Chapter 29
luna shifted in her seat on the couch to look out the window at the sun dipping low over the water, casting pink and orange light over the high-rises of the West End.
She was waiting for Alice to change her clothes before they left for the house, but she didn’t want to talk to her brother beside her, who was muttering to himself and staring at his phone.
He had finally stopped inundating her with his wild conspiracy theories.
“Do you think the twin is some kind of biological warfare? Like a drug company has been experimenting on Mom all this time? What if we’re being watched by the Russians? And the spy is wearing a disguise that is supposed to look like Mom?”
“Shut up, Luca.”
And he had fallen silent, but after she turned away, he started whispering theories to himself, counting on his fingers as if he had to keep track of every thought, every possibility.
What he didn’t say, and what Luna didn’t want to tell him, was that all the evidence suggested that the woman who had beaten up their father and dragged Jas away was actually their mother, and she was playing a trick on every single one of them.
She looked like her, moved like her. What if it was her?
It was obvious. They could all see it. What if Alice, mortified by having her secret dating life exposed, had tried to get rid of all the evidence, erase the men from her life because of deep, torturous shame?
They had all noticed that she hadn’t been herself lately, had been drinking too much and talking to herself, staying in bed for days at a time, stretched so thin over tasks and dates and the time she never had.
What if she had snapped? What if she saw Grant and Jas as barriers to an uncomplicated, easier life?
Luna’s hands were in sweaty tight fists as her brain worked in circles, going over every piece of evidence to create a narrative that made sense of her mother’s disgusting horniness and the rage that filled Luna’s body, that collected in her belly and rose until her cheeks were fiery hot.
Last night, she had woken up just before dawn, sweaty under her blankets.
She could only remember snippets of her dream, images with no sound.
Her mother, mouth open in a scream, bleeding from a wide gash in the middle of her face.
The garden at Nam Koo covered in black ash that smelled of burning meat.
Her brother in a casket, eyes open; she didn’t know if he was still alive.
There was a plot she was missing, a thread that tied all of these images together.
Luna needed to know what she was supposed to do when they returned to the house, and she knew the answer was in that last night terror, just out of reach.
She groaned in frustration. Luca probably thought she was going home to help Alice and Pinky.
That’s fine , Luna thought, let him think that.
But her motivation was slightly different.
Maybe she would have to save someone—Pinky probably, or a neighbour.
Maybe she would have to call the police.
Maybe she would have to hide in the dogwood, hands clasped over Pinky’s mouth, until it was safe enough to emerge, running as fast as they could away from her mother.
Or maybe she would have to confront her mother, ask her about the lies, about Jas, about why she had torn their family apart in the first place, why she would try to kill their father, if she felt guilty for all the chaos she had created just because she was bored and lonely.
Maybe she would have to hold her by the shoulders and shake her, watch her head snap back and forward, until she was the mother Luna remembered, the one who sat on the floor and let her daughter braid her hair into uneven, lumpy ropes, the one who ate pizza on the couch as they watched MasterChef , the one whose bed they could crawl into at night, their smaller bodies shoved up against their mother’s polka-dot flannel pyjamas.
Yes, those were the things Luna wanted back, wanted to shout out loud until they became real again, until she could see the flicker of recognition in her mother’s eyes.
As she stared out the window, at her own reflection in the glass, she remembered her dream again, a flash that had lasted no longer than a few seconds.
It was her mother, the deep, bloody gash in her face opening wider and wider until Alice’s wound began to swallow her face whole—first her eyes, then her mouth.
It was as if her entire physical self was being sucked away, until all that was left was muscle and flesh turned inside out, arteries quivering as they tasted air for the first time.
Alice had been standing at the edge of a koi pond, thick with dead fish floating upside down just under the surface, her own gory reflection rippling in the murky water.
Luna watched her mother point to the pond, a wordless scream coming from her body.
There, the dead fish had disappeared, leaving only the grey water and the reflection of the moon.
But there was no reflection of Alice, though she was still standing there, dripping blood, in the same spot as before. Where had it gone?
She felt Luca reach across the sofa and grab her hand. She felt the sweat from his palm and didn’t pull away. What did it all mean, these nighttime clues? She shook her head and shut her eyes. Everything in her head hurt from the effort.
“I’m scared, Luna,” her brother said.
“I got you, Luca, don’t worry. I’ll keep everyone safe.” Her brother leaned toward her and rested his head on her shoulder. She kissed his damp hair, as if she wasn’t scared too.