by Cj Omololu
I open the door to the van, jump out, and head for Zane as fast as I can. I hear Ava call my name, but I don’t stop and don’t even look toward her silver car. My eyes are glued to the girl talking to Zane—the girl who looks just like us but isn’t Ava. In some part of my brain, all of the events of the past few weeks have started to make sense, but all I can do is stare in disbelief.
“What the hell?” Ava says as we reach them at the same time. Her voice has an angry edge to it that I feel but can’t really express.
There’s no mistaking it as we look at the girl standing next to Zane. She looks just like us. She has the same dark curly hair and green eyes that I’ve seen in my mirror for as long as I can remember. She’s even wearing the diamond pendant that I threw out the window of Zane’s van last night. It’s impossible, but only one word escapes my lips in these first few seconds.
“Alicia?”
“It’s Rubi,” the girl says calmly, as if she’s been expecting this confrontation all along. I recognize the name from Cecilia’s text. I knew that had nothing to do with Cecilia’s sister’s husband. This is who they were talking about. Worrying about. My stomach sinks—Cecilia has something to do with this. Out of all the ways I imagined this ending, no way I pictured what’s standing right in front of me.
“What?” demands Ava. Her disbelief is almost palpable. We can’t believe what we’re seeing. Is it the makeup or the clothes that make her look so much like the two of us? I’m not sure, but whatever it is, she’s doing a better job at being Alicia than I ever could.
“My name’s Rubi, not Alicia.” Even her voice sounds like Ava’s. The girl’s hand goes to the pendant around her neck. “I love that you think that.”
By the tone of her voice, I can tell Ava’s feeling threatened when she says, “You have two seconds to tell us what the hell is going on here before—”
“Before what?” Rubi says. A small smile crosses her lips. “Before you call the cops?” She glances at me. “We all know you’re not going to do that. I’m guessing you were pretty careful to make sure that none of them followed you today.”
Suddenly it all makes sense—the strange Alicia sightings in the surveillance photo, at the food trucks, and at the club, not to mention the angry guy at the party who we’d never seen before. She turns her head, and I see two faint parallel pink lines running down her neck and into her jacket. The exact marks fingernails would make if Casey grabbed her. It wasn’t me or Ava behind all of this—it was this girl.
I notice her hand move toward the white bag. If she murdered Eli last night, she might still have the knife on her.
“There’s something in her hand!” I grab her arm roughly, and her wallet falls to the ground.
“Take it easy,” Rubi says, wrenching her arm away. “I’m not the killer, if that’s what you’re worried about. And neither is Ava.” She bends down and gathers up the wallet and some papers that fell out of it.
Ava whirls on me. “You thought I killed Eli? What the hell? What about you? What am I supposed to think when one second you vanish into thin air, and the next the club is full of cops and Eli’s dead?”
I’m suddenly not sure of anything anymore. “He was already dead when I found him,” I explain quickly, trying to blink back from my mind the image of his lifeless body. “Someone had gotten to him first. I saw you on the way to the bathroom, and then I couldn’t find you, so I figured—”
“You figured I was the killer? I’ve spent the last twelve hours looking for you. Of all the ungrateful, insane ideas—”
Rubi holds out her hands to stop Ava just as she’s ramping up. “Neither of you killed Eli. Or Dylan or Casey. It’s all a mistake. There have been too many secrets for too long—I’m here to straighten stuff out.” She opens the wallet and pulls out a driver’s license. One with a picture that looks just like ours and with the name Alicia Rios on it.
“Where did you get that?” Ava asks.
Rubi turns it around so she can admire it. “Had it made. Took the test and everything.”
Ava’s cheeks are red, and I can see she’s frustrated. “What the hell? I have Alicia’s ID. And it’s fake.”
“Yeah, well … this one is more official.” I picture the cops at our door, Alicia’s license mysteriously on their computers.
“Which is why the police had a copy of it,” I say. “Why would you do that?” Does she want so desperately to be like us?
Rubi shrugs. “I needed it in order to be Alicia, and a real one was a lot cheaper than a fake ID. And my parents said that if I got a speeding ticket they’d take my car away. It wasn’t that hard.”
“That’s crazy.” I study her face, and I can’t deny that she looks the part—whoever did her makeup is amazing.
“This is bullshit,” Ava says, echoing my thoughts. I can see from her face how much she doesn’t like to be out of her element like this. “I don’t care what the license says. Who the hell are you?”
Rubi straightens up, and I can’t tell if she really is this calm or if it’s all an act. “I thought you’d figured it out by now. I’m your sister.”
Ava takes a step closer to me, solidarity apparently overcoming anger. “We don’t have a sister. We’re twins.”
“Actually, we are triplets.”
She says that like it won’t change everything. Triplets. I feel like I can’t breathe, like all of this must be some kind of sick joke. But I look at her and can’t deny what I’m seeing.
Rubi looks from me to Ava. “I somehow thought you’d be happy when you guys finally found out the truth. I’ve been keeping the secret for months, and it’s been killing me.”
“Months?” Ava demands. “You’ve known about this for months?”
She shrugs, and it seems like Rubi is trying to look casual, like finding out you have another sister is something that happens every day. “I followed Cecilia to your house one day. They’ve always been so secretive about where she goes, and why I can never go along. You weren’t home, but I saw your rooms and the pictures on the wall and started to put it all together. I promised them I wouldn’t tell,” she says. For the first time she looks a little bit guilty. “But it was harder than I thought it would be.”
My heart drops. Cecilia knows about this girl. She’s been lying to us our whole lives. “What does Cecilia have to do with all of this?”
Rubi raises her eyebrows at me. “Cecilia is our aunt. Our mother’s sister.”
Ava’s face is bright red. “Dad would never lie to us like that!”
“He doesn’t know there were three of us.” Rubi shakes her head. “And he doesn’t know that Cecilia had anything to do with it. As far as your dad knows, she’s just an employee who volunteered to become his housekeeper when his wife up and bailed on him.”
Ava steps toward her. “So your … mother … just got rid of two of us, like puppies in a litter that was too big? Dumped us on the restaurant steps like a bag of garbage?”
For a second I see the first cracks of doubt in Rubi’s face. She doesn’t like us talking bad about her mother. Our mother? It’s so hard to believe, but the proof is standing here staring me in the face—telling me the story that I’ve always wanted to hear—at the totally wrong time and place.
Rubi’s jaw clenches. “It wasn’t like that. Mama was only eighteen and couldn’t raise us all, so she did what she thought was best. You two were the chosen ones, with the big house and the new cars. How do you think I felt, seeing all the things you got growing up?”
“You got our mother.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. “Isn’t that enough?”
Zane hasn’t said a word this entire time, has just been looking from one of us to the next. He catches my glance. “What?” he says. “You have to admit this is pretty freaky.”
I look around at the empty parking lot, suddenly feeling very exposed. “We need to get out of here before someone recognizes me.” I look at the two of them. “Us.”
“That’s why I’
m here,” Rubi says. “This has gone on too long. I need to turn in evidence that will help clear your name.” She nods at me. “All of our names. Thanks to you, I can’t show my face around town at the moment.”
“What evidence?”
“I got a look at someone who pulled into the Cheesecake Factory parking lot that night. And part of a license plate. Find him and you’ll find the guy who’s behind the murders. I’m sure of it.”
“What were you doing there in the first place?” I ask.
A look of guilt crosses her face. “I was being Alicia.” She glances at me. “I’d gone out with Casey a couple of times. As Alicia. I didn’t know what had happened with you the night before. I thought it would be fun to surprise Casey after he got off work.” Rubi puts one hand up to her neck. “He thought it was a little less fun.” She holds out a scrap of paper for us all to see. “When I took off, I saw another car pull into the lot. I should have turned this information in a long time ago.”
I look at the paper. 7ETR. “That’s it? Four figures?”
“That’s enough,” Rubi says defensively. “It was a black pickup truck, and a guy in a dark hoodie was driving. It pulled up right beside Casey’s car after I got out of there. I remembered the license plate when I found out what happened. I have kind of a photographic memory.”
“Did you see him?” I ask. “Did you see this mysterious guy in a black truck kill Casey?”
“No. But who else would have pulled into an empty parking lot in the middle of the night?”
“All you have is a partial license plate and your word that this truck was in the parking lot that night,” I say, anticipating Ms. Alvarez’s reaction. “Unless you have a picture of him actually killing Casey, this isn’t going to do us much good.” Rubi looks at the piece of paper again, the confident look slipping from her face.
“All we know is that the killer is someone who owns a hoodie and a black truck.” I squeeze my eyes shut. “Not exactly narrowing the suspect pool.”
“It’s better than nothing,” Zane says, taking another look at the paper. “I mean, at least we could get Ms. Alvarez to run the plate against black trucks in the area. It’s a start.”
“It’s a shitty start,” I say. “All it proves is that there was someone in the parking lot around the same time.” I want what Rubi is saying to be true, but I just don’t know how to prove it.
“Why should we believe anything you say?” Ava says to Rubi. “This is … this is insane!”
“Do you have any better suggestions?” Rubi asks. It’s almost a taunt. She makes a sweeping motion with her arm. “Anything else that would explain what I’m doing here?”
I don’t say a word. It feels like the world is closing in on me, fast.
“I’ll go,” Ava says, grabbing the paper from Rubi. “I’ll take it to the lawyer.”
I take a step toward her, already feeling guilty for suspecting her. “No, let me. This is my mess.”
“You can’t go in there,” Ava says. “Every cop within fifty miles is looking for you. What if someone sees you? Or worse, what if Ms. Alvarez is under some kind of obligation to turn you in?”
“You look just like me,” I remind her. “What’s to stop them from arresting you instead?”
Ava waves her hands at me. “My fingerprints are different, and they fingerprinted me last night,” she says. “If they do take me in, it won’t take them long to figure out it’s me and not you. But I don’t think it’ll get that far.”
I’m starting to say something more, when I catch Zane’s eye and the almost imperceptible shake of his head. I take a deep breath and let it go. “I’ll wait out here, but the minute I see one flashing light on a cop car, I’m coming in to get you.”
“I’m coming too,” Rubi says, taking a few steps toward the building. “It’s my evidence.”
Ava whirls on her, more in command of the situation than I’ve ever seen her. “And she’s my sister. You stay.”
Zane puts a hand out to stop Rubi. “Let her go. No sense muddying up the water right now. Giving you up to the lawyer is only going to put a bigger target on everyone’s head.” Rubi hesitates, and I can see her thinking about it. “Zane’s right. Instead of just being after me, they’ll want all of us,” I tell her.
“Okay,” Rubi says. “But you’ve got to make her believe you. Tell her that they need to find this guy.” She looks down at her hands. “I should have done this a long time ago. I just … I just didn’t think this many people would get hurt.”
“I got this,” Ava says, straightening her back and walking toward the steps.
“I don’t like being out here,” I say, looking around at the open parking lot. “Can we wait for Ava in the van?”
“Let’s go,” Zane says, putting one hand protectively around my waist. Once we reach the van, he slides the door open, but I put a hand out to stop Rubi. “No way.” I turn to Zane. “I don’t want her in there.”
Zane pauses. “Your suspect list gets longer by the minute. Why would she come here if she had something to do with the killings?”
Rubi smiles at Zane but says nothing.
I look away from her—there’s something disturbing about seeing my face on someone who isn’t Ava. “You’ve already admitted that you’re a stalker. So now I’m supposed to invite you into a conveniently enclosed space?”
Rubi drops her bag to the ground and holds her arms out wide. “Frisk me,” she says. “Go ahead, pat me down. Check my bag—whatever you want.”
I know she’s bluffing, so I call her on it and quickly run my hands over her pockets while Zane picks the white bag up off the ground.
“There’s nothing in here,” Zane says, handing it to me.
“Okay,” I say, pointing to the open door. “But I’m watching you.”
“If this is the way you treat family …” She peers into the van and then jumps back. “Holy shit! What is that?”
I look in and see Bettina in the corner. I’d forgotten about her. “She’s good at keeping secrets,” I say. “And she doesn’t track people like they’re the wounded antelope on the Serengeti.”
Rubi sighs and climbs in. “It wasn’t like that,” she says, settling against the back wall of the van.
“So what was it like, then?” I say, leaning against the back of the front seat. It’s not that I don’t want to sit near Rubi but that I want to get up the courage to look at her. I stare at her face and try to pick out the differences. They’re there, just like there are differences between me and Ava, but it’s almost impossible to put into words. We must have remembered Rubi deep down somewhere in our baby brains—even six-month-old babies must have some sense of the world—and made up Alicia not out of our imaginations but out of our half-formed memories.
Rubi shrugs. “I’d heard them talk about Raquel and Robin before, but I didn’t know who they meant, and they always stopped talking when I came into the room.”
“Raquel and Robin?” Zane asks from the driver’s seat.
“Raquel and Robin. Alexa and Ava.”
Robin. I roll the name around in my mind. I know without asking that my name was Robin.
“Mama’s going to be pissed that the secret’s out now. But I think she knew you’d find out someday.”
“So, what—they just told you all about us?”
“No,” Rubi says. “Like I said, I followed Cecilia to work one day. You weren’t home, but there were pictures on the walls and stuff. They had to tell me then.”
“Did you get that from my room?” I ask, pointing to the diamond A pendant around her neck. The same one I thought I’d lost and Dad replaced.
She lifts it up as if seeing it for the first time. “Yeah. I told myself I was just borrowing it. I was going to put it back, I swear. I just wondered what it would feel like to be one of the chosen twins.”
Dad always said that we were chosen just for him, but until now I never really thought about it much. I can’t imagine growing up alone and then finding ou
t I had two sisters somewhere else. I almost feel sorry for her.
Rubi reaches behind her neck. “You can have it back.”
“I don’t want it,” I say quickly, remembering the feeling that I got dropping mine out Zane’s car window. “Alicia’s gone.”
Rubi nods knowingly. “I knew she would be sometime. She was fun, though.”
“So you really pretended to be Alicia?” Zane asks.
Rubi hesitates. “A few times. Some guy at a party thought I was Alicia, and I figured it might be fun to play along, so I did.” She looks down at her fingernails. “Made me feel like I was one of you. At least for a little while.”
“So you just became Alicia? Told people that was your name?” I look at her hard. “Made appointments as her?”
Rubi looks surprised I figured that out. “Not all the time. But it was nice when people would call me Alicia. Made it feel more real.”
“How long have you been following them around?” Zane asks. I’ve been so involved in the conversation, I almost forgot he was there.
“I don’t know. A while, I guess. To get it right I watched how Alicia acted and dressed—”
“The sunflower seeds!” I say suddenly. “That’s why the DNA on them came back as mine. Ours. You were sitting outside Ava’s room watching us, weren’t you?”
Rubi bites the inside of her cheek, something I’ve seen Ava do a million times. “Look, I know it sounds creepy, but … I just really wanted to be part of it, you know?”
I’m relieved and sad at the same time. “I thought some guy was stalking us. You scared the crap out of me.”
“Good,” she says, suddenly serious. “Because someone is stalking you. Whoever’s in that black truck killed Casey, Dylan, and Eli, I’m sure of it.”
I look out the window at the office door, but there’s no movement. Each second that ticks by makes my nerves feel tighter. “But why? I mean, Casey was an ass and Dylan cheated on Ava, but Eli didn’t do anything.” If anything, I lied to him—it should have been me who ended up dead.