The Name They Buried

Julia — First-Person POV

I pulled back from Alan.

Not far. Just enough. Just the specific distance of someone who needed to be the one standing rather than the one being held, who needed the floor under their own feet rather than someone else's arm as the thing keeping them upright.

"Prove it," I said.

Iris looked at me.

"The photograph—"

"Could be fabricated," I said. "A child who looks like me. A necklace that could have been duplicated." I held her gaze. "The necklace has been mine since befo