'Soapstone kitchen counters,' said Julia.
'Mmm-hmm,' said Valentina, entranced.
The family room was dim; the only light came from the television and the front window. But if the light had been stronger the room would have been hard to look at, because everything in it was Kelly green, bright red plaid, or related to golf. The entire house was aggressively decorated. All the furnishings were either overstuffed, covered in chintz, made of brushed metal or frosted glass, or painted in colours with names that sounded like ice-cream flavours. Edie was an interior decorator; she liked to practise on their house, and Jack had given up trying to have any say in the matter. The twins were convinced that their mother had the most egregious taste in the entire world. This was probably not true; most Lake Forest homes were decorated in more expensive versions of the same. The twins liked the family room because it was their dad's, and therefore ironically hideous. Jack took a certain pleasure in acquiescing to the demands of his tribe as long as he was comfortable.
The twins themselves looked odd in this house. Actually, they looked odd everywhere they went.
They were twenty years old, on this winter Saturday. Julia was the older twin by six (to her, very significant) minutes. It was easy to imagine Julia elbowing Valentina out of the way in her determination to be first.
The twins were very pale and very thin, the kind of thinness that other girls envy and mothers worry over. Julia was five feet, one and a half inches tall. Valentina was one quarter of an inch shorter. Each twin had fine, floating, white-blonde hair, bobbed at their ear lobes, hanging in spiderweb curls around their faces, giving them the look of dandelions gone to seed. They had long necks, small breasts, flat stomachs. The vertebrae in their spines were visible, long straight columns of bumps under their skin. They were often mistaken for undernourished twelve-year-olds; they might have been cast as Victorian orphans in a made-for-TV movie. Their eyes were large, grey and so wide-set that they appeared almost wall-eyed. They had heart-shaped faces, delicate upturned noses, bow lips, straight teeth. Both twins bit their fingernails. Neither had any tattoos. Valentina thought of herself as awkward, and wished that she had Julia's splendid air of belonging. In truth, Valentina looked fragile, and this attracted people to her.
The thing that made the twins peculiar was hard to define. People were uneasy when they saw them together without knowing exactly why. The twins were not merely identical: they were mirror-image twins. The mirroring was not limited to their appearance, but involved every cell in their bodies. So the small mole on the right side of Julia's mouth was on the left side of Valentina's; Valentina was left-handed, Julia right-handed. Neither looked freakish by herself. The marvel was most evident in X-rays: while Julia was organised in the usual way, Valentina was internally reversed. Her heart was on her right side, with all its ventricles and chambers inverted. Valentina had heart defects which had required surgery when she was born. The surgeon had used a mirror to help him see her tiny heart in the way he was accustomed to seeing. Valentina had asthma; Julia rarely had so much as a cold. Valentina's fingerprints were almost the opposite of Julia's (even identical twins don't have exactly the same fingerprints). They were still essentially one creature, whole but containing contradictions.
The twins sat attentively, watching a gigantic house near the Atlantic Ocean being reshingled, sanded, painted. Dormers were restored, a chimney rebuilt. A new inglenook replaced one that had been torn out.
The twins were avid for things that belonged to the past. Their bedroom looked as though it had once been part of another house, as though it had strayed and been adopted by this ordinary ranch house out of charity. When the twins were thirteen they had stripped the blowsy floral wallpaper off their walls, sent all their stuffed animals and dolls to AMVETS and declared their room a museum. The current exhibit was an old birdcage stuffed with plastic crucifixes, which rested on a crocheted doily draped over a small table which had been completely covered with Hello Kitty stickers. Everything else in the room was white. It was a bedroom for Des Esseintes' sisters.
Outside, snow blowers began to roar. It was becoming a clear, blindingly sunny morning. As the credits rolled on the fourth episode of This Old House, the twins sat up, stretched, turned off the TV. They stood at the window squinting in their paisley bathrobes, watching Serafin Garcia (who had been mowing their lawn and blowing their snow since they were babies) as he cleared the driveway. He saw them and waved. They waved back.
They heard their parents stirring, but knew that this did not mean they would be getting up any time soon. Edie and Jack both liked to sleep in on the weekends. The night before they had been at a party at the Onwentsia Club; the twins had heard them come in around three. ('Shouldn't it be the other way around?' Julia said to Valentina, not for the first time. 'Shouldn't it be us causing them anxiety?') The twins moved on to the next part of their usual Saturday morning: pancakes. They made enough so that when Edie and Jack eventually did emerge, they could microwave some pancakes if they felt like eating. Julia made the batter, and Valentina poured it onto the griddle and stood staring at the pale yellow circles as air bubbles formed and popped. She loved flipping the pancakes. She made five baby pancakes for herself and five for Julia. Julia made coffee. They ate in the kitchen, sitting at the island surrounded by African violets and a cookie jar that looked like a gnome.
After breakfast the twins washed the dishes. Then they put on jeans and hooded sweatshirts with BARAT printed on them. (This was the local college; the twins had attended it for a semester and then dropped out, claiming that it was a waste of their time and Jack's money. It was the third college they had attended. They had originally matriculated at Cornell; Julia had stopped attending classes in the spring semester, and when she was asked to leave Valentina came home with her. At the University of Illinois they'd lasted a year, but Julia refused to go back.) The mailperson trudged up the walk and shoved the mail through the slot. It landed on the floor of the foyer with a loud thud. The twins converged on it.
Julia grabbed the bundle and began to spew each piece of mail onto the dining-room table. 'Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, ComEd, Anthropologie, letter for Mom ... letter for us?' The twins rarely received mail; all of their correspondence took place online. Valentina took the heavy envelope from Julia's hand. She stood weighing it, feeling the texture of the paper. Julia took it back from her. They glanced at each other. It's from a law firm. It's from London. The twins had never been to London. They'd never left America. London was where their mom was from, but Edie and Jack seldom spoke about that. Edie was an American now - she had gone native, or faux native; the Poole family lived in a suburb of Chicago that had pretended, from its inception, to be an English village. The twins had noticed that Edie's accent tended to reappear when she was mad, or trying to impress someone.
'Open it,' said Valentina. Julia's fingers fumbled with the stiff paper. She moved to the living-room window and Valentina followed her. Valentina stood behind Julia and put her chin on Julia's shoulder and her arms around Julia's waist. The twins looked like a two-headed girl. Julia raised the letter so Valentina could see it better.
Julia and Valentina Poole
99 Pembridge Road
Lake Forest, IL 60035 USA
Dear Julia and Valentina Poole,
I regret to inform you of the death of your aunt, Elspeth Alice Noblin. Though she never met you, she was interested in your welfare. Last September, knowing that her illness would soon result in her death, she made a new will. I am enclosing a copy of this document. You are her residuary legatees; that is, she has bequeathed to you her entire estate, with the exception of a few minor bequests to friends and charities. You will receive this inheritance when you reach the age of twenty-one.
The bequest is given to you with the following conditions:
1) Ms Noblin owned an apartment in London, in Vautravers Mews, Highgate, N6. It borders Highgate Cemetery in Highgate Village, a very lovely part of London indeed. She
bequeathed this apartment to you on the condition that you both live in it for one year before you may sell it.
2) The entire bequest is given on the condition that no part of it shall be used to benefit Ms Noblin's sister, Edwina, or Edwina's husband, Jack (your parents). Also, Edwina and Jack Poole are forbidden to set foot in the flat or inspect its contents.
Please let me know if you care to accept Ms Noblin's estate on these terms. I am always available to answer any questions you may have in regard to this matter.
Ms Noblin's executor is Robert Fanshaw. He will be your neighbour if you accept your aunt's bequest as he lives in the flat just below hers. Mr Fanshaw can also assist you in matters pertaining to the estate.
Regards,
Xavier Roche
Roche, Elderidge, Potts & Lefley LLP - Solicitors
54D Hampstead High Street
Hampstead, London, NW3 1QA
Julia and Valentina exchanged looks. Julia flipped to the next page. The handwriting was disturbingly similar to Edie's.
Dear Julia and Valentina,
Hello. I was hoping to meet you both some day, but now that won't happen. You might wonder why I am leaving all my flotsam and jetsam to you and not to your mother. The best reason I can give is that I feel rather hopeful about you. I wonder what you might make of it all. I thought it might be interesting, even fun.
Your mother and I have been estranged for the last twenty-one years. She can tell you about that if she wants to. You may think that the conditions of my will are a bit harsh; I'm afraid you will just have to decide for yourselves whether to accept on these terms. I am not trying to create discord in your family. I'm trying to protect my own history. A bad thing about dying is that I've started to feel as though I'm being erased. Another bad thing is that I won't get to find out what happens next.
I hope you will accept. It gives me great pleasure to think of the two of you living here. I don't know if this makes a difference, but the flat is large and full of amusing books, and London is an amazing place to live (though rather expensive, I'm afraid). Your mother tells me you have dropped out of college but that you are autodidacts; if so, you may enjoy living here very much.
I wish you happiness, whatever you may choose to do.
With love,
Elspeth Noblin
There were more sheets of paper, but Julia put the sheaf down and began pacing around the living room. Valentina perched on the back of an arm chair and watched Julia orbiting the coffee table, the sofa, then winging off to circle the dining-room table a few times. London, thought Valentina. The thought was large and dark, the word was like a giant black dog. Julia stopped, turned and grinned at Valentina. 'It's like a fairy tale.'
'Or a horror movie,' said Valentina. 'We're, like, the ingenues.'
Julia nodded, resumed pacing. 'First, get rid of the parents. Then, lure the unsuspecting heroines to the spooky old mansion--'
'It's only a flat.'
'Whatever. Then--'
'Serial killers.'
'White slavery.'
'Or it's like, you know, Henry James.'
'I don't think people die of consumption any more.'
'They do in the Third World.'
'Yeah, well, the UK has socialised medicine.'
Valentina said, 'Mom and Dad won't like it.'
'No,' said Julia. She ran her fingers across the dining-room table and discovered a bunch of crumbs. She went into the kitchen, moistened a washcloth and wiped the table.
Valentina said, 'What happens if we don't accept?'
'I don't know. I'm sure it says in the letter somewhere.' Julia paused. 'You can't seriously be thinking about not accepting? This is totally what we've been waiting for.'
'What's that, sweetie?' Edie stood squinting at them from the archway between the living room and the hallway. Her hair was mussed and she had a generally crumpled aspect. Her cheeks were very pink, as though someone had pinched them.
Julia said, 'We got a letter.' Valentina scooped it off the side table and brought it to her mother. Edie looked at the return address and said, 'I can't possibly deal with this before I've had my coffee.' Valentina went to pour her a cup. Edie said, 'Julia, go wake up your dad.'
'Um ...'
'Tell him I said so.'
Julia bounded down the hall. Valentina heard her shrieking 'Daddeeeeeeee' as she opened their parents' bedroom door. Nice, Valentina thought. Why not just use an ice pick? Edie went hunting for her reading glasses. By the time Jack lumbered into the dining room she had read the first few pages of the letter and was making her way through the will.
Jack Poole had once been handsome, in a corn-fed, college-athlete sort of way. His black hair now had a sumptuous grey streak. He wore it longer than the other guys at the bank. He was quite tall and towered over his petite wife and daughters. The years had coarsened his features and thickened his waistline. Jack wore suits so much of his waking life that on the weekends he liked to be slovenly. At the moment he was wearing an ancient maroon bathrobe and a splitting, enormous pair of sheepskin slippers.
'Fee, fi, fo, fum,' Jack said. This was an old joke, the rest of it lost in the mists of the twins' earliest childhood. It meant, Get me some coffee or I will eat you. Julia poured a cup for her father and set it before him. 'Okay,' he said. 'I'm up. Where's the fire?'
'It's Elspeth,' said Edie. 'She's not just leaving it to them, she's prying them away from us.'
'Say what?' Jack held out his hand and Edie put part of the letter into it. They sat next to each other, reading.
'Vindictive bitch,' Jack said, without much emotion or surprise. Julia and Valentina sat down at the table and watched their parents. Who are these people? What happened? Why did Aunt Elspeth hate them? Why do they hate her? The twins widened their eyes at each other. We'll find out. Jack finished reading and groped in his bathrobe pocket for his cigarettes and lighter. He put them on the table but did not light one; he glanced at Valentina, who frowned. Jack put his hand over the pack to reassure himself that it was there. Valentina took her inhaler from her sweatshirt pocket, set it on the table and smiled at her father.
Edie looked up at Valentina. 'If you don't accept, most of it goes to charity,' she said. The twins wondered how much of their conversation she had overheard. Edie was reading a codicil of the will. It instructed someone named Robert Fanshaw to remove all personal papers from the flat, including diaries, letters and photographs, and bequeathed these papers to him. Edie wondered who this Robert person was, that her sister had made him custodian of all their history. But the main thing is she's arranged for the papers to not be in the flat when the twins arrive. That was the thing Edie had most feared, the intersection of the twins and whatever Elspeth had left in the way of evidence.
Jack put the letter from Elspeth on the table. He sat back in his chair and looked at his wife. Edie held the will at arm's length and scowled at it, rereading. You don't seem all that surprised, darling, thought Jack. Julia and Valentina were watching Edie read. Julia looked rapt, Valentina anxious. Jack sighed. Although he had been trying to push his daughters out of the ranch house and into the real world, the world he had in mind was college, preferably an Ivy League college on a full scholarship. The twins' SAT scores were almost perfect, though their grades were wildly uneven and by now their transcripts would give any director of admissions pause. He imagined Julia and Valentina safely ensconced at Harvard or Yale, or even at Sarah Lawrence; heck, Bennington would be okay. Valentina glanced at him and smiled, raised her nearly invisible eyebrows just slightly. Jack thought about Elspeth as he had last seen her, weeping in line at the airport. You don't remember her, girls. You have no idea what she was capable of. Jack had been relieved when Elspeth died. I didn't realise you had any more tricks up your sleeve, Miss Noblin. He had never failed to underestimate her. He stood up, scooped his cigarettes and lighter into his palm and headed for the den. He shut the door, leaned against it and lit up. At least you're dead. He inhaled smoke and le
t it stream through his nostrils slowly. One Noblin sister is the most anyone should have to cope with in a lifetime. He considered that he had ended up with the right sister, after all, and was thankful. He stood smoking, and thought about other ways things might have turned out. By the time Jack re-entered the dining room he felt steadier, almost cheerful. Wonderful substance, nicotine.
Edie was sitting very straight in her chair; the twins each leaned forward, elbows on the table, chins in hands, Valentina listing sideways as Julia said, 'But we never met her; why would she leave us anything? Why not you?'
Edie regarded them silently as Jack sat down in his chair. Julia said, 'How come you never took us to London?'
'I did,' Edie replied. 'We went to London when you were four months old. You met your grandmother, who died later that year, and you met Elspeth.'
'We did? You did?'
Edie got up and walked down the hall to her bedroom. She disappeared for a few minutes. Valentina said, 'Did you go too, Daddy?'
'No,' said Jack. 'I wasn't too popular over there then.'
'Oh.' Why not?
Edie came back holding two American passports. She handed one to Valentina and the other to Julia. They opened the passports, stared at themselves. It's weird to see new baby pictures. The stamps said HEATHROW AIRPORT, 27 APRIL 1984 and O'HARE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, JUNE 30, 1984. They traded and compared the photos. Without the names it was impossible to tell which twin was in each photo. We look like potatoes with eyes, Julia thought.