Brain Farts

How Does Your Garden Die?

The girl that sat at our table was not my sister.

"Millie, could you please pass the salad?" the girl that was not my sister asked.

They had the same voice, my sister and this girl, a dulcet tone that was somehow strong and soft at the same time. My parents loved her voice. They say she sounded exactly like my mother when she was young, before her throat and lungs were ravaged by the tendrils of cigarette smoke. The moment my sister sang my grandmother's lullaby back to her (a song she reserved only for her and our mother), mother tossed all of her packets of tobacco in the trash, not wanting to jeopardize the melody that once again graced our modest home.

My sister had that kind of effect on everyone. She was brilliant. Perfect, one might be inclined to say. That beautiful voice that songbirds can only hope to mimic. That beautiful brain that our tutors had fawned over (preferred, really). That way with people that made everyone (perhaps everyone) love her. It was a miracle that we were born from the same womb.

We were twins - fraternal twins, but nobody really cared to know the difference. Whenever this was mentioned, the first thing said would be, "Well, you're nothing alike, are you?"

I'd have to explain what fraternal twins are and how they differ from identical twins. My parents made sure I knew the difference.

And then these people who had asked would say, "That explains it then."

What it explains, they never care to say, but they do not need to.

My sister is beautiful - the kind of beauty that makes mothers proud and fathers nervous (sisters sometimes feel neither) - fair, porcelain skin that glowed in the moonlight; wide, dark eyes full of life and mirth; long, midnight curls that my cousins and aunts would artfully shape and tie as my mother looked on proudly.

This girl had that beauty. But that could not be. This could not be my sister. For just a few hours ago, I had killed her.

---

My family lived in the house at the end of the lane, a modest home my father claims was built by our great-great grandfather with his bare hands and the kindness of friends. He'd lived there since he was a boy, and he hoped we'd live there until he was old (as most fathers do). In the back was a garden of crawling ivy and barren rosebushes, of brilliant azalea and ancient oak, of grass that was always freshly mown and free of unwanted weeds.

In the garden, my sister and I would play. Whatever the season, whatever the weather, we would always find something to do. If it was raining, we would jump in the puddles and squeeze the soft mud between our bare toes. If it was snowing, we would make snow angels and snowmen, snow forts and snowballs, while my mother melted chocolate into milk with marshmallows. In autumn, we would jump in the leaves that blanketed the ground like a pointilist's canvas and carve pumpkins for our porch. In the summer, we would wade in the pond, which was always clear and stagnant, our faces reflected in the clear water, showing us what twins should have been. 

"Where did the pond come from?" I remember once asking.

"Yes. Where does it come from?" my sister had echoed.

My father turned to my sister then, smiling as he ruffled her hair. "The pond has always been there, princess. My grandfather - your great grandfather - said that we were lucky it was here."

I frowned. "But where does the water come from? The water-"

"Has always been there," he'd said, this time more sternly, although neither his smile nor his gaze strayed from my sister, who'd smiled back and, after a while, had pulled me to the garden to play some more.