Sweet Temptation: A Trick-Or-Treat Collaboration

“Yeah…” He gazes at me, raising his eyebrow. “I mean, we said this was forever, and you expect me to walk away as if our life together meant nothing.”

“Um… no…”

“Anyway, time to get up. Jessa will barrel through those doors at any second.”

He throws himself on top of me, forcing his lips onto mine before pulling away with a satisfied smirk. Completely naked, he ambles to the bathroom before closing the door behind him.

The second it’s closed, I sit up in a rush, pulling the sheet to cover my chest while scanning my surroundings.

This is not my house.

This is Noah and Morgan’s bedroom.

Lavender’s her thing.

Her doona is the color of the walls, even the ugly rug is there against the dark oak floorboards.

There’s a photo of Morgan and Noah in a frame on the nightstand. I grab the frame, clutching it tightly in my hands. The guilt is eating away at me as I continue to stare at the picture of them on their wedding day. Suddenly, my eyes wander toward my hand, where a white gold band sits on my wedding finger.

Why am I wearing HER wedding band?

Jumping out of bed, I trip over my own feet while stumbling toward the mirror, barely able to release the breath caught inside my heaving chest. The panic begins like a cluster of spark plugs going off in my abdomen with no end in sight as I stare at the reflection looking back at me in the mirror.

My hands wander across my face—it’s not me.

Ash-blonde hair cut just above the shoulders, straight without a single trace of a wave. Brown eyes outlined with perfectly tweezed brows, and the lips—they’re thin. My fingers trace my cheekbones, pinching them in an attempt to wake up from this nightmare. They turn a tinge of pink, brightening my light skin.

My voice quivers as I repeat the word, “No, no, no,” while pulling this god-awful nighty away from my skin and peering down at my chest.

These breasts—they’re small.

The adrenalin surges through my entire body, knees shaking and affecting my ability to stand firm. My ribs are heaving, bound by the enormity of the reflection, unable to breathe at a healthy pace.

My head is a carousel of fears spinning out of control, each one pushing my mind into blackness, begging for answers. Anything. Any snippet of a clue.

Why? What is happening to me?

I close my eyes, one final time, praying to God this is some nightmare I need so desperately to wake from.

Five…

Four…

Three…

Two…

One…

Open.

My attention falls back to the mirror.

And the reflection is there, but it’s the one I dreaded would haunt me again.

I am my sister—Morgan.

“Morgan, what’s wrong? You look dazed and confused?”