My heart dropped like a stone into deep water. “That can’t be right,” I insisted, though my voice lacked conviction. “You must be mistaken. Maybe it’s a neighbor’s kid who looks like her.”

“Perhaps,” Mrs. Greene murmured, though her eyes remained unconvinced. “Just thought you should know.”

I drove to work in a haze. The uneasiness in my chest was not a flutter; it was a heavy, cold weight. I tried to rationalize it. Mrs. Greene is getting older. Her eyesight is failing. But as the miles blurred beneath my tires, I couldn’t ignore the subtle shifts I had been dismissing for weeks.

Lily had been quieter. Her appetite, once robust, had dwindled to picking at her dinner. There were dark circles under her eyes that concealer couldn’t quite hide. I had chalked it up to the academic rigor of middle school, the growth spurts, the hormones.

But what if it was something else?

That night over dinner—pasta with marinara, her favorite—I watched her like a hawk. She seemed normal. Polite. Calm. When I casually mentioned Mrs. Greene’s comment, expecting a shocked denial, Lily stiffened. It was a micro-reaction, a split-second tensing of her shoulders, before she shrugged it off with a laugh that sounded a fraction too bright.

“Oh, Mom, you know Mrs. Greene,” Lily said, twirling her fork. “She probably saw the mailman and thought it was me. I’m at school, I promise. My attendance record is perfect.”

She smiled at me. But for the first time, I saw that the smile didn’t reach her eyes. Behind the hazel irises, something trembled—a frantic, caged fear.

I went to bed, but sleep was a stranger. My mind circled the possibilities like a vulture. Drugs? Boys? A secret life I knew nothing about?

By 2:00 a.m., staring at the ceiling fan slicing through the shadows, I knew I couldn’t live in the dark anymore. I had to know the truth, even if it broke my heart.