Before she can finish her sentence, someone wails. A woman. It's a keening sound, high and hollow. The sudden, treacherous violence of fresh grief. Jasmyn freezes. She can feel her heartbeat in the soft palate of her throat. Up ahead, the door with the security panel is slightly ajar. The scream came from in there, she's sure of it. Quickly now, she heads for the door. It slams shut just as she reaches it. She spins to face the not-twins. 

'What was that?' she asks. The baby kicks. Jasmyn cradles her stomach with her hands. 

'What the hell kind of treatments are you doing back there?' Alarm flashes across the face of the taller not-twin. But then, she smooths it to the pleasant-enough, transactional smile of customer service. 

'That was nothing to worry about, Mrs. Williams,' she says. 

Jasmyn is more than worried. She's afraid. 

'Someone was screaming for their life,' she whispers, hand at her throat. 'Mrs. Williams, I assure you that all of our treatments are patient directed and safe,' says the shorter one. She reaches out, gesturing for Jasmyn to continue on, but Jasmyn backs away.

'You expect me to believe that someone asked for whatever made them scream like that?'

'Sometimes the muscles in my neck get so tight, it hurts to get a massage', says the shorter not-twin. 

The taller one nods in agreement. 'That’s certainly happened to me as well', she says. 

'Sometimes even an exfoliation can do it,' says the first. 

'Especially if you have a lot of blackheads that are rooted deeply,' explains the second. Both women are speaking in the soothing, singsong voice you’d use on a child who's spooked from a bad dream or a sinister- looking shadow. 

But she’s not a child and this is not a dream. She knows what she’s heard.