Chapter 21: The Date

"I never knew," Cora said again, into the dead quiet.

She turned to the ballroom with her hands out, tears on her cheeks.

"I'm so sorry. I had no idea my sister was the donor."

"That picture is only a letter about me."

"Cosima must have sent it to the screen herself."

A few people in the front rows shifted in their chairs.

She was good, and some of them wanted to believe her.

"Read the caption out loud," I said.

"I can't read it from here."

"It's written in your own words, under your own photograph, on your own phone."

"Someone could have typed that!"

"Then someone typed it the night my results came back," I said. "Sixteen days before surgery."

"The date on a photo can be changed."

"Can it?" said a man's voice.

Reed was walking down the center aisle with the laptop open in both hands.

He did not look at Cora.

He climbed the steps and set the laptop on the podium.

The screen above us flickered and showed the file information for the picture.

Date taken, the night of my results. Device, Cora's phone. Sent to the shared family album within the minute.

"That's the original file," Reed said into the microphone. "Not a screenshot. It came off the family tablet in her mother's kitchen."

"Reed," Cora said.

"I also have this."

He tapped a key, and the ballroom speakers crackled.

Cora's voice came out of them, light and a little amused.

*Of course I knew. I read her receipt at Mom's. It said four vials and the date.*

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