The day before my birthday, Hector Tyler asked me, with reddened eyes, “It’s almost my birthday. Is she really not coming back?”

I wanted to celebrate my birthday too, but I didn’t dare say it out loud.

Hector wouldn’t stay with me on my birthday—he probably wished I would disappear altogether. The person he truly loved, his first love, was my second personality. She could only appear if I wasn’t there.

Later, I decided to undergo personality removal surgery.

I died, in a way. Yet, Hector searched for me like a madman for three years.

——

“Is she really not coming back?”

Hector asked me again.

This question had become his refrain ever since I woke up. I stayed silent.

He wasn’t looking for someone else. He was searching for my second personality, the one who emerged out of nowhere after I was struck by a car.

If she returned, what would happen to me? Would I vanish completely?

But wasn’t it her who had stolen my place in the first place?

Even though I had answered this question countless times, Hector still wouldn’t give up. Every few days, he would confirm it again.

Hector sat, staring blankly at the calendar, his eyes filled with an indescribable emptiness and loneliness.

“Tomorrow is Eds Black’s birthday. It’s…”

His voice choked up, leaving the sentence unfinished. I knew what he was going to say: it marked one year since Edna Black had disappeared.

“Hector, it’s my birthday too.”

Those words drained all my strength, but they didn’t even earn me a glance from him.

He merely uttered a soft “hmm.”

I had pursued Hector for four years and been with him for five, but he had never spent a full birthday with me. The day of the accident had been the first time he’d celebrated my birthday. Even then, he left before we could blow out the candles.

“Hector, can’t you at least stay until we blow out the candles and eat the cake? You promised to grant one of my birthday wishes!”

I clung to his clothes, my voice breaking in desperation. “I’ll make my wish now—I wish you’d spend today with me!”

“I told you, there’s an emergency at the company. I need to fly to London, and the driver is already waiting downstairs.”

He pried my hands off him without hesitation, his voice carrying a trace of irritation. “Edna, you should be sensible.”

Sensible.

That word again.

Hector had always told me to be sensible.

When work kept him too busy to celebrate my birthday, he’d say, “Edna, I’m swamped. You should be sensible.”

When his social obligations prevented him from accompanying me to the hospital, he’d promise, “I’ll come by as soon as I can. Be sensible.”

Even when we were together, he said, “Edna, I chose to be with you because you’re sensible. Please stay that way.”

But I didn’t want to be sensible. I just wanted him to stay, even if only long enough to eat cake before leaving.

My nose stung, and mist blurred my eyes.

Perhaps noticing I was about to cry, Hector softened his tone. He slid a card across the table to me. “If you don’t like the gift, you can get something else. There’s no limit.”

I kept my head down, saying nothing.

He scooped up a piece of cake and took a bite. “Happy now?”

“Be good, Eds. I’ll make it up to you when I return.”

Hector rubbed the top of my head with an affectionate gesture. My tears turned into a small, reluctant smile.

For the first time, he’d compromised.

For the first time, he’d called me “Eds” instead of “Edna.”

After Hector left, I noticed something on the floor—his ID card, which was likely dropped by accident when he pulled out the other card.

I rushed out to give it to him, but was struck by an oncoming car. When I regained consciousness, strange memories flooded my mind. For two years, the fake Edna had been living in my body. In these memories, Hector had spent time with the fake Edna—eating, watching movies, and traveling together. He no longer claimed to be too busy, nor did he ask her to be more sensible.

On her birthday, Hector booked an entire amusement park and surprised her with a doll costume, presenting a carefully prepared gift. Fireworks lit up the sky all night, nearly illuminating the entire evening. They had even planned a trip to Paris, where Hector promised to give her a beloved princess pumpkin carriage and castle.

The night before their departure, the fake Edna drank too much and stumbled down the stairs. The following day, it was me—Edna—who woke up in the hospital, not the version Edna Hector had been with.

Less than two weeks passed before Hector began to notice something was wrong. He asked, "Who are you?"

"Eds used to love having a lively home, always playing music, but for the past two weeks, the speakers have gathered dust. She couldn’t handle spicy food, mixing chili sauce with everything. And most importantly, Eds always cared deeply about her job at the piano store. Yet, you suddenly resigned three days ago and interviewed for a lab assistant position."

"Eds once said she didn't like doing experiments. She preferred music, photography, and romantic things—not boring research."

"You’re not Eds, so who are you?"

Hector’s eyes bore into me, fierce and searching, as if he wanted to see my soul through my face. I took a deep breath, trying to remain calm. "Hector, I am Eds!"

I didn’t know how to explain the past two years to him. I could feel that I was her, but at the same time, I wasn’t her.

Eventually, Hector took me to see a doctor. He left no stone unturned, visiting specialists in Neurology, Psychiatry, and Psychology. The diagnosis was that I had a split personality: the primary personality had returned, and the secondary one had disappeared.

That was the first time I saw Hector's eyes reddened. He asked the doctor in a trembling voice, "Will she come back?"

"No, she won’t."

Hector's body swayed slightly, and he gripped the table for support, asking, "No, there’s still a chance?"

"Unless the primary personality disappears, or chooses to give up."

Give up? Hector tilted his head and locked eyes with me, his expression one I’ll never forget. It was sinister, and paranoid, yet there was a glimmer of hope that could not be ignored.

I started to realize that everything might be different after all. At first, I hadn’t cared much. Whether the main personality or the second one, it was still Edna. What did it matter? Hector loved Edna for who she was, and I believed that I could do the same things she did.

But in the two years I’d been absent, the love between "me" and Hector had replayed in my mind, fueling my hope for the future. However, I failed to see that she and I were, in the end, two separate souls—something Hector could tell clearly.

Hector no longer called me Eds; he called me Edna, or sometimes, just "Hey." Under the same roof, he barely acknowledged my presence.

In the mornings, I would make breakfast and place it on the table, but he would glance at it and walk away. In the evenings, he wouldn’t come home for dinner, even when I sent him a message saying I had prepared his favorite dishes. However, he never stayed out all night.

I searched my memories and realized that the fake Edna had once said to him, "Hector, I don’t like it when you come home late. I worry about you." Because of that, no matter how busy he was, Hector always made sure to come back before 10 PM, and whenever he went on a business trip, he would send me a message ahead of time.

He wasn’t talking to me; he was trying to speak to his Eds through me. The only interaction we had was his persistent question: “Will she come back?”

Every three days, he would ask stubbornly. And each time, I gave him the same answer: “No.”

“Hector, no one wants a secondary personality to replace the main one. I am Edna. The fake Edna will never return!”

“She’s not the fake Edna!” Hector’s voice suddenly rose, nearly shouting. It startled me. He was rarely this emotional. Usually, he was composed, detached, and silent.

I swallowed the bitterness in my throat and tried to change the subject with a smile. “Let’s go to the concert. Look—it’s Kian Soltani’s. Didn’t you say you loved his cello the last time we watched him?”

I pulled two tickets from my bag, tickets I had spent a small fortune on, and held them out. But Hector stepped back as if I were holding something poisonous. He left abruptly, without a word.

In my desperation, I tried imitating the fake Edna, drinking poison to quench my thirst. I secretly learned piano, practicing for two hours every evening after work before heading home. I spent another thirty minutes each night perfecting my smile in the mirror. The fake Edna had been vibrant and lively—everything I was not.

I even forced myself to eat spicy food, enduring swollen lips and teary eyes. I popped a piece of candy in my mouth and kept going. Eventually, my body gave out, and I ended up in the hospital.

When Hector found out, he flew back from Japan immediately.

You see, it worked. When I used to get sick, Hector would just make a phone call, express polite concern, and have his assistant send over some skincare products. But now? Now I received the kind of attention that only the fake Edna had been afforded.

Still, his mood was dark, and his anger and contempt were unmasked.

“Can you stop this nonsense? No matter how hard you try to act like her, you’re not her!”

“Eds was a musical genius. You’ve been practicing for so long, and you still can’t play even the simplest piece. Her smile came from the heart—genuine and beautiful. Yours is stiff and forced.”

“And you’re not allowed to eat spicy food, stay up late, or drink alcohol. It’s bad for your health.”

Then, in a softer voice, almost a whisper carried away by the wind, he added, “What will you do if Eds comes back and your health is ruined?”

But I heard him.

It felt like my tail had been stepped on. I grabbed the nearest cup and hurled it at him.

“She is me! She’s all of me! This is my body—I can do whatever I want with it!”

“She doesn’t exist! She’s not real!” I screamed, tears streaming down my face, repeating the words like a broken record.

It was the first time I had ever lashed out at Hector. Normally, I kept everything bottled up. I was naturally reserved, avoiding conflict whenever possible. Besides, Hector had always emphasized that he valued calm and sensible women, saying he despised those who made a scene.

But in that moment, I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I didn’t know how else to release the frustration and helplessness boiling inside me.

The memories of those two years haunted me, constantly reminding me that being “sensible” wasn’t a prerequisite for being loved.

Hector’s blatant favoritism was like a slap to the face, forcing me to confront the truth: she wasn’t me.

Even though we shared the same face, Edna wasn’t the fake Edna.

No, I realized bitterly, to Hector, I was probably the fake one.

That day ended in yet another unhappy parting between us.

I didn’t have the courage to ask him to celebrate my birthday with me. Not that it mattered—he wouldn’t have agreed, even if I had.

A call from my childhood friend, Kim Kennedy, felt like a lifeline. She said she’d be back the next day and insisted we celebrate my birthday together.

“Don’t you dare ditch me for Hector!” she warned teasingly. “Don’t put love over friendship, okay?”