It was almost a joke when you asked me.
I’d been splashing water on my face in the bathroom off the grand ballroom’s hallway, inching up my sleeve cuffs to press cold, wet fingers to my wrists, wiping blindly at my temples so I wouldn’t have to lift my gaze above the sink. It was in this state that you’d come up behind me and said something about tampons.
“I—sorry?”
When I turned, you had my face, like a mirror, like a nightmare. I didn’t scream, but it was close.
“Holy shit,” you said. “Who are you?”
“Samson,” I said, prickly. The curls I’d fought to have edging below my hairline had plastered themselves to my damp neck. I stuck out a hand like an idiot. You didn’t take it.
“Samson, the—?”
Star of tonight’s gala, sure, yes; satellite of the star, at least. I shrugged.
You tipped your head like you’d get a better view from a twenty-degree angle. “Hm.”
“Okay,” I said, because I was tired and the party was terrible and this may as well have been happening. “Do you… know someone here?”
“I work for the hotel,” you said. “We should switch places.”
I laughed.
You didn’t.
I laughed again, more nervously. You smiled. This was the first hint I had that you were nothing like me.
“Why?” I asked, like an asshole.
“Why not?” you answered, like a crazy person.
Which wasn’t a generous assessment on my part, but I wasn’t feeling at my best that night, and you were suggesting defrauding hundreds of guests at my expense.
You put a hand at my elbow; I jumped. “Seriously,” you said. “We could get away with it. Don’t you want to try?”
“We don’t look that much alike,” I told you, because—
“Okay, you’re a boy,” you said, dismissive, “but come on, Sam; do you mind if I call you Sam? Samson’s a bit biblical… but look at us!”
You dragged me to the mirror. Nobody else was using the bathroom, so there was no one else to gawk at us: a shaggy-haired boy and a short-haired girl, me in oval-shaped glasses, yours more rounded. You were maybe half an inch taller. I straightened my spine, averting my gaze. You grinned at me.
“I’d hardly have to cut my hair.” You pinched a lock under your ear, then tapped your glasses. “What’s your prescription?”
I didn’t know the number offhand. We swapped frames, bracing to wince, and found our eyes to be as identical as our faces.
“Carmen,” I said, off your nametag, “what you’re proposing is identity theft.”
You shrugged. “Can’t steal what’s freely given,” you said. Some people would call that socialist propaganda. I didn’t want to voice that. “I mean, it’s not like I’m saying permanently or anything.”
So we got down to logistics. How the washroom attendant would swap herself out for the socialite. Not that I’d have to—just, you riding along, making an appearance. Living the life you’d seen from afar. It didn’t sound so crazy when you said it. I let you make a lot of plans.
I didn’t have scissors, but I gave you my room number and when I opened the door to your knock you’d found a pair, so I followed you in and cupped your scalp to trim your curls.
It was an unprecedented intimacy with a stranger. I didn’t… touch people, not a lot. I didn’t touch girls a lot. Your hair was very soft. I tried to be gentle. The scrape of the scissor blades set my skin on edge; you didn’t notice, or say anything if you did.
“You’re sure your dad won’t catch us?” you asked, and my hand jerked. “Hey!”
“Sorry.” I squinted at your hair, cheeks hot. “It, um, it looks fine.”
“Okay. So your dad?”
My father was busy. My father was the sort of man who never really looked at anyone except for what he could make of them, and he could never manage to make anything of me. “No,” I said. “Drop your voice around him. That’s all.”
You looked at me for a minute. I focused on protecting your ears from the scissor’s snips. “Why are you doing this?” you asked, finally.
“I can’t suddenly have longer hair,” I said, but you put a hand on my wrist to stop me, so I had to look at you.
Your eyes were bright, I thought. Lively. Nobody would believe you were me.
“Sam?”
“It was your idea. Call it a social experiment.” I brushed loose hair off your shoulder. “What about you?”
Again, that flash of a grin. You’d have to learn to keep that under wraps. “This kind of opportunity! How could I turn it down?”
“Oh, shit. You’re some scam artist.” The scissors were warm in my hand; I lifted them so they caught the light and your eye. “I think this is kind of a big commitment to ripping my father off.”
“How often do you meet your doppelgänger?” With this weird earnestness. Like you were really excited to meet yourself as a boy, and not faintly sick. “Hey, you don’t think your dad was a sperm donor?”
“Definitely not,” I said, and didn’t volunteer what he thought of unmarried pregnancy. “Maybe he has a secret twin.”
“Maybe we were twins. Separated at birth.”
Maybe some force of nature just had a sick sense of humor. I stepped back and looked at you, which was nauseating.
“How do I look?” you asked, deadpan.
Like me. I shrugged. “You’ll pass.”
#
You did pass, beautifully. Handsomely. Not that I—But on you my features could almost seem pretty. Anyway, nobody noticed a thing.
You glowed, telling me afterward, gloating about shaking hands and brushing shoulders with the high and mighty unsuspecting. I had never, in my whole life, been so excited about attending a dinner. Or maybe about anything.
I shouldn’t have been surprised when you asked, “Could we do it again?”
So we did it again. Smuggled you along, hid one of us in a closet, trotted you out for another public appearance. And then, when your palms didn’t sweat during and nobody puked afterwards, for another.
“This is great,” you said, grinning, glorious, and I had to agree.
It was kind of inevitable that we’d try our fantastic new trick in other ways. Could you get away with being me at dinners? at school? at breakfast?
“Your mom’s nice,” you told me, and I shook my head.
“Your mom.” This wasn’t the first time we’d slipped out of character; I didn’t mind reminding you.
“Okay, whatever. Our mom’s nice.” You flopped back on my bed. Our bed. Your bed, half the time—on those nights, I slept on a pile of blankets we’d put together in the walk-in. It was fun, like camping, if family camping trips had ever been fun. We took turns. What if someone had come in to wake us?
“Did she say anything to you?” I asked.
You bit your lip the way I always did when I didn’t want to answer. You were getting really good at me.
“Oh.” Mom was—had been—the last hurdle we thought we might stumble over. Like, at least, my mom would… Our mom. I focused on my breathing.
“I think she’s glad we’re eating,” you said, and my eyes slid to the plate you’d brought me.
“Later,” I said, and even though you knew my face, you weren’t looking.
#
You were me more often now. My friends liked you, you reported, which was weird because I didn’t know I had any. After that, school was your domain. You brought home textbooks with page numbers circled so I could keep up. Had to be on top of things when I went back, right?
We joined clubs: chess, at first; and then drama, which made sense with all the acting practice you were putting in; then band, where you revealed we had a gift for flute.
“I can’t play the flute,” I insisted.
“Well, we do now.” You held it out to me.
That’s a girly instrument. Kids will talk. I could just picture your face if I said that. Instead, I tried, “I don’t know how,” so you ended up teaching me.
Trying to. I was never very good, I kept making this horrible screeching with the thing until you snatched it away from me. So music was yours, too.
#
I got used to hearing how you were acing my life; I got used to free time: I caught up on my TBR pile. I tried people-watching until we realized if I was noticed it would blow our cover. I discovered my bedroom had 413 ceiling tiles and 6 of them were cracked.
“That’s great, Sam,” you said when I told you this. “Hey, weird question: Could you stay, y’know, back this afternoon? I invited Terry and Sahar over.”
Girls? I tried, halfheartedly, to convince you it made sense for me to be the host. But they were your friends, and they’d notice if we were different than we’d been all day. You made good points.
I spent the evening trying not to eavesdrop. You’d tell me about it eventually.
#
You were me more than I was. In the closet, spread out among the linens and throws, I closed my eyes and waited for you in stale air.
“Hey,” you said, drawing the door open, “check this out.”
You’d pierced your ears. A little stud sparkling at me from each lobe. Which meant you’d pierced our ears. You acted like you didn’t get why I didn’t love that.
“Come on, Sam,” you said, “it’s cute. It looks cute on us, it really does. And you can always let it close later if you hate it.”
I let you talk me into it; we watched Parent Trap and took notes, and then you brought us an apple, a lighter, and a pin. I bit my tongue bloody, but no one downstairs heard anything.
The mirror caught the flash of silver any way I turned my head.
#
“We need a haircut,” I told you when I saw your curls brushed your shoulders now. Mine too, I guess.
You ran a hand through the ends of it. “Do we?”
I didn’t really know how to counter that. Eventually, I said, “Is it my turn tomorrow?”
“No, I have flute after school,” you said, but you looked sorry about it.
“Don’t worry,” I said, “I’ll take next shift.”
“Thursday is play rehearsal. And Friday the chess tournament starts.”
Oh. Huh. Inhaling took effort. “Has Dad said anything about the hair?”
“Dad doesn’t look at me,” you said.
“Us,” I said.
#
I thought it was obvious that I’d do the play one night and you’d do the other. Apparently I hadn’t cleared that with you.
“Sam,” you said, “you don’t even know our lines.”
Yes, I did. I’d studied everything you were doing for us. I wasn’t an idiot. I knew the lines and the cues, and I would be great up there, or at least not terrible. I didn’t say this—something invisible was sitting on my stomach, pressing me flat.
You were angrier than I had ever seen you, angrier than I had ever seen myself. The brightness in your eyes was cold. “I can’t believe you’re trying to steal this from me. I’ve been practicing—”
“We’ve been practicing—”
“No!” You were whisper-shouting now, because even hidden in the walk-in we didn’t want anyone overhearing. “No, we haven’t! I’ve gone to every session, I’ve been with the other actors, and you think dancing with clothes hangers is going to substitute for real human interaction!”
I saw red. “No one asked you to do any of this,” I said, which felt reasonable. “You invited yourself, remember? I’m doing the play. It’s my life.”
I slept in the bed that night. At two am, I woke up because you were standing next to me. The crack of light from under the door cast your shadow across my chest.
“I’m sorry,” you said. “Of course you can do the play. Can I do opening night?”
“Fine,” I said, and rolled over. As I fell back asleep, the closet door closed quietly.
#
I shouldn’t have gone to watch your play.
We’d agreed a long time ago we could never be in the same place at once, outside our bedroom. But I needed to see. I was careful: I put on our most oversized hoodie, wore sunglasses indoors like a creep, and stayed way back at the end of the auditorium the whole time.
You were great. That was—whatever, I’d passed the script back and forth with you, I had some idea you knew what you were doing. If it was just that it wouldn’t have meant anything.
After, though. After the curtain fall and the bows and the applause. The cast spilling out from backstage to get hugs and cheers—and our parents were there, with flowers, Mom calling for her Sam.
My parents, actually.
My parents. Your friends. Everyone loved us, but no one was looking at the weirdo in the hoodie. There wasn’t any air left in the room. I went home.
“That was amazing,” you said as soon as you got back, bouncing on my bed, beaming. “God, you should have seen it. We totally killed.”
“You,” I said. The mattress was jouncing me with your excitement. “You did. Not me.”
“Well, it’s your turn tomorrow.” Your smile didn’t waver. When had I ever smiled like that? “C’mon, we’re celebrating!”
I said, “I think you should leave.”
The words took a moment to reach you through your halo of bliss. Then you said, “What?”
“Go home,” I said, chest tight. “I’m sick of the game. You’re taking my whole life.”
Your cheeks flushed. “As if you wanted it,” you said. “Like I haven’t noticed our massive closet doesn’t have anything in short sleeves. Mom’s really glad we’re doing so well.”
Nausea churned. I couldn’t draw breath. “Get out of my fucking house,” I said. “I’m done, Carmen.”
“Sam,” you said, and I guess I’ll never know if you meant it as a plea or a correction, because that’s when I slapped you. “Ow! What the fuck!”
“Get out!” I said, voice rising into hysteria, cracking on the pitch. “God, didn’t anyone even notice you disappeared? Is that it? You wanted to try being someone who mattered?”
“Picked pretty badly then, didn’t I,” you said, breathing hard and fast, “right, ’cause guess what, Sam, no one—”
I had never hurt anyone but myself in my life. But you had been me for months, and I was on top of you, and my hands fit around your throat—you clawed at me, but I got my knees onto your arms to put a stop to that; you opened your mouth like you planned to scream, but I don’t think you had enough air left.
“Leave me alone,” I said, pressing as hard as I could, “stop it, stop it…”
“Sam,” you wheezed.
“It’s Samson,” I said. “Sam’s someone you made up.”
Your eyelids fluttered. You were so pretty—how did nobody notice you weren’t me? Your face was growing darker. You mouthed something I didn’t catch.
I don’t know what I did after that. It gets blurry. I hope I was careful cleaning up. I wasn’t really thinking at my best. Could have used an extra pair of hands, a partner in crime. Or just a washroom attendant.
But I couldn’t dwell on all that. I had to get plenty of sleep that night; after all, I was going back onstage tomorrow.
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