Some Quiet Place

him. “Get away from me.”
    “Oh, you’re mad now. You must really miss him.”
    “I don’t miss him.” I’m mad at you for staying away. I’m mad at you for falling in love with someone else. I’m mad at myself.
    But he doesn’t hear my thoughts. “Now you’re the one pretending, Elizabeth.”
    “Don’t call me that,” I snap, glaring at him. Is he deliberately being cruel, throwing it in my face that I can never be the one he loves again? “Elizabeth was the little girl whose life I stole. I’m just the fool who tried to be a human, and I damaged everyone I came into contact with. I’m not Elizabeth. Even if it hurts so much sometimes I want to kill myself, I’m going to remember myself this time.”
    Fear lifts a finger in the air, teasing. “Ah, but you are Elizabeth. You’ve brought a little of her back with you. Don’t you remember who you were, Rebecca, before Landon died?” Before I can retort or hate him for mentioning my twin’s name, Fear silences me by putting his finger over my lips. A jolt runs through me at the touch, and I struggle against the terror suddenly edging in.
    “Listen to me,” Fear whispers now. His breathing is
uneven. “You’re a little of both now. Rebecca in all your beauty and grace, and that little bit of snobbery”—he doesn’t let me utter a protest—“and Elizabeth in your gentleness. The way you endured my feelings for you because of your compassion. Really, I feel like an idiot for not seeing it. Maybe some part of me knew.”
    And in his search for me, he found a new obsession. I swallow, all my sharp words and outrage fading again. Endured his feelings? As Elizabeth, maybe. Now I crave them. I remember those nights we spent together, the way his fingers felt brushing over my skin. “Fear—”
    “It’s fine,” he cuts in, dismisses what he thinks is an apology. When I lift my gaze, Fear sighs. Removing his hand from my cheek, he brushes his silky hair out of his face and looks away. “It’s always been my lot to want what I can’t have,” he says. “This is no exception. I’ll survive, Rebecca.” His grin is tinged with sadness and defiance, something he tries to hide from me but miserably fails.
    Heart in my throat, I move as if to touch him, but Fear shakes his head, moving back so he’s out of my reach. Doesn’t he know that if I could bring Elizabeth back for him again, I would?
    I chew my lower lip, wishing again that I had the strength to tell him how I really feel, that I don’t want him to leave me again, that it’s him I think about, not Joshua. It never was, even that night I chose him over Fear. Where is that damn Courage when you actually want him to appear? “Fear—”
    “Don’t.” Again he doesn’t let me finish. “You’ve given me enough. Just a glance in my direction was a rush.” He winks, shoving his hands in his coat pockets. He’s moving even farther away and I don’t attempt to stop him. What more is there to say? As if to agree with me, Fear shrugs, and his form begins to lighten, go transparent, as he leaves me yet again. Even though I hate myself for it, I don’t stop him.
    “You don’t have to say anything,” Fear murmurs. “Just go to him. Love him. Be happy again. After all you’ve been through, you deserve it. I was right, by the way,” he adds unexpectedly.
    I swallow. “Right about what?” I ask faintly.
    He fades completely from sight. “You do look beautiful in a dress,” his voice whispers in my ear. Then … silence. I let him go.

TWENTY-FIVE
    Sometimes I think I hear my twin’s tread on the ground, coming closer. It always turns out to be nothing. A deer, a breeze, my imagination. That voice in the back of my head has been nudging me lately. The numbness is gone, along with everything else, and the voice of feeling hisses at me, demands that I acknowledge it’s not the absence of my family holding me back from life now. From the very thing I can’t make disappear with an illusion. Forever a part of me, no matter how much I resent it.
    One afternoon, as I pick my way across a creek, Courage is suddenly beside me. When I don’t stop he walks with me. I glance at his profile sidelong, curious as to what he could possibly want. But I refuse to ask, so we trek in silence together. The bare trees watch us.
    Courage doesn’t let the stillness remain for long. “So is this your plan? To wander around here and mope for the rest of your life?” He walks so perfectly, so