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A man’s voice shouted from outside.
“Police! Open the door!”
Clara’s blood ran cold.
Two officers entered moments later.
Rainwater dripped from their coats.
One of them looked directly at Clara’s mother.
“Margaret Vale?”
The old woman stiffened.
The officer continued:
“We’ve been looking for you for six days.”
The room fell silent.
Clara stared.
“Looking for her… why?”
The officer hesitated.
Then spoke carefully.
“Ma’am, three caretakers at Saint Jude Medical Facility are dead.”
Noah gasped.
Daniel went pale.
And Clara felt the world split open beneath her feet.
The officer’s next words landed like a hammer.
“Your mother disappeared the same night the fires started.”
Part 6
The apartment dissolved into chaos.
One officer moved toward Margaret cautiously.
Another questioned Daniel.
Noah stood frozen near the doorway.
But Margaret never took her eyes off Clara.
Not once.
“You told them,” Clara whispered.
Margaret smiled faintly.
“No. But you will.”
Then, suddenly, she collapsed.
Her body struck the floor hard enough to make Noah cry out.
Paramedics arrived minutes later.
Heart failure.
Critical condition.
The officers escorted everyone to the hospital for statements.
By midnight, Clara sat beneath sterile fluorescent lights while rain battered the emergency room windows.
A detective slid a folder across the table.
Inside were photographs.
Burned hallways.
Destroyed rooms.
Bodies covered in white sheets.
And security footage.
Margaret walking calmly through smoke.
Clara stared in disbelief.
“This can’t be real.”
The detective folded his hands.
“Your mother suffered severe psychiatric decline after entering the facility. Staff reported violent episodes and obsessive discussions about her daughters.”
Daughters.
Plural.
Even though one had died decades ago.
The detective paused.
“One nurse survived long enough to give a statement. She claimed your mother kept repeating the same sentence before the fire spread.”
Clara forced herself to ask:
“What sentence?”
The detective looked directly at her.
“‘I chose the wrong daughter.’”
Something inside Clara cracked.
Because for the first time in twenty-three years…
she remembered the missing piece.
Not Anna falling.
Not the storm.
Not the lake.
What came after.
Tiny hands clawing desperately against the dock.
Anna screaming for help.
And their mother standing there.
Watching.
Doing nothing.
Clara’s breath hitched violently.
No.
No, that wasn’t possible.
Unless—
Unless Clara hadn’t blocked the memory because of guilt.
But because the truth was worse.
Her mother had let Anna drown.
On purpose.
And made Clara carry the blame.
Part 7
At three in the morning, a nurse approached the waiting room.
“Margaret is asking specifically for Clara.”
Daniel stood immediately.
“You don’t have to go in there.”
But Clara already knew she would.
Some doors followed you forever unless you opened them yourself.
The hospital room smelled of antiseptic and dying flowers.
Machines beeped steadily beside the bed.
Margaret looked smaller than ever now.
Almost transparent.
Yet her eyes remained sharp.
“Close the door,” she whispered.
Clara obeyed.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
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