The Vanishing Half

by Brit Bennett

Jude paused. “Well,” she said, “my mind’s all over the place right now.” It was exactly the type of thing her mother would have said—sly, meant to guilt her into submission.

Knowing a little was worse than not knowing at all.

“I’m not a Negro,” she said. Jude laughed again, this time uneasily. “Well, your mother is,” she said. “So?” “So that makes you one too.”

“My father’s white, you know. And you don’t get to show up and tell me what I am.” It wasn’t a race thing. She just hated the idea of anyone telling her who she had to be. She was like her mother in that way.

that. And did you know Jude does things like this, she would’ve asked him, befriends white girls? It’s a new world, ain’t it? Did you know the world is so new?

this Stella Vignes, looked so ordinary, he lost his breath. Not like Desiree—he wouldn’t have confused the two, even as he drew closer, Stella clambering to her feet. She wore navy blue slacks and leather boots, her hair pinned into a ponytail. Pitch black, like she hadn’t aged at all, unlike Desiree, whose temples began to streak silver.

Desiree speak to their mother, her voice soft and soothing. And all the while, to Adele Vignes, the twins were the same as they’d ever been.

“White.” “No,” Stella said. “Free.” Desiree laughed. “Same thing, baby.” She took another sip of gin, swallowing hard. “Well, who was he?”

though she only was by a matter of minutes. But maybe in those seven minutes they’d first been apart, they’d each lived a lifetime, setting out on their separate paths. Each discovering who she might be.

He led

Stella to his car. He offered to drive her, not out of kindness, but because Desiree loved Stella and that was how love worked, wasn’t it? A transference, leaping onto you if you inched close enough.

What type of life did her mother think she was living that she couldn’t interrupt with that type of news?

The white shotgun house appeared, looking the same as she’d remembered, which seemed wrong since her grandmother would not be sitting on the porch to greet them. Her death hit in waves. Not a flood, but water lapping steadily at her ankles. You could drown in two inches of water. Maybe grief was the same.

“Nobody knows why. It’s like they’re living their lives backward.”