Chapter 48

Shauna knew something was wrong. Sherie wasn't at work, wasn't at home, and her cellphone was switched off. What was the matter? Sherie had seemed a little under the weather on Friday night. But Shauna had assumed that was the monthly blues. Sherie was one of those women who got really awful PMS. Surprisingly, Shauna didn't.

There were some things even identical twins don't have in common. But even PMS wouldn't make Sherie switch off her cell. Both of them lived by their phones, their lifelines to the world. They even kept them on during sex. In fact, they often kept their lines open while in bed with men, wearing handsfree earphones, so each of them could hear the other's pleasure sounds and double the enjoyment.

What could be serious enough to make Sherie switch off her cell? Shauna couldn't think of a single reason. She parked her car at the curb, leaped out, and locked it as she walked away. The Autocop responded with its familiar whistle-beep-beep. She went into the building and waited for the ancient lift to descend. She had never been able to understand why Sherie had to rent an apartment in one of these Gothic monstrosities. Or rather, she knew why: Sherie loved the old architecture, the high ceilings, the spacious rooms. But she couldn't understand why she didn't take a more modern apartment, like the one Shauna had. She worried all the way up in the clanking, gothic cage of a lift. Maybe her sib was really, really ill. Or something.

She rang the doorbell of Sherie's flat, then realised she had a key. She fumbled in her purse, found it and put it in the doorlock.

The door wouldn't open.

She frowned and tried again.

Same result.

Then she looked closely at the lock and saw that it was brand new. An imported Yale. She looked at the key in her hand. It was a Godrej. Had Sherie changed the locks? Why would she do that?

She sensed a movement behind the door, inside.

"Sherie?" She raised her voice. "Shauns, it's me. Open

up."

She saw a change in the light streaming out from beneath the door, the unmistakable shadows of a person moving about inside the flat.

"Shers?" She was getting nervous now. "Open up, honey. You're scaring me."

She heard what sounded like voices inside, then after a long tension-fraught pause, Shauna heard the sound of the door being unlocked.

Whew, she thought, finally. What was with Sherie today?

The door opened just a crack, held shut by a massive San Francisco-style door chain. In the crack, Shauna could just glimpse her twin sister's shoulder and her left ear.

"Hey," she said, tapping on the door impatiently.

"What's with this chain and lock thing? Let me in, girl."

Sherie's face appeared in the crack. She looked all right, healthy, normal. Not sick. "I think you should leave, Shauna." She spoke quietly, in a subdued tone of voice that was totally unlike her usual bubbly way of speaking.

Shauna was taken aback. "Sherie, what the fuck is wrong with you, girl? I've been worried sick, you know. Yesterday I thought you were just hanging loose, or something. But when you didn't show up at work today, didn't answer any of your calls, I got worried. What's up?"