The Duplicate

Chapter Thirty-three

Soundlessly, like a specter creeping through the dark, I pull the bathroom door shut, toes sinking into the carpet of the upstairs hallway. Out here it is much cooler compared to the steamed bathroom. I dried and shook out my hair as best I could before coming out, but a chill still rattles through my body, starting from the top of my damp head down to my bare feet.

The house is quiet, winding down for the night.

A while ago, Noah was put to bed, silencing him, for once. Now, behind the closed door of their bedroom, I can hear Aubrey and Malcolm getting ready for bed, bumping around in their master bathroom and murmuring to one another, perhaps discussing their crazy day and crazy guests. A thin, flashing light under Leah's door slices through the shadows of the hall. Only the muffled mutterings of a TV float from her room, and an occasional, "Yeah, I know, right?" She must be on the phone.

I'm an only child, and the daughter of a widowed father. These sounds, I'll admit, are a little strange to me.

Tiptoeing, I creak down the stairs, and when my feet kiss hardwood, a motion-sensing nightlight plugged into an outlet in the wall snaps on. It lights my way through the downstairs hallway, to the office door.

The office, too, is dark. Not how I left it. Opening the door, I find the coffee table, which had been sitting in front of the couch, now pushed against the wall. The pull-out bed is out and made. And Trip, who is fully dressed—even though he's already taken a shower—is stretched out on the couch, lying on his back, one arm slung over his face. He's asleep, I think. At least, he's not moving.

The only thing that hasn't changed, pretty much all day, is Dax, at the desk, at his laptop. He turns his head to watch me cross the room, throw my clothes in my suitcase beside the wall, and make my way over to him. The screen's light beams over his lenses, like it should. It always fits him, somehow.

"You look comfy," he whispers, smiling at my old flannel pajama bottoms and cottony tank-top, the only nightclothes I found in my suitcase. I guess Trip hadn't had the time to get to my pajama drawer, eons ago when he forcefully packed for me.

"Thanks."

"How was your bath?" Dax asks.

"Really nice. Relaxing. It made me sleepy." The whole house is making me sleepy. The dim lighting, the quiet. Stifling a yawn with my hand, I look down at the blue codes taking up the laptop screen—the program Dax has been working on all day. "How is it going?"

"It's a good start. I'm all jazzed up on Coke." He lifts a soda to his lips and slurps. "So, I'll be up a while, I think. Triple told me to work on it as much as I can."

My eyes waver towards the couch.

Dax follows my gaze with a laugh in his eyes. "Don't let him fool you. He's awake. He just complained about me typing too loud. But he liked his spaghetti." He tips his soda can towards the empty plate on the desk.

Like breakfast, Trip refused to eat dinner in the dinning room.

"I think," Dax says, poking his index finger to his chest, "Government deprived Triple of good food. Probably had him on some fancy diet to build all that muscle. That's my guess. We should feed him more often, Evette, and introduce him to cake and ice-cream. I bet he hasn't had any of that stuff." It sounds like he's talking about an adopted pet. He was Government's dog, now he's our dog, and we should take much better care of him, Evette. Let's give him cake.

I bite my tongue to keep from laughing and give Dax's hair, which is still a little damp from his shower, a gentle ruffle. "Alright, I'm going to lie down." Then as an afterthought, believing I can and should, I lean forward and peck him on the cheek. "Goodnight, Dax."