Aria Dalton did not have headaches.
She never flustered, never missed a deadline, never forgot to color-code her calendar or double-space her notes. She never speculated about things she knew them.
But from the minute Zuri Hart stepped into Saint Celeste, a dull ache had settled into her temples.
She had tried to brush it off attributed it to stress, or mid-term pressure, or maybe even the cheer fundraiser she'd organized to the second.
But none of that explained the dreams.
Or the scar.
She stood in her bathroom the next morning, staring at the white crescent below her collarbone.
It had always existed.
She never had. Her parents told her it was from when she was a baby, something about a fall off the changing table. A story explained with too much information. Practice.
Last night, however, she dreamed about a crib.
Two of them.
Side by side.
One with a gold bracelet. The other… with a red one.
She woke up sweating, hand pressed against her chest.
Now she couldn't help but glance at the mark. It was small. Nearly imperceptible. But it had begun to itch not the skin, exactly, but the memory underneath.
Like something in the earth was struggling to surface.
She tucked the shirt back over the mark and away from her face. She did not need ghosts.
School was cancelled too.
Her locker door squeaked open a defect she never even noticed before. Her flawlessly picked outfit was too cold, too confining. Her friends' laughter was tinny. Even her almond milk latte was. off.
And then there was Zuri.
Sitting under the cherry tree again. Same hoodie. Same impossible peace.
Aria couldn't look away from her.
It wasn't about competition now. Or pride. Or dominance.
It was that pull.
Like a string was tied to her ribcage, and Zuri was unknowingly dragging it tighter with every breath.
In sixth period, Aria dropped her pen. It rolled across the floor and stopped at Zuri's foot.
Without a word, Zuri bent down and picked it up. Their fingers brushed for a moment barely.
But it was enough.
A flicker of heat sparked in Aria's chest.
Not anger. Not shock.
Recognition.
A flash a picture she'd never seen but somehow remembered.
Two babies.
Whimpering in the same room.
And for the first time in years, Aria Dalton felt something she couldn't define.
Not fear.
Not confusion.
Longing.
She took the pen, nodded rigidly, and turned forward.
But her hand was shaking.
And suddenly, everything she believed she knew about herself no longer seemed so certain.
That night, the Dalton house was quiet.
Too quiet.
The kind of silence that came with rules. Aria's home did not reverberate with laughter or music or raucous conversation. It was maintained in hushed tones, perfectly timed between court cases, fund-raising balls, and dinner parties with linen napkins.
She perched at her desk, homework spread out in front of her, untouchable. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, but the blinking cursor simply glared back at her as if it knew she wasn't okay.
The image from earlier wouldn't leave her.
Zuri's hand. The flicker of that scar.
Matching scars.
Could that even be a coincidence?
She opened her drawer and pulled out the old photo album her mother had made her for her tenth birthday. Cream leather. Gold embossed lettering.
"Our Little Aria"
She flipped through the glossy pages. First steps. Birthday parties. Dance recitals. Her father accompanying her at a courtroom ribbon-cutting ceremony. Her mother wearing her pearl earrings, smiling perpetually.
There weren't any of the pictures taken in the hospital.
None at all.
No baby photos. No baby anklet. No photos of the nursery.
That was weird, wasn't it?
For a family that lived and breathed image, they had left out the first chapter of her life.
Aria's heart raced faster.
She shut the album and stood up.
On the downstairs hall, the light gave a wan sheen as she barefooted it down to the den. Her mother on the sofa, reading legal briefs behind her glasses. Her father by the fire, sipping something dark in a crystal tumbler.
Her mother looked up first.
"Sweetheart. Is everything all right?"
Aria did not blink. "Do I have a sister?"
Silence.
Glass rang softly against the mantle.
What?" her father had said, his tone low and defensive.
"You heard me." Her voice was even. "Do I have a sister?"
Her mother blinked. "Where is this suddenly coming from?"
"Answer the question."
They exchanged a look the kind that screamed a thousand words unspoken. Her father shifted. Her mother slowly slipped her glasses off her face.
"There was… a situation," her mother said at last. "When you were born. Complicated. Painful.".
Aria's heart thudding in her head. "So I wasn't born by myself."
"Aria," her dad warned, voice soft. "You're our daughter. That's all that matters."
"You're avoiding the question."
Her mom sighed and leaned back from the table, folding her arms tight. "You were adopted. You know that."
"Yes. But was I adopted alone?"
Her mom didn't answer.
That silence screamed louder than words ever could.
Aria stepped back. Her palms cold. Her mind louder than her breath.
So it was true.
Somewhere on this earth, someone had taken the other half of her tale. Hidden it. Wiped it out with whiteness and niceness and neatly kept little picture books.
And now. that other half had a face.
Zuri.
She did not sleep that night.
Not exactly.
She stretched out on her back and breathed the name softly into the shadows like a secret too terrible to speak out loud.
"Zuri."
It was a perfect fit. It echoed inside of her chest as if it were the place where it was supposed to be.
And for the first time in her life, Aria Dalton the girl who had a plan hadn't a clue what she was going to do next.
She didn't cry.
Aria Dalton did not cry.
Instead, she stood in the middle of her walk-in closet, designer clothes surrounding her, flawless shoes, painstakingly clean jewelry, and didn't feel any of it was hers.
Not really.
It was like waking up and realizing you'd been living someone else's life. Someone else's lie.
She was adopted.
She'd always known that part. It was framed as a loving gift, wrapped in phrases like "chosen," "special," and "meant to be."
But no one ever told her that she might not have come into the world alone.
That there had been another heartbeat beside hers.
Another baby.
Another girl.
And now, this girl had a face, a name, a voice like the sting of honey and eyes that were too much like her own.
Zuri.
The name was like thunder in her bones.
She wished to scream. Break something. Pose questions to faces that only answered in well-rehearsed silences. She did not. She sat in front of her vanity table, flung open her date book, and tore out the week's schedule.
For the first time ever, the calendar did not matter.
For the first time, Aria Dalton had no idea who she was.
She woke up before dawn.
Too early.
And for once, she didn't reach for her silk robe or school binder.
She tiptoed barefoot into the hall and downstairs.
The house slumbered on quiet in the same way a lie is until it's shattered.
She stood in the front door and went out into the icy morning air, the bite of it on her skin. No masks. No guards. Just Aria.
The sky was still filled with bruised purples and dark gray. The world was rough. Unfinished. Honest.
For the first time… she felt the same.
A memory struck her as she stood on the front porch a memory so real it nearly took her breath.
Tiny fingers. Laughter.
Another voice, softer, but a part of her.
It wasn't a noise she remembered using her head.
It was something more instinctual.
Something cellular.
Like a melody she'd heard in the womb and never again afterwards.
Her hands trembled as she clutched her phone.
No more standing around.
No more silence.
She pulled up her school directory program and typed in the name.
Zuri Hart.
There it was. Homeroom. Class schedule.
She memorized it in seconds.
Today, she would find her.
And she would ask the one question neither of them had yet had the courage to utter.
Not "Do I know you?"
Not "Why do we look alike?"
But the one that had been echoing in Aria's heart since the moment she met her:
"Why do I feel like I've missed you my entire life?"