Chapter 3

Three days later was the school Christmas charity parade.

It looked good on Ivy League applications, so Colette had signed up months ago. She was going to be the Angel of Charity at the front of the line, in a white dress.

Except there was no way her delicate body was walking two miles.

So the job landed on me.

"Put this on." Dad dropped a heavy reindeer costume in front of me. "You walk it for Colette. The head stays on the whole time. Nobody finds out it's you."

I was lying on the basement floor. Breathing alone took effort. For three days I'd had nothing but a few mouthfuls of tap water, and every cough brought up clots.

"Dad. I can't walk." I forced the words out. "I'm really sick. I can't do it."

He kicked me in the ribs.

Something gave way in my chest with a dull sound, and the pain blew through me. I curled into a ball on the floor.

"Those two legs of yours belong to Colette." He crouched down and looked me in the eye, his voice very low. "You crawl the whole route if you have to. But you're finishing it."

Caleb came over, hauled me up, and started pulling the costume over me. It smelled like mold.

"Quit acting like you're dying, Nell. Colette's been working on her speech for weeks. Don't ruin this for her."

They put me in the car and drove me to school.

Christmas lights hung all down Main Street. The snow had been shoveled up onto the curbs, and parents and students were standing three rows deep along the route. Mom and Dad took the best spot, phones already up, ready to film "Colette."

The real Colette stood at the finish line in a brand-new white coat, waiting to give her acceptance speech and pose for pictures.

The costume was heavy. The second the head came down over me, my whole field of vision shrank to two small mesh circles. The air inside went hot and stale right away. Every breath ground against the break in my ribs, and my chest pulled tighter and tighter.

The parade started.

I dragged my feet and shuffled along with everyone else. The Christmas music was loud, and the trumpets and bells made my head throb.

Way up ahead I could see Colette at the finish line. White coat, white scarf, a cup of hot chocolate in her hand, laughing with the kids next to her.

She looked so warm.

A little girl ran out from the sidewalk and grabbed my reindeer paw, grinning up at me.

"Reindeer! Can I take a picture with you?"

Her mom was behind her with a phone out. I crouched down for her, and the moment my knees bent, something in my ribs cracked. Quietly.

My vision went black around the edges. But the costume head hid all of it.

The little girl threw her arms around my neck, then ran back to her mom. Her mom waved at me. "Thank you! Merry Christmas!"

By the time I got back on my feet, I was crying. Nobody could see it in there anyway.

Keep walking.

By the third intersection, something was dripping off the legs of the costume.

The blood coming up from my lungs ran down my chin and into the suit, soaked through my shirt, and worked its way to the cuffs, where it dripped onto the asphalt one drop at a time.

"Why is that reindeer dripping water?" someone called out.

"That's not water. That's red!"

A woman on the sidewalk covered her mouth. The man next to her stepped forward to get a better look.

Dad rushed over and put himself in front of me. He turned and gave the crowd a smile. "It's stage paint. The costume crew did it for effect. It's fine."

Then he leaned close to my ear, dropping his voice. "Don't you dare stop. There's one stretch left. Hold it together."

I couldn't really hear him anymore.

My ears were ringing and my heart was slamming against my ribs.

Walk.

One more step.

It felt like everything inside me was leaking out. Every time my foot came down it was slick underneath, and I couldn't tell if it was slush or blood running out of my pant leg.

One more step.

People were shouting ahead of me. People were shouting behind me. A woman on the sidewalk with a baby on her hip grabbed the man beside her and pointed at the ground under my feet. "That's not right. It's red the whole way back, go get someone—"

Then my vision blurred out completely. My legs stopped listening and I started tipping to one side.

"What's wrong with that reindeer? It's staggering—"

"Wait, there's blood under it. It's been bleeding this whole time!"

"Somebody stop it, now!"

A teacher pushed out of the crowd and reached for me.

But I was already going down.

I pitched forward and hit the pavement. The reindeer head snapped off and rolled a few feet away, and there was my face underneath, white as paper.

The cold air hit my wet skin. I lay there on my back with blood running out of my nose, my mouth, my ears, spreading across the street beneath me.

The whole street went quiet for a second.

Then the screaming started.

"That's not Colette! That's Nell, her twin sister!"

"She's bleeding— God, there's so much blood—"

"That man said it was paint. He was lying!"

Phones came out. A few people rushed in to help.

The teacher dropped to her knees beside me and looked up at Dad. "I told you something was wrong with her! What did you do to this girl?"

Dad just stood there, frozen.

Mom's phone slid out of her hand and hit the ground.

Down at the finish line, Colette let out a scream and crumpled next to the awards platform.

I lay in the blood and looked up at the gray-white sky. A few snowflakes drifted down and caught on my eyelashes.

Good.

I didn't have to walk anymore.