Fractured

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There is something soothingly idyllic about a sunny summer’s day in England. A green park, the shade of an old tree, and the innocence of youth as two pretty girls lie together in the shade.

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It’s almost sinful how such a tableau can so easily deceive.

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The two young girls were an almost impossible picture of innocence; with their long blonde hair, their cotton summer dresses and their white knee socks, they appeared as outrageously beautiful identical twins; the one, her back against the tree, and the other her head resting on the lap of the first. It was a setting for a watercolour painting or a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle. Such pictures shouldn’t exist outside the realm of the artist. Only the frown on one face, and the sadness on the other began to destablise the image of perfection.

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It was indeed an impossible picture, though not in ways that were immediately apparent to the casual observer. For starters, the girls were not identical twins. They were semi-identical – sesquizygotical – twins, one egg fertilised by two sperm, and yet whilst not identical they shared many similarities. The most startling was that they shared amazingly luminous blue eyes, so blue and so deep as to steal your breath away. They were mystical, magical, and could at a glance wipe every thought from your head. Yet for all the external beauty the twins shared, their true bond was hidden from view, deep inside them both.

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They would share the same thoughts, share the same emotions – often they would finish each other’s sentences, and feel each other’s pain. In their short lives their identities had gradually become enmeshed as one; it had become a shell – a very fragile shell – within which they hid together when the world threatened, peeping out when they dared to see if it was safe. It was very much a survival strategy; it wasn’t a great one, but it was all they had.

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And right now, under the rare English summer sun, that shell was trembling under the oppressive weight of an ominously unstable home life, as it drew closer to the time they would have to leave and head home. They each stared sightlessly into different distances, their moods clearly not lifted by the perfect day. The girl resting on the other used her head to bang on the sister’s lap.

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‘What?’ Caroline, her back against the tree, came out of her despondent reverie.

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‘Say something.’ Karel’s voice reflected their shared misery.

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Caroline sighed. There was nothing to say – nothing that hadn’t been said all ready at least. She sighed again and absently stroked Karel’s head. She leaned forward and awkwardly kissed Karel’s forehead.

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‘It’s a beautiful day,’ she said sarcastically.

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Karel laughed. ‘For someone, somewhere, I’m sure.’

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Caroline fell back into silence, half-musing as to who those lucky ‘someones’ might be. As she did so often these days, she once again searched her brain for a way out of their life. A way out before the final train wreck. And as always her efforts took her nowhere.

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‘Don’t torture yourself, sis,’ said Karel.

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It was not unusual for the twins, when under stress, to intuitively know what the other was thinking. It was an emotional, rather than a mental, communication. Caroline  shook off her growing melancholy and poked Karel’s shoulder.

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‘We best be getting back. Get back before him, is best. Safer.’

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It was Karel’s turn to sigh, but this time there was genuine foreboding in the sigh. Reluctantly rolling off her thighs, Karel came up on both knees.

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‘I wish…’

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Caroline was halfway standing; she placed a finger on Karel’s lips.

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‘Me too. One day, little sister, I promise.’

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They both stood up, stretching.

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‘You better change,’ said Caroline seriously, ‘unless you want to greet him with a curtsey…’

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Karel looked at her sourly, but nodded. Caroline leaned down and opened the backpack they had brought, pulling out a shirt and a pair of grey school trousers. She tossed them across.

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‘I should be grateful, I suppose,’ she said, ‘I get a sister and a brother.’