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“Uh huh.” He drops his hand. “I’ll hand it to your father, he was thorough.”
“I’m telling you, you have the wrong girl.”
“Still haven’t convinced you, have I?” He pushes to a stand and my heart feels like it’s about to beat its way out of my chest, my anxiety increasing. “Then how do you explain this?” He pulls something from his back pocket. It isn’t until he extends it to me that I realize it’s a picture. “Go ahead, take it,” he barks when I don’t immediately move to accept it.
I jump at the harshness of his voice, tugging the old looking photo from his grasp. My vision is slightly blurred from unshed tears, so I have to blink several times before the image comes into view.
I look at the man. Black hair, dark eyes, skin so tan it’s almost brown. Much like the man standing in front of me. I look over his features, study his eyes, but there’s nothing familiar about him to me.
I wish I could say the same about the woman sitting next to him in the photo. She looks almost too familiar. She looks like, well, me. Same slender build. Same nose and chin. Same blue eyes. The only difference between us is that I’m younger than she was in the picture, and while she has blonde hair, I have hair so dark most would classify it as black.
And then there’s the small, dark haired toddler in her lap. I know the instant I see the child that it’s me. I’ve seen enough pictures of myself from when I was little to know what I looked like. Sure, I’m a little younger than the oldest photos my mom has of me, but not by much.
Suddenly, everything he said starts to sound a little less crazy.
Are these two people really my parents?
Is my mom, or the woman I call mom, really my aunt?
Has my entire life been a lie?
“I’m guessing you recognize the little girl.” His voice is softer this time, coaxing my gaze up to where he’s standing next to the bed.
“It’s me,” I admit, fresh tears welling behind my eyes.
“It is.”
“I don’t... I don’t know these people.” I look back down at the photo. There’s something so familiar about the woman. If I think hard enough, dig deep enough into the recesses of my brain, I can almost see her face in a memory. She’s there, somewhere that I can’t reach. “Why? Why would my mom lie to me? Why would she keep this from me?”
“To protect you.”
“Protect me from what?”
“From people like me.”
The picture falls from my fingers, landing somewhere beside me on the bed.
“Are you going to kill me?” The fear in my voice is obvious.
“That depends on you.”
My eyes swing to the door.
Without a second thought, I fling my legs over the bed and run as quickly as I can toward the door. Tugging on the knob, I let out a frustrated cry when it doesn’t budge.
I spin around to face the man who didn’t attempt to stop me from fleeing.
“Let me out!” My voice echoes off the walls around us.
“I’m afraid I can’t do that.” He crosses his arms in front of his chest. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that he’s amused, which only fuels the flames of my anger.
“Let me the fuck out!” I repeat, louder this time.
“You can scream all you want. It won’t do you any good.”
“Why are you doing this?” I turn and tug on the doorknob again, hoping for a different result but knowing I won’t get one.
“In case you haven’t noticed, it’s locked.”
