Chapter 141

Chapter 141
Kelly 

I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting here. Currently, everything around me moves. It feels like I’m frozen in place. My thoughts are tangled, messy, impossible to sort through. Twins? I have another twin, like a real twin. Not Kate but Susan. It doesn’t feel real. 

I stare at Susan, half-expecting her to take it back, to laugh and tell me it’s all some sick joke. But she doesn’t. Instead, she hesitates, then reaches into her bag and pulls out something like a bracelet and….. 

A small, slightly worn photograph. The moment my eyes land on it, my breath hitches. Two baby girls, the same face. A chill crawls up my spine. I know this picture, I’ve seen it before.

Mom used to show us, saying it was taken just a few hours after Kate and I were born. But now, looking at it again, my stomach churns. Something feels off. 

“This is…” I trail off, feeling the words choke in my throat. 

Susan watches me carefully. “That’s us.” 

Us??? The way she says it makes my skin prickle. My hands tremble as I take the photo from her, my fingers brushing over the worn edges. The paper feels soft, fragile, like it holds something I was never meant to see. 

I stare at the babies in the picture. One of them is me, but the other…I suddenly feel lightheaded. Was it really not Kate? Or have I been looking at this picture wrong my entire life? Kate and I had baby pictures, but not this particular one of us as a baby.

Before I can process that thought, Susan pulls out another photo. This time, it’s just one baby. The same age. The same soft, round cheeks. The same tiny tuft of dark hair. 

She looks exactly like me, but it’s not me. Looking at it again, I reliazed that’s Susan. My head spins. I press my fingers to my temple, my pulse hammering. Everything inside me screams that this isn’t possible. But the proof is right in front of me. 

I look up, my voice hoarse. "Where did you find this?" 

Susan exhales, shifting slightly. “Mrs. Kim’s house.” 

My brows furrow. “Mrs. Kim?” 

She nods. “I went there to drop off some jam for her, like I always do, and while I was waiting, I saw old box of photos. I… I don’t know why, but I felt like I needed to look through them. And then… I saw this.” She said, gesturing to the photo of us together as babies.

I stare at the picture in my hands again, feeling like the ground beneath me is slipping away. I’ve known Mrs. Kim for years. She’s always been in the background of my life, a quiet presence, someone I never questioned. 

But now, a sick feeling coils in my stomach. 

“Did you ask her about it?” I manage to say. 

Susan nods. “I did.” She hesitates before continuing. “She lied.” 

My heart stutters. 

“She told me that it was pictures of you and Kate,” Susan says, her voice tight. “But I had seen myself as a baby a lot of times that I know when it’s me and when it’s not me” she paused, then picked the other picture “I mean look at this single picture of me” 

My grip on the photo tightens. Susan didn’t lie, the pictures had one thing in common: it was me and Susan.

I don’t think Mrs Kim knows, because If she knew, why wouldn’t she tell Susan the truth? Why hide this? 

A heavy silence stretches between us, filled with unspoken questions. 

Susan’s voice is quieter when she speaks again. 

“I think Mrs. Kim knows something. And… maybe my adoptive parents do too.” 

A sharp pain stabs through my chest. I’ve spent my entire life thinking Kate was my twin. But now, even the truth feels like a lie. Just how much of my life had been a lie? I swallow hard, forcing myself to meet Susan’s gaze. 

“Then we find out the truth,” I say. 

Because I can’t keep living in the dark. Not anymore.

Susan stays silent for a moment before she speaks again, her voice softer this time.

“I keep thinking… What if Mrs Kim knew? What if my parents knew ?”

Her words send another feeling of unease crashing over me. I never considered that before, but now the pieces start to shift in my mind. Susan wasn’t just adopted, she was taken from somewhere.

And Mrs. Kim, how much did she really know? I felt like my lungs can’t hold enough air. Like I’m suffocating under the weight of it all. Susan watches me carefully, as if afraid I might reject her.

“I don’t know what to do next,” she admits. “But I had to tell you.”

I nod slowly. My hands curl into fists, I need to know what was really going on.

“We go to Mrs. Kim,” I say.

Because if anyone has the answers, it’s her.