Her Best Friend

I wake with dirt under my nails and no memory of how it got there.

There are texts on my phone I don’t remember sending. A body at the lake. And a voice in the dark whispering: “You can rest now. It’s done.”

Three months earlier, I moved to Portland to start a new life with a new job after my divorce. Then I met Emma. She brought me coffee without being asked, saved my job before I knew it was in danger, and showed up at my door with soup when I was too sick to stand. She knew my coffee order, my sister’s name, my Sunday routines, things I was sure I’d mentioned.

I hadn’t. She knew them before we ever met.

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