if in remembered pleasure mingled with regret. “Dad had his problems, but he did his best.”
“That he did.”
How many times had I seen that photo? I’d watched Daisy walk right past it. The girl in that photo was little more than a baby, chubby, a doll with blond curls and wide eyes. She’s not the girl in Tom’s photo, thin, with straight blond hair and shy eyes. That girl looks like Daisy.
Daisy.
CeCe.
The real Celeste Turner.
