I was 18 years old when my mother wheeled me toward an operating room and told me that wanting to stay alive was selfish. By then, I had spent my entire childhood learning one rule: my body belonged to my sister before it belonged to me. But as the fluorescent lights passed above my face that morning, one after another, I finally understood something nobody in my family had ever allowed me to say aloud.

The scandal exploded through St. Catherine’s Hospital before my casket was even lowered into the ground.

The recording leaked onto social media within an hour—recorded by three different hospital board members who had pulled out their phones during the memorial service. By midnight, national news outlets were broadcasting the story: Famed Pediatric Surgeon Accused of Sacrificing One Daughter to Save Another.

I sat on the roof of my parents' two-story suburban mansion, watching the rain pour down over the manicured lawn.

My ghostly hands were no longer transparent. They were solidifying, turning a pale, luminescent white. I could feel the cold rain hitting my ethereal skin. The truth had given me physical substance, just as the shadow had promised.

Downstairs, the house was in chaos.

My father was pacing back and forth across the Persian rug in the living room, a glass of straight bourbon shaking violently in his grip.

"The medical board suspended your surgical license twenty minutes ago, Margaret!" my father screamed, slamming his glass onto the marble coffee table. "They’re initiating a formal medical homicide investigation! Dr. Chen gave a sworn statement to the police an hour ago!"

My mother sat on the leather sofa, her lace veil thrown onto the floor, her eyes wide, unblinking, staring at the dark television screen.

"Chen is a coward," she spat through clenched teeth. "I built his department! I brought millions in research grants to that hospital!"

"They don't care about your grants, Margaret!" my father yelled, pulling at his hair. "The District Attorney is convening a grand jury! They're looking at Emily’s old medical records! If they subpoena the private lab in Switzerland—"

"They won't find anything," my mother snapped, standing up. "Those files are locked in my safe."

"They have a search warrant!" my father roared. "The police will be here tomorrow morning with a federal squad!"

In the corner of the room, Claire sat huddled in an armchair, clutching a plush velvet blanket around her shoulders. Her face was pale again—not from blood loss, but from sheer terror.

"Mom," Claire whimpered, her voice trembling. "What happens to me if you go to prison? Who is going to manage my post-transplant rejection medications? Who is going to get my blood panels?"

My mother walked over to Claire, kneeling beside her chair, taking her hands with a tenderness she had never once shown me in eighteen years.

"Don't worry, my sweet girl," my mother whispered softly, kissing Claire’s forehead. "I will never let anything happen to you. Emily did her job. You are safe now."

I floated down through the ceiling, landing silently behind the sofa.

Emily did her job.

"She really thinks I'm finished," I whispered into the cold air.

I reached out my newly solidified right hand and touched the heavy brass table lamp sitting beside my father’s elbow.

CRACKLE.

A burst of blue electricity shot from my fingers into the lamp socket. The lightbulbs in the living room shattered simultaneously, plunging the room into absolute darkness.

Claire shrieked. My father dropped his glass, cursing wildly in the dark.

"Margaret!" my father yelled. "Check the circuit breaker!"

Through the pitch-black room, I leaned down until my lips were two inches away from Claire’s ear.

"You're wearing my marrow, sister," I whispered in a raspy, terrifying breath. "And I want it back."

Claire screamed so loud her vocal cords cracked. She threw herself off the chair, scrambling across the floor in terror, pointing a trembling finger at the dark space behind the sofa.

"SHE'S HERE!" Claire howled, hyperventilating. "EMILY IS IN THE ROOM! SHE SPOKE TO ME!"