Chapter 23

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Jennie wander away from the box, trying to temper her hope.

This could be an abandoned power plant in Seoul in any number of worlds.

As she moves slowly down the row of generators, a glint on the floor catches her eye.

Jennie approaches.

Resting in a crack in the concrete six inches from the base of the generator: an empty ampoule with its neck snapped off. In all the abandoned power plants she havepassed through during the last month, she have never seen it.

Perhaps the one Jennie2 injected himself with seconds before she lost consciousness, on the night she stole Jennie's life.

I should check everything first. Jennit thoughts.

Over the last month, she's been in Seouls that looked similar, but there's something different about this one. It isn't just that empty ampoule. It's something deeper that IJennie can't explain other than to say it feels like a place where she belongs. It feels like hers.

She wonders—

Is Lisa, my Lisa, alive and well under this snow-laden clouds?


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Jennie exits the train and thrust her hands deep into the pockets of her coat. Snow is sticking to the familiar streets of her neighborhood. To the sidewalks. To the cars parked along the curbs. The headlight beams from rush-hour traffic slash through the profusion of snowflakes.

Up and down her block, the houses stand glowing and lovely in the storm.

A fragile half inch has already collected on the steps to her porch, where a single set of footprints leads to the door.

Through the front window of the house, Jennie sees the lights on inside, and from where she stand on the sidewalk, this looks exactly like home.

Jennie keep expecting to discover that some minor detail is off—the wrong front door, the wrong street number, a piece of furniture on the stoop she doesn't recognize.

But the door is right.

The street number is right.

There's even a tesseract chandelier hanging above the dinner table in the front room, and Jennie is close enough to see the large photograph on the mantel—

Lisa and her.

Through the open doorway that leads from the dining room into the kitchen, Jennie glimpse the other Jennie standing at the island, holding a bottle of wine.

Reaching across, she pours into someone's wineglass.

Elation hits, but it doesn't last.

From her vantage point, all she can see is a beautiful hand holding the stem of the glass, and it crashes down on Jennie again what the other her did to Jennie.

All that she took.

Everything she stole.

Jennie can't hear anything out here in the snow, but she sees the other her laugh and take a sip of wine.

What are they talking about?

When was the last time they fucked?

Is Lisa happier now than she was a month ago, with me?

Can I stand to know the answer to that question?

The sane, even voice in her head is wisely suggesting that Jennie should move away from the house right now.

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