Maybe my intentions aren't relevant.
"dearest we"
padma&parvati
twinnection take #23970275, this time with amnesia. for stiletto.
ecco a letter starting"dearest we"
unsigned:remarkably brief but covering
one complete miracle of nearest far
"i cordially invite me to become
noone except yourselves r s v p"
- ee cummings
She wakes up and sees only nothing. She hears whirrs, ticks [clocks, grandfather clocks, a thin hand slipping the hands into place], buzzes, howls. Nothingness is white but she thought [thought?] that nothingness was supposed to be black and she thinks hard around the bruise in her mind until she's interrupted. White against white, a moon in the white sky, the pale moon face of a woman in stiff off-white [eggshell, the snap of eggshells against a pan, violent] cloth.
How are you feeling? says the pale moon face. She opens her mouth, but does not know what to do next.
She shuts her eyes.
[Her hands lime-green sticky and the hiss of the water running under the ship, and mother saying there, can you see it? Land. But all she sees is clouds. The ground is unstable against her feet. She grasps at mother's long dress but it slips through her hands, and when she sees mother's face she does not grasp again.]
[black black sky like tar like pupils like ink torn through with bright pinpoint light, a snakeandskull floating in the air, father shouting run]
[silver thread, sewing a badge onto a sweater, a charm that doesn't quite work so the stitches are sloppy and a girl's voice saying here let me help you with that]
The second day she wakes up and words crowd at the back of her throat, pushing against her tongue.
"I've remembered that I've forgotten."
In the bed next to hers is a young girl with brown skin and long black hair. They are both sitting up, awake, but the other girl is looking at her like she was [a ghost a monster a memory] something strange, worthwhile to be looked at and she wonders, but then the silver-dollar-moon-faced nurse hands her a piece of glass [mirror, and these talk sometimes] surface cold and bright and in it she sees the other girl, but - ?
The other says, what are you doing with my face?
[an exam; tea leaves and hanged men and the fear of seeing Avada-green in the crystal ball]
[boy with a girl's name slipping a hand under her skirt saying You didn't honestly expect to study, did you?]
[thin wrists and red mouth, borrowed notes but all she does is make paper frogs and flick them across the table]
"You are you, but I? We are - "
"Twins," the other says. "Padma and Parvati."
"I have memories," she says. "But I do not recall - "
After careful discussion, they discover that they share the same memories/fragments of memories and this does not bother either of them as much as it should, perhaps because they are still remembering how to feel that odd-and-out-of-place sensation. And besides, they're twins, and doesn't that make a strange sort of sense?
On the fifth day, Nurse Amwell props them up with pillows and hands them each a cup of tea. She greedily drinks hers, the hot liquid scalding her lips, but her sister just inhales the greenbrown fumes and lets the thin bone china warm her hands.
"Now, girls, since you don't seem to remember, er, who you are, perhaps your parents should just..." The Nurse does not know how to act; the closest to this that she has had to deal with was Lockhart, and there was only one of him.
She does not feel sympathy for the nurse. And Mother? Father? Who sit across the room with frightened blank looks holding hands and not looking the twins in their eyes. They cannot tell their children apart, and she'd find it funny if it weren't all so confusing.
But Father smiles with a tic and says, "That is Padma, and that is Parvati."
Neither Padma nor Parvati experience any epiphanies now that they have been identified.
"Well, at least I know what to call you," Parvati says.
[summer day midday sun high in the sky and shadows cast from her dress on the pavement. her hand is tangled around her sister's hand, and she pulls her along, feet bouncing on the ground, can't keep up and she says she says please slow down but she doesn't, just stares at her shadow on the pavement and her sister's shadow next to it and hates how the shadows look more different than they do as people]
[everyone is looking at her, staring with eager eyes as the hat lists her faults and her accomplishments and she squirms on the stool, hands shoved deep into her pockets]
[the yule ball, in her brand new gown and the boy who lived doesn't know how to dance or do much of anything at all and she's annoyed, but someone slipped something into her punch and she stands there smiling waiting for someone to dance with her]
They've split up again into Gryffindor and Ravenclaw and they've relearned what those words mean and which colors to nod at in the hallways, but they still meet sometimes in the library to talk about new memories.
Padma says, "I think we've got it wrong. I think I'm Parvati and you're Padma."
Parvati says, "There's no way of knowing that. I feel just fine as Parvati."
"But, I, I feel something when I remember certain things that I don't feel when I remember others, so I think those are my memories. And they're Parvati's - I mean - They seem to be the memories of someone who - I think I'm Parvati, I really do."
Parvati does not look up from Hogwarts: A History. "Maybe you're right. But it'd be so hard to change now."
[in DA casting a near-perfect patronus]
[paper lotus flowers drifting restlessly in the pool, fairies twinkling]
[firewhiskey hot in her throat, redgold common room and a girl with flyaway hair looking at her from over a book]
Padma thinks, No, and slips the bronze and blue tie from under her collar, cuts the badge off her robe. She transfigures the tie stripe by stripe, but she doesn't remember what the badge is supposed to look like so she leaves it off. She goes to her first class early, and will not leave her seat when the other Parvati arrives.
"Padma," the other Parvati says through gritted teeth. "What are you doing here?"
"This is my class," says Parvati. "What are you doing here?"
"No, this is - we decided who we were and it's final, okay? You can't be me. You're you, I'm me. Okay?"
"I am me."
"No, you're-"
Parvati smiles sweetly. "Yes?"
The other Parvati takes a deep breath and does not let all of it out. "I am Parvati. You are Padma. Please leave now."
Trelawny comes over with her bottleglass eyes, looks at the tea leaves in her cup and says "Yes, I saw this happening. There is a great imbalance here. The lines between..."
Normally the Parvatis would be holding on to her every word, but now they ignore her completely. "I don't understand why you have a problem with this," Parvati says.
"Look, you can't just pick who you want to be. We've been through this. We are who we are and that's final."
Neither Parvati leaves.
[twin taking her hand and a pill in the other and saying are you sure this will work?]
[new-cut grass near the lake presses into her feet like needles, flowers behind her ear and flowers in her pockets and she kneels by the water though the grass slices her knees]
[fresh-plot grave near the house, red clay earth and the little wooden sign and she imagines flesh turning to bone]
Dumbledore looks at him from over his half-moon glasses. His eyes do not twinkle. "A very strange situation indeed."
The Parvatis sit side by side in matching Gryffindor colors, hair tied back, looking away from the other in the same exact way.
"I don't suppose one of you would be willing...? No, of course not," he says quickly when both Parvatis glare at him. "I was afraid of that. Now, I belive we must resort..."
He opens the heavy dusty book in front of him to a earmarked page and runs his finger down the tiny gently biting words. "Ah, yes, here we are. 'Concerning the separation of persons and the consequences and cures thereof.' Now, would you girls stand up and stand facing me? Yes, just so. Thank you. Now. Unistero.
[...]
[...]
[...]
"I do hope this doesn't affect the house cup in any way. Unfairness is such an unfortunate thing. Bertie Bott's Bean?" Dumbledore twinkles cheerily. "Oh, toast, my favorite." He waves the box at her.
Parvati shakes her head, and gathers her things to leave. Outside in the hallway, she drops her bookbag to the floor and massages her temples.
This is your fault, you know, thinks Parvati.
What? Like I was supposed to know what's going on in that old coot's mind? replies Parvati.
This owes more than a little to Martin Amis' brilliant novel Other People, and only a little bit to the equally brilliant Johnny Got His Gun, and maybe a tad to that Buffy episode where Xander gets split in half. And also to Harlan Ellison's short story "Shatterday". Um. My influences > me.
Curiously enough, I was listening to Yo La Tengo's "My Heart's Reflection" when I finished this. For the uninitiated, the lyrics include:
Let's lock the door,
Hide the key.
I'll try to look like you if you'll dress up like me.
And you'll play dumb, and I'll play too,
Nobody has to know.
I wanna see my heart's reflection in your eyes.
Perhaps a more upbeat take on the theme.
padma&parvati
twinnection take #23970275, this time with amnesia. for stiletto.
ecco a letter starting"dearest we"
unsigned:remarkably brief but covering
one complete miracle of nearest far
"i cordially invite me to become
noone except yourselves r s v p"
- ee cummings
She wakes up and sees only nothing. She hears whirrs, ticks [clocks, grandfather clocks, a thin hand slipping the hands into place], buzzes, howls. Nothingness is white but she thought [thought?] that nothingness was supposed to be black and she thinks hard around the bruise in her mind until she's interrupted. White against white, a moon in the white sky, the pale moon face of a woman in stiff off-white [eggshell, the snap of eggshells against a pan, violent] cloth.
How are you feeling? says the pale moon face. She opens her mouth, but does not know what to do next.
She shuts her eyes.
[Her hands lime-green sticky and the hiss of the water running under the ship, and mother saying there, can you see it? Land. But all she sees is clouds. The ground is unstable against her feet. She grasps at mother's long dress but it slips through her hands, and when she sees mother's face she does not grasp again.]
[black black sky like tar like pupils like ink torn through with bright pinpoint light, a snakeandskull floating in the air, father shouting run]
[silver thread, sewing a badge onto a sweater, a charm that doesn't quite work so the stitches are sloppy and a girl's voice saying here let me help you with that]
The second day she wakes up and words crowd at the back of her throat, pushing against her tongue.
"I've remembered that I've forgotten."
In the bed next to hers is a young girl with brown skin and long black hair. They are both sitting up, awake, but the other girl is looking at her like she was [a ghost a monster a memory] something strange, worthwhile to be looked at and she wonders, but then the silver-dollar-moon-faced nurse hands her a piece of glass [mirror, and these talk sometimes] surface cold and bright and in it she sees the other girl, but - ?
The other says, what are you doing with my face?
[an exam; tea leaves and hanged men and the fear of seeing Avada-green in the crystal ball]
[boy with a girl's name slipping a hand under her skirt saying You didn't honestly expect to study, did you?]
[thin wrists and red mouth, borrowed notes but all she does is make paper frogs and flick them across the table]
"You are you, but I? We are - "
"Twins," the other says. "Padma and Parvati."
"I have memories," she says. "But I do not recall - "
After careful discussion, they discover that they share the same memories/fragments of memories and this does not bother either of them as much as it should, perhaps because they are still remembering how to feel that odd-and-out-of-place sensation. And besides, they're twins, and doesn't that make a strange sort of sense?
On the fifth day, Nurse Amwell props them up with pillows and hands them each a cup of tea. She greedily drinks hers, the hot liquid scalding her lips, but her sister just inhales the greenbrown fumes and lets the thin bone china warm her hands.
"Now, girls, since you don't seem to remember, er, who you are, perhaps your parents should just..." The Nurse does not know how to act; the closest to this that she has had to deal with was Lockhart, and there was only one of him.
She does not feel sympathy for the nurse. And Mother? Father? Who sit across the room with frightened blank looks holding hands and not looking the twins in their eyes. They cannot tell their children apart, and she'd find it funny if it weren't all so confusing.
But Father smiles with a tic and says, "That is Padma, and that is Parvati."
Neither Padma nor Parvati experience any epiphanies now that they have been identified.
"Well, at least I know what to call you," Parvati says.
[summer day midday sun high in the sky and shadows cast from her dress on the pavement. her hand is tangled around her sister's hand, and she pulls her along, feet bouncing on the ground, can't keep up and she says she says please slow down but she doesn't, just stares at her shadow on the pavement and her sister's shadow next to it and hates how the shadows look more different than they do as people]
[everyone is looking at her, staring with eager eyes as the hat lists her faults and her accomplishments and she squirms on the stool, hands shoved deep into her pockets]
[the yule ball, in her brand new gown and the boy who lived doesn't know how to dance or do much of anything at all and she's annoyed, but someone slipped something into her punch and she stands there smiling waiting for someone to dance with her]
They've split up again into Gryffindor and Ravenclaw and they've relearned what those words mean and which colors to nod at in the hallways, but they still meet sometimes in the library to talk about new memories.
Padma says, "I think we've got it wrong. I think I'm Parvati and you're Padma."
Parvati says, "There's no way of knowing that. I feel just fine as Parvati."
"But, I, I feel something when I remember certain things that I don't feel when I remember others, so I think those are my memories. And they're Parvati's - I mean - They seem to be the memories of someone who - I think I'm Parvati, I really do."
Parvati does not look up from Hogwarts: A History. "Maybe you're right. But it'd be so hard to change now."
[in DA casting a near-perfect patronus]
[paper lotus flowers drifting restlessly in the pool, fairies twinkling]
[firewhiskey hot in her throat, redgold common room and a girl with flyaway hair looking at her from over a book]
Padma thinks, No, and slips the bronze and blue tie from under her collar, cuts the badge off her robe. She transfigures the tie stripe by stripe, but she doesn't remember what the badge is supposed to look like so she leaves it off. She goes to her first class early, and will not leave her seat when the other Parvati arrives.
"Padma," the other Parvati says through gritted teeth. "What are you doing here?"
"This is my class," says Parvati. "What are you doing here?"
"No, this is - we decided who we were and it's final, okay? You can't be me. You're you, I'm me. Okay?"
"I am me."
"No, you're-"
Parvati smiles sweetly. "Yes?"
The other Parvati takes a deep breath and does not let all of it out. "I am Parvati. You are Padma. Please leave now."
Trelawny comes over with her bottleglass eyes, looks at the tea leaves in her cup and says "Yes, I saw this happening. There is a great imbalance here. The lines between..."
Normally the Parvatis would be holding on to her every word, but now they ignore her completely. "I don't understand why you have a problem with this," Parvati says.
"Look, you can't just pick who you want to be. We've been through this. We are who we are and that's final."
Neither Parvati leaves.
[twin taking her hand and a pill in the other and saying are you sure this will work?]
[new-cut grass near the lake presses into her feet like needles, flowers behind her ear and flowers in her pockets and she kneels by the water though the grass slices her knees]
[fresh-plot grave near the house, red clay earth and the little wooden sign and she imagines flesh turning to bone]
Dumbledore looks at him from over his half-moon glasses. His eyes do not twinkle. "A very strange situation indeed."
The Parvatis sit side by side in matching Gryffindor colors, hair tied back, looking away from the other in the same exact way.
"I don't suppose one of you would be willing...? No, of course not," he says quickly when both Parvatis glare at him. "I was afraid of that. Now, I belive we must resort..."
He opens the heavy dusty book in front of him to a earmarked page and runs his finger down the tiny gently biting words. "Ah, yes, here we are. 'Concerning the separation of persons and the consequences and cures thereof.' Now, would you girls stand up and stand facing me? Yes, just so. Thank you. Now. Unistero.
[...]
[...]
[...]
"I do hope this doesn't affect the house cup in any way. Unfairness is such an unfortunate thing. Bertie Bott's Bean?" Dumbledore twinkles cheerily. "Oh, toast, my favorite." He waves the box at her.
Parvati shakes her head, and gathers her things to leave. Outside in the hallway, she drops her bookbag to the floor and massages her temples.
This is your fault, you know, thinks Parvati.
What? Like I was supposed to know what's going on in that old coot's mind? replies Parvati.
This owes more than a little to Martin Amis' brilliant novel Other People, and only a little bit to the equally brilliant Johnny Got His Gun, and maybe a tad to that Buffy episode where Xander gets split in half. And also to Harlan Ellison's short story "Shatterday". Um. My influences > me.
Curiously enough, I was listening to Yo La Tengo's "My Heart's Reflection" when I finished this. For the uninitiated, the lyrics include:
Let's lock the door,
Hide the key.
I'll try to look like you if you'll dress up like me.
And you'll play dumb, and I'll play too,
Nobody has to know.
I wanna see my heart's reflection in your eyes.
Perhaps a more upbeat take on the theme.