My father rubbed his forehead. “She died,” he said. “Ella died. That’s all you need to know.”
I didn’t see a body. I don’t remember a funeral. No small casket. No grave.
One day I had a twin. The next, I was alone.
Her toys disappeared. Our matching clothes vanished. Her name stopped existing in our house.
At first, I kept asking: “Where did they find her?” “What happened?” “Did it hurt?”
My mother’s face shut down. “Stop it, Dorothy,” she’d say. “You’re hurting me.”
I wanted to scream, “I’m hurting too.” Instead, I learned to stay quiet. Talking about Ella felt like dropping a bomb in the middle of the room. So I swallowed my questions and carried them.
On the outside, I was fine. I did my homework, had friends, stayed out of trouble. Inside, there was a buzzing hole where my sister should have been.
At sixteen, I tried to fight the silence. I walked into the police station alone, palms sweating. “My twin sister disappeared when we were five,” I said. “Her name was Ella. I want to see the case file.”
The officer frowned. “How old are you, sweetheart?”
“Sixteen.”
He sighed. “I’m sorry. Those records aren’t open to the public. Your parents would have to request them.”
“They won’t even say her name,” I said. “They told me she died. That’s it.”
His expression softened. “Then maybe you should let them handle it. Some things are too painful to dig up.”
I walked out feeling stupid—and more alone than ever.
In my twenties, I tried my mother one last time. We were folding laundry on her bed. “Mom, please. I need to know what really happened to Ella.”
She went still. “What good would that do?” she whispered. “You have a life now. Why dig up that pain?”
“Because I’m still in it,” I said. “I don’t even know where she’s buried.”
She flinched. “Please don’t ask me again,” she said. “I can’t talk about this.”
So I didn’t.
