Three Black Swans Read online

  They had a cleaning lady one day a week, which was good, because otherwise they would live in squalor. The cleaning lady scrubbed the bathrooms, mopped, vacuumed and did laundry. She was not patient. She would yell at Missy’s parents, “Get out of the way! Pick up your junk! Bring your clothes to the washing machine, I’m not getting them off the floor.”

  Claire’s house was a complete contrast. Uncle Phil and Aunt Frannie were excellent cooks. Dinners included a vegetable, salad and dessert along with the carefully considered main dish. Every dinner was eaten at a table, and the Linnehans had several: kitchen, dining room, sun porch, deck. Nobody watched television as they ate. Nobody interrupted a conversation; everybody waited patiently for one story to end before adding his or her own thoughts. They even chewed slowly. Missy always felt as if she were traveling between planets when she stayed over at Claire’s.

  And yet their mothers were sisters. It was why Missy and Claire looked so much alike; they had half the same genes.

  Or not, thought Missy.

  Their dads had nothing in common. Claire’s dad was a huge sports fan and followed beloved teams in several sports. He had all the T-shirts and read all the blogs. Missy’s father was largely unaware of sports and when forced into a conversation would say, “What a game!” which saved him from having to know whether they were talking about soccer or baseball. Uncle Phil was always outdoors coaching kids or else framing houses, but Missy’s father had no interest in fresh air and owned one tool—a screwdriver that was never the right type or size.

  When the two families got together, it was difficult to believe anybody was related to anybody.

  Missy did not think they were.

  * * *

  “Grace,” said the principal to Mrs. Stancil behind the closed doors of her office, “you actually gave your students an assignment to create a hoax?”

  “The theory was that the kids would do serious research—dinosaur bones in Montana or peat bog burials in Denmark—and with that research, buttress a pretend discovery. I thought it would add a little spice and get everybody excited. We weren’t going to fake anything to the public.”

  “I have already had phone calls from two school board members.”

  Mrs. Stancil stared. “How could they know?”

  “Grace! What century are you in? Rick put it on YouTube. Kids texted their parents! Our student test scores slid this year, SATs are down and dropout percentages continue to swell. Now one of my teachers has abandoned the biology curriculum for a hoax assignment?”

  “Missy didn’t do what I asked,” protested Mrs. Stancil. “She just pulled off a prank.”

  “A prank that is your responsibility.”

  Grace Stancil did not want responsibility. “I’ll withdraw the concept, and that will be that.”

  “Grace, I cannot correct YouTube. The world is going to think that our school reunited lost identical twins. What’s more fun than that? What TV talk show wouldn’t want two beautiful, tearful girls who just found out they’re separated identical twins?” The principal stood up. “The parents have to be informed.”

  Grace Stancil left the principal’s office. She would make Missy call. That would be easier, and blame would lie where it belonged.

  Then she thought, Tomorrow is Friday. I can let it go over the weekend. It’ll fizzle out.

  * * *

  Shortly before the end of the school day, Mrs. Conway’s voice came over the public address system. “I’m sorry to break in, people. May I have your attention, please. This morning we saw on our in-house television what we thought was an emotional and stirring reunion between identical twins. In fact, Missy Vianello was perpetrating a hoax using her cousin. Missy regrets having misled us and hopes you had a good laugh. The girls are not identical, they just have a strong family resemblance, and I’m asking students please not to spread rumors about identical twins.”

  But Mrs. Conway, like Mrs. Stancil, was occupying another century. Rumors were no longer spread by word of mouth. Hours had gone by. Several hundred kids had already forwarded Rick’s video to everybody they knew.

  THE SAME THURSDAY

  After school

  MRS. CONWAY’S OFFICE was large. Missy and Rick were seated at a distance from the vice principal, and from each other.

  “Melissa,” said Mrs. Conway.

  Nobody called her Melissa. She had always been Missy. Her parents often talked about the terrifying days and nights they’d spent in newborn intensive care, hanging over their sick little girl. It was the nurses who had begun to call the tiny baby Missy.

  Claire’s right, thought Missy dully. Adoptive parents don’t visit NICU. I’ve made this all up. I relied on a stupid talk show, when I didn’t even hear the beginning or the ending of it, and it probably had nothing to do with me anyway, and now I have to pay the price.

  “Melissa, what were you thinking?” demanded Mrs. Conway.

  I was thinking, thought Missy, that Claire would weep from joy when she grasped that we are not cousins after all. Instead, Claire wept from horror. I was thinking that this television moment would corner my mom and dad, and Claire’s mom and dad, but most of all, Claire.

  What was the point in proving you were identical twins if the other twin didn’t want to be one? Missy had known she might hurt somebody with this hoax, but she had not expected to get hurt herself. She had once read a remark made by an identical twin: “If you’re an identical twin, you’re never alone.” Wrong, thought Missy.

  “Melissa, I am disappointed in you,” said Mrs. Conway. “Why on earth did you perpetrate this hoax?”

  “It was not a hoax!” said Rick. “Those two girls are identical. Missy, stop denying it. Just look at this frame, Missy. I’ve paused it where you and Claire face each other.”

  Even from Claire, with whom Missy supposedly shared everything, there were secrets. Missy had a hole at the bottom of her heart. The hole was a slit, as if left by a knife blade. Sometimes she could feel it when she breathed—a cold spot in her soul. At the dry cleaner’s, Missy had realized that the cold place was not a slot. It was a slice. Something had been cut away, as if her heart were a pie, and a fraction had been served to somebody else.

  Claire was that fraction.

  Claire was the deep member of the family. Claire read classics and booklist books of her own free will—from the difficult antique phrasing of Robinson Crusoe to the horrors of The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn and Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl.

  Missy kept up with People magazine.

  Claire’s books were about finding truth. Missy’s were about nontruth, about celebrity and scandal.

  And yet it was Missy who was desperate for truth. Now she was humiliated by her fantasy. It was pitiful.

  “Missy!” yelled Rick.

  Missy had been there. She didn’t need to see the video. But she was trapped. She watched Rick’s video. Two utterly identical girls looked back at her.

  “Melissa,” said Mrs. Conway, “the resemblance is certainly there, but what a cruel punch to your own family! And a low trick to play on your school. Furthermore, it’s now online. Melissa, do you understand what the Internet is?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Conway. I realize that Rick’s video is irretrievable.”

  In their home offices, Missy’s parents sat at computers all day. It was possible that they had already come upon the video, or that it had been forwarded to them and they were only a click away from viewing it.

  If I’m really their daughter, thought Missy, I have to face them with what I’ve done. But if I’m not their daughter, they have to face me.

  In the end, Mrs. Conway did nothing to either student, because there wasn’t anything to do. Rick and Missy left the vice principal’s office and walked out of the building.

  Almost never did seniors take a school bus. Rick was the rare exception. His parents did not spend their money on cars and car insurance. Rick’s father had a traveling hobby: he wanted to visit every football and majo
r league baseball stadium in America and every NASCAR track, and also fish in a hundred remote but famous streams. Rick and his father were always flying to some distant venue for some great clash of athletes or else for trout. Rick was an interesting guy.

  As for Missy, she was the last bus pickup in the morning and the first drop-off in the afternoon, making her bus ride quick and easy. Yet another reason why her parents were not about to let Missy have her license. Why pay for cars and insurance when you had free transport at the front door?

  The buses were long gone. Rick and Missy could hike home or call their parents. Missy was not ready for parents. “I guess I’m walking,” she said to Rick.

  “I’ll walk with you.”

  Missy set a fast pace.

  “You can’t outwalk me,” said Rick. “You two are identical twins. I’ll buy you a Coke if you tell me the real story.”

  “I have a refrigerator full of Cokes at home,” said Missy, although at the moment she could think of no one she’d like to share a Coke with more than Rick.

  “I’ll give you more airtime.”

  “Thanks. I had all I needed.”

  “Missy, you owe me. I want to do a real interview. With you and Claire. How does the weekend look?”

  The weekend did not look like the usual sleepover. Why wasn’t Claire glad? thought Missy.

  At the next intersection Rick had to walk in a different direction. “Think about it, okay, Missy?”

  She smiled at him. He was nice. This wasn’t his fault.

  He smiled back. “Say hi to your sister.”

  Missy had used the word “twin.” She had never used the word “sister.” I have a sister.

  How dare they? she thought. How dare my parents separate us?

  * * *

  Claire’s last class on Thursday was math, which came easily to her, and her best friends and the adorable Aiden were in it.

  The hoax had thrown her into a tailspin and now Lilianne had spilled the unemployment news. It had never occurred to Claire that her father had problems. What else had never occurred to her? Certainly not adoption.

  Claire walked into math class with her eyes averted so she would not see all these boys who were capable of being fathers and giving their daughters up for adoption. She wrenched her mind off the choreography of sex.

  This was the moment Aiden chose to rush over. “Hi, Claire!”

  In middle school, Aiden had been a loser. A lot of boys fit into this category in seventh and eighth grade. But by junior year, Aiden was tall, lean and sophisticated.

  Claire tried to look like a girl with no concerns, a girl who was fun. Immediately the word “fun” felt like a substitute for the word “sex,” which rushed toward the appalling concept of teen fathers who abandoned their daughters.

  “Remember Ashley Moore?” said Aiden excitedly. “Remember she used to live next door to me? Remember she moved away?”

  Ashley had been both a cheerleader and a member of the dance team, which hardly seemed fair. Claire loved to dance, and of course Jazzercise used dance steps, so Claire had grown up at the feet of a dancing woman. But even with all that exposure, she was not a fine dancer. She and every other girl in school had been envious of Ashley. Had Ashley come back to snag Aiden?

  A huge grin spread across Aiden’s face. “Ashley sent me the video.”

  Ashley was sending Aiden videos?

  “Ashley says hello. She says congratulations.”

  Claire was thinking of dance. Of Ashley. And then it came to her. She, Claire Linnehan, who loved Facebook and YouTube and all the other social networking sites, who could hardly wait for the next download, had thought of her sixty seconds at Missy’s high school as a contained and finite event. A little box of time now closed. Sealed. Done.

  But nothing stays in a drawer in a studio in another state. Nothing filmed is ever over. Of course there was a video. Of course it was online.

  Claire yanked her ponytail out. Set her books down on her desk. Repaired the ponytail.

  “A girl Ashley roomed with last year in cheerleading camp forwarded it to her,” explained Aiden, “because she remembered Ashley used to attend this school.”

  This school? But the video had been filmed at Missy’s school. In another state. Claire said thickly, “I don’t think I mentioned my high school.”

  “No, you didn’t. But it’s one of the tags the announcer Rick used. It’s so exciting about your new sister.”

  Sister.

  Claire felt as if weight were actually falling off her. If she looked down, she would see pounds of flesh lying on the floor, like locks of hair after a cut.

  “That TV interview was so tough on you,” said Aiden. “I don’t blame you for sobbing.”

  Claire would have said that a tear or two might have leaked out of one eye. She had sobbed?

  The math teacher began teaching. Aiden lowered his voice. “I think identical twins are fascinating. I mean, the whole concept. Being exactly, totally the same as another person.”

  Claire remembered the math. The indisputable eight-week age gap between her and Missy. She clung to the fact of the age difference.

  I am not exactly, totally the same as any other person. It is impossible for us to be sisters. Aiden succumbed to the power of suggestion because Missy and I have a strong family resemblance.

  The teacher raised his voice. “We will put today’s exercises on the board to observe how each problem is solved. Claire, will you begin?”

  Begin what? And why? Who cared?

  Now that Claire thought about it, who was it that she and Missy were supposed to resemble? Claire didn’t look a bit like either of her parents and Missy didn’t look a bit like hers. The strong family resemblance was strictly between Claire and Missy.

  Claire needed to talk to Missy. Needed it like oxygen.

  She stomped on the thought. I do not need Missy. She is not oxygen to me. I am complete without her.

  But was she? Saturdays, when they parted company for another week, when Missy disappeared from sight, Claire would feel as if one of her limbs had been amputated.

  Roberta, who sat behind Claire, leaned forward to tap the first exercise on the homework sheet with her beautiful fingernail. Roberta’s nails were black today, and featured tiny silver fir trees. Claire managed to walk to the board and write out her work.

  Thinking about identical twins gave her vertigo. If she tipped close enough to the concept, she and Missy might merge. There would not be two of them. There would be one of them.

  “Perfect,” said the teacher. “Any questions, people?”

  Claire made it back to her seat. “How long is the video?” she whispered to Aiden.

  “Maybe a minute. When did you find out, Claire? How are your parents handling it?”

  My parents are going to see that video! It isn’t just me on the receiving end of Missy’s hoax. It’s Mom and Dad. It’s my aunt and uncle. They’ll be crushed.

  Roberta whispered, “You’re going to go bald yanking at your hair like that.”

  Claire could handle a new identical twin more easily than going bald. She re-ponytailed and locked her fingers together.

  Usually she would be texting Missy about now, but she had turned her phone off, which was like having her mind off or her pulse off.

  Tomorrow was Friday. Sleepover night. Missy used to call them Claire-overs. When things in Claire’s life went wrong, Missy’s presence would remove the sting every Friday night.

  Now Missy was the sting.

  * * *

  Missy stood on the front steps of her house, unwilling to walk in the door.

  Melissa, what were you thinking? Mrs. Conway had demanded.

  She had been thinking of an afternoon at the mall in August, only a few months ago. Both the Vianellos and the Linnehans had been considering new appliances. Was there anything more boring than reading refrigerator energy-use tags? Missy and Claire had abandoned their parents and sped to a clothing shop too expensive for thei
r parents to consider. For a lovely half hour, the cousins tried stuff on.

  The saleswoman could not figure out how one customer changed so fast into so many outfits. Missy was emerging from the dressing room when the clerk spotted Claire poking through the accessories. “Why, you’re identical twins! You’re adorable,” she cried.

  Over the last few years, the girls had often been asked if they were twins. They would haul out the “family resemblance” line. But this was different. This was a woman who did nothing all day but scan bodies.

  Claire laughed. “We’re just cousins.”

  The saleswoman snorted. “No way. You are identical.”

  Claire ignored this. “I absolutely have to have these earrings,” she said, handing the clerk a shiny card from which pink and silver bead earrings dangled. The woman was already holding a card with the exact same earrings, which Missy had picked out earlier.

  “See?” said the clerk to Missy.

  Missy saw.

  Claire didn’t.

  Missy’s mother had been horrified when Missy related this anecdote, and had returned to the same old topic of tapering off the cousin activity. “It’s not healthy to rely so heavily on a cousin,” said Missy’s mother. “No more sleepovers.”

  “Fridays are sacred,” protested Missy.

  “Sundays are sacred. Fridays are habit. In just a few years, Claire’s going to college. And here you are, depending on her like a toddler with a blankie.”

  That night Missy had researched identical twins.

  Surprisingly, experts couldn’t always tell by sight whether twins were identical. Fraternal twins could look very much alike, and might be called identical twins until blood tests proved this incorrect. Parents who had identical twins might not see them as being exactly alike; they would magnify the slightest difference between their children. The difference might be attitude or personality or a chipped tooth, but it loomed large for the parents. As for the twins themselves, it was not unusual for identical twins to think they only mildly resembled each other. They would insist they were fraternal twins.

  There were ways to determine whether two children were identical: Comparing ponderal indices. Fingerprint ridge counts. Palm print characteristics. DNA profiles. But even in these, fraternal twins could be confusingly close.