My pulse started pounding in my throat.
I should have gone back inside.
Instead, I heard myself say, “Excuse me.”
“Yeah?” He glanced over politely, distracted.
Up close, it was no longer a resemblance; it was him, or someone really close to him.
“Excuse me.”
My mouth went dry. “This is going to sound strange,” I said carefully, “but do you know anyone named Ron? A relative? Cousin?”
His entire body went still.
“No,” he said quickly.
He adjusted the little girl against his chest. “Katie, let’s go inside, baby.”
“A relative? Cousin?”
The name hit me like a slap.
“Katie?” I repeated before I could stop myself. “Katie?”
“It’s just her name,” he said, avoiding my gaze.
“And it’s my name, too,” I said, swallowing hard.
For a second, something flickered across his face.
The name hit me like a slap.
I stepped closer.
“I’m sorry. You just look so much like someone I loved and lost. It’s unsettling.”
He turned back to the door, fumbling with the lock. That was when I saw his right hand clearly.
Two fingers missing.
The same two fingers Ron lost when he was ten, after lighting fireworks behind his uncle’s garage while his mother stood there yelling at him to stop.
Two fingers missing.
My stomach dropped.
“Your hand…” I whispered.
