I heard the sound of traffic in the background, a distant siren, and her heavy breathing.

“I had to call you from a burner phone,” she said.

“What is going on, Lauren? Where are you?”

“I’m in Chicago, near the loop,” she said. “Megan found out I was looking into her medical bills.”

I gripped the edge of the kitchen counter, my fingernails digging into the laminate.

“What do you mean, her medical bills?” I asked.

“She doesn’t have multiple sclerosis, Clara,” Lauren said.

The words hung in the cold air of my kitchen.

“She never had it,” Lauren continued. “She made it all up to get your family to pay for her life.”

I looked down at the linoleum floor, focusing on a small gray speck near the refrigerator.

“That’s impossible,” I said, though my empty bank account told a different story. “She’s been in wheelchair-accessible apartments. She has a doctor in Chicago.”

“The doctor is a physical therapist who thinks she is recovering from a minor sports injury,” Lauren said. “She pays him in cash to write general progress reports.”

“And the wheelchair?” I asked.