---
The first thing Amara noticed was the light. Blinding and sterile, it stabbed at her eyes, dragging her from a foggy abyss into a painful clarity. Her head throbbed, and every nerve in her body seemed to scream in protest. She blinked sluggishly, her surroundings coming into focus—the sharp scent of antiseptic, the steady beep of a heart monitor, the impersonal sterility of a hospital room.
She wasn't sure how she got here.
Memories clawed at the edges of her mind, hazy and fragmented. The crash. Adelaide's scream. The sensation of spinning, falling, shattering. But beyond that, her thoughts dissolved into static.
Her gaze wandered to the corner of the room, where a cracked mirror caught her attention. It stood propped awkwardly against the wall, as though someone had tried to hide it and failed. Amara stared at it, her chest tightening with an unspoken dread.
Dragging herself from the bed, each step a monumental effort, she moved closer. The reflection that greeted her stopped her cold.
It wasn't her.
Adelaide's face stared back at her—perfect, composed, hauntingly familiar. Her black hair was gone, replaced by Adelaide's honey-blonde waves. Her pale, angular features had softened, transformed into the delicate, camera-ready beauty of her twin.
Her breath hitched, and her fingers trembled as they reached out to touch the glass. The reflection mimicked her movements flawlessly, yet it felt like a stranger staring back at her.
What is this?
She backed away, her chest heaving, but the reflection stayed the same. She shook her head violently, hoping the image would change, that the spell would break. But it didn't. The mirror stayed unyielding, a cruel window into a life that wasn't hers.
I'm not Adelaide. I'm me. Aren't I?
Her legs buckled, and she sank to the floor, gripping her head as if to contain the screaming chaos inside.
---
She didn't know how much time had passed when the door opened. A man in a white coat entered, his clipboard tucked under one arm.
"Good morning, Adelaide," he said without looking up, his tone brisk and professional.
Her stomach twisted. "I'm not—" she started, but her throat was dry, the words barely audible.
The doctor glanced at her, his brows furrowing slightly. "How are you feeling? Any dizziness or nausea?"
Amara stared at him, her mind reeling. She wanted to scream, to tell him that she wasn't Adelaide, but something held her back. Maybe it was the way he looked at her, like she was supposed to know the answers. Like she was supposed to be Adelaide.
He continued speaking, but his words blurred into an incomprehensible hum. Vitals. Recovery. Discharge. She caught none of it, her thoughts drowning in a tide of confusion and fear.
---
Later that afternoon, they took her home. Or rather, they took Adelaide home.
Her parents hadn't even visited her in the hospital, she realized. They'd sent someone else—a family acquaintance—to sign the papers and escort her back. Now, sitting in the back seat of a car that smelled like leather and disinfectant, she stared out the window, the city rushing past in a disjointed blur.
The house loomed large and foreboding as they approached, its pristine facade mocking her. She had grown up here, but now it felt like enemy territory.
Her mother was waiting in the foyer when she arrived, her face pale and drawn. Her father stood behind her, his expression unreadable.
"We need to talk," her mother said, her voice clipped.
Amara followed them into a room she rarely entered, her heart pounding.
"You'll need to take over for Adelaide," her father began without preamble.
She blinked, uncomprehending. "What?"
"You need to be her now," her mother said, avoiding her gaze. "It's what's best for the family."
Amara's mind reeled. "You want me to pretend to be her?"
Her father nodded. "The world believes Adelaide survived the crash. We can't change that now."
"But why?" Amara's voice cracked, her anger bubbling to the surface. "Why would you do this to me? You've ignored me my entire life, and now you want me to erase myself completely? Am I even your child?"
Her mother's hand shot out before she even realized it was coming. The slap landed with a sharp, stinging force that left her reeling.
"You will do as you're told," her mother said coldly, her eyes hard and unyielding. "This is not up for discussion."
Amara pressed her hand to her cheek, her vision swimming with tears she refused to let fall. She stared at her parents, at the people who had never truly seen her, and felt something inside her fracture.
---
The funeral was a grotesque spectacle.
The world believed it was Amara who had died, and they mourned her with a hollow kind of reverence. She stood in the back of the crowd, dressed in black, watching as strangers wept for a girl they never knew.
Her parents were the perfect picture of grief, their tears carefully timed and their sobs just loud enough to be convincing. Her mother even fainted dramatically when the casket was lowered, earning sympathetic murmurs from the congregation.
But Amara knew better. Those tears weren't for her. They were for Adelaide, the golden child they had lost. And now, standing in Adelaide's place, Amara felt like a ghost, trapped in a life that wasn't hers.
The air was heavy with incense and irony. She watched as people laid flowers on the casket, their faces etched with sorrow. They didn't cry for her—not really. They cried for the idea of her, for the tragedy of losing someone so young.
It was almost laughable, she thought bitterly. She had spent her entire life feeling invisible, and now she was truly gone.
The nausea hit her suddenly, a wave of sickness that made her stumble back. She closed her eyes and leaned against a nearby pillar, trying to steady herself, but the world seemed to spin around her. Everything was dizzying—the faces of strangers, the whispers of grief, the crushing weight of the reality that she was nobody to anyone here. Even her parents had forgotten her as Amara. She had been erased.
Then, a soft hand touched her shoulder, grounding her. She opened her eyes to see a girl about her age, her features soft with concern.
"Are you okay?" the girl asked, her voice gentle, but Amara couldn't place her.
It took her a moment to realize who the girl was—Claire, Adelaide's friend, who looked as if she had stepped out of the world Amara didn't belong to. The realization hit her like a punch to the gut. Claire didn't know. She didn't know who Amara really was. She thought she was grieving her friend, Adelaide.
"I'm fine," Amara replied hollowly, her words just loud enough to carry over the quiet hum of the crowd. She didn't even know why she said it—she wasn't fine. Not at all.
Claire frowned, but didn't press further. "If you need anything, I'm here," she said, her words soft, genuine.
Amara nodded absently, her gaze drifting back to the casket. The world moved on without her. Her parents, her old life, even the people who claimed to mourn her—they didn't understand who she was. She was nothing but a replacement, a figment of someone else's life.
---
That night, back in Adelaide's room, Amara sat on the edge of the bed, staring at her hands. They didn't feel like hers anymore. Nothing did.
The room was suffocatingly perfect, every detail carefully curated to reflect Adelaide's polished image. Amara ran her fingers over the pristine sheets, the smooth surface of the desk, the framed photos on the wall.
This isn't my life, she thought, her chest tightening. This was never my life.
She looked at the mirror again, the same reflection staring back at her with unyielding intensity. She didn't recognize herself, but maybe that was the point.
Adelaide was gone.
And now, so was Amara.
The weight of it all settled around her, a suffocating blanket of isolation. She wanted to scream, to break free from the prison her parents had built for her. But no sound came. There was nothing left to say.
For the first time in her life, Amara felt completely alone.
She wasn't sure if it was because of the identity she had been forced to adopt, or because of the undeniable truth that Adelaide's life was now her own, but in that moment, she realized that there was no escaping what had been done to her. She had been replaced, reshaped into someone she wasn't, and now she was stuck.
But as she sat there, her mind still spinning with the absurdity of it all, she couldn't shake the feeling that, maybe, just maybe, there was more to this—more to what she could do in this new life. Could she fight for herself in the only way she knew how? Or was she doomed to become a reflection of someone she would never truly be?
The questions lingered as she lay down in the bed, staring at the ceiling, her body heavy with despair. The night stretched on, and all she could hear was the deafening silence of her new world.
---