Helen had the kind of beauty that hurt to look at, like staring into a low sun. High cheekbones that caught the light. Lips that seemed sculpted by a Renaissance artist. Eyes the color of deep honey. She moved through the world as if gravity had personally decided to be gentler on her.

“Cultivated from a consenting aesthetic ideal,” Dr. Voss explained. “High-density collagen. Perfect melanin distribution. No scarring. No rejection.”

They were Mira’s eyes. The original, unmatched pair.

On the back of her hand, just below the knuckles, was a tiny, raised scar—the size and shape of a surgical needle puncture.

Helen looked up. For the first time, she truly looked at Mira. Not through her. At her.

Not on the surface. Beneath . As if the grafted tissues were trying to push roots into her bones. She scratched until she bled. The blood was not her type. The nurse at the clinic frowned at her bloodwork and asked, “Have you had a transfusion recently?”

Mira lied. She said no. The final Thursday arrived. Helen looked different—her jawline now sharper, borrowed from someone else. Her ears were smaller, more delicate. She seemed less like a person and more like a composite sketch of everyone’s desires.