The Girl in the Mirror(34)

Was the idea with me when I left my own life behind to step aboard Summer’s yacht with Summer’s husband? Was the idea with me when I crouched beneath my father’s corpse, learning that he had chosen not to split his fortune?

When I mutilated my leg, I wasn’t thinking about this. I had no plans. The act felt symbolic. A meaningful way to honor Summer, like a tattoo.

You can’t lie to Adam. Okay, he can’t tell us apart, and he’s so inattentive that he wouldn’t notice a few slipups. And I know Summer’s life very well now, even her sex life. She talked openly on this trip. I heard so much about Adam that he invaded my dreams.

Not long after I watched the CCTV footage, I grew afraid that it would be lost before anyone else could see it. Only seven days of footage was there—it must auto-delete after that. I saved the file onto a disc, ejected the disc, and put it in a drawer. Now, I find a spot where the fabric has ripped away from the lining of my suitcase, and I tuck the disc inside.

I can’t deny the temptation. I would no longer be the woman who couldn’t keep her husband even with the Carmichael fortune as bait. I would no longer be out of work, out of a home. Annabeth would never have to know that Noah left me. He could play the part of heartbroken husband if he wanted.

I rummage through my life as if it’s a bag of goodies, looking for something that I want to keep. I don’t find anything. There’s not even anyone to mourn me. My mother has always been closer to Summer. The person I love most in the world, perhaps the only person I love in the world now, is my brother, but what difference would it make to Ben whether he lost one sister or the other?



I’m not going to do it. I would never lie to Adam. But I worry about the awkwardness of turning up in the Seychelles on someone else’s boat, with a convenient story about the owner falling overboard. Even with the disc, things could get lost in translation. I don’t want to end up in an African prison.

And my passport. I can’t believe I never checked out of Thailand. It seemed like a minor detail at the time. Summer and the boat were checked out, but I wasn’t. Now it feels ominous. Seychellois immigration will surely be unimpressed. I spent so long circling in the zone, searching for Summer, that I’m overdue, which will add to the suspicion. In the middle of it all, I will have to phone Adam in Thailand and break the news.



I can pretend to be Summer to the Seychellois authorities, get through customs and immigration, catch a plane to Thailand, and tell Adam in person. Iris Carmichael isn’t on the crew list. No one in the Seychelles need ever know that someone fell overboard.

Except, Adam is Seychellois. It’s a tiny country, and Adam has a big family. In his grief, he’ll rush home. He’ll find out that nobody in the Seychelles knew of Summer’s disappearance. What will he think of me? I’ll seem like a crazy woman.

Perhaps I could tell the authorities that Iris fell overboard. As Summer, I wouldn’t come under the same suspicion, because I’m the yacht owner with all my papers in order, married to a Seychellois citizen, entitled to citizenship myself. They’d investigate the disappearance, so it wouldn’t look suspicious, but they’d let me leave the country to reunite with my husband. And then I could tell Adam the truth.

But what if the news spreads? Wealthy Australian girls don’t fall off yachts every day. It’ll make the newspaper. The news might reach Thailand.

I can’t be Iris to Adam and Summer to everybody else. He won’t be able to hide his shock and grief.

Perhaps I could break it to Adam slowly. First I tell him that I’m Summer, but I’ve lost the baby. Iris fell overboard, and I lost the baby from the strain. That would kind of prepare him for the worse news to come. It would give me the chance to wait for the right moment to tell him the truth.

I couldn’t keep up the charade for more than a few days. Even though I know Summer so well, even though I know her most intimate secrets, I couldn’t be Summer for the rest of my life. I can impersonate Summer, but that doesn’t mean I want to.

I think about a version of Summer who didn’t die. She has Bathsheba and Adam and Tarquin, while I have nothing. Even if she weren’t pregnant already, if she were still alive, she might still have time to get pregnant, to beat Virginia to the money. And even without the money, she has Adam and his money and his love.

I would be doing everyone a favor. It would be a kindness to Adam, to Tarquin, to Annabeth. A kindness to Summer.

So far she’s dead only to me. In the eyes of the rest of the world, Summer lives on.

I wrap myself in her sarong, lie in her bed, breathe in her apple scent, imagine Adam’s arms around me. Every night, every morning, for the rest of my life. Crossing oceans on Bathsheba. Making love on the foredeck, naked in the golden sun. Raising our baby together, the Carmichael heir.

If I tell the truth, what will happen? There’s no life for me back in Wakefield. I’ll have to fly back to my mother, who’s living in Summer’s house. But that won’t work. Where will Adam and Tarquin be? They’ll want their house back. Adam won’t keep sailing without Summer, and he won’t want me in his home. He won’t be able to stand the sight of me, the living image of his lost love.

They won’t want Bathsheba. She’s the place where Summer died. Perhaps Adam will give her to me after all, and I can set off and sail around the world on my own.

The years stretch out ahead of me. The rest of my life circling the world’s oceans, searching for Summer. Or I could be Summer, and no one will search for her at all. No one will search for Iris. No one will miss her. It would be a favor to them all.