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Would you drink poison if I drank it? Asked one twin to her sister.
Why would you drink poison? Asked the other in confusion.
That doesn't matter. Doing things together is what shows we love each other. Right?
***
E's twin's perspective
Dear Sister,
Why won't you respond to any of my letters? I miss you so much. Please at least tell me, did I do something wrong?
I hadnt replied to Es yet. It had been so long since I last replied to her letters, that I wasn't sure if i could anymore. I retired in my seat for hours rocking lightly back and forth, wondering where had I gone so wrong that I had forgotten something I'd known all my life.
My sister had always been the type to worry. I was the type to sit in solitude and act like all was alright, until it was. She was the cheerful one who talked off my ears, while I enjoyed writing and receiving letters.
There had been so many signs that my sister wasn't happy any longer. Yet still I chose to move countries, for here i was free to think however much I wanted. . When we had said our goodbyes a year ago, , she had forced a smile, said that us writing to each other would be enough. I had been glad that our separation wasn't so difficult.
At first everything felt perfect. She’d tell me about her friends. She talked about her exams and how she was graduating school. The last letter that she'd sent me that I didn't reply to had a little blue butterfly hairclip. She said that if we both wore them at the same time, we might feel a bit closer, even though we were on opposite ends of the world.
I might have worn the clip for a day until it felt heavy on my head. Then I left it on the bedside table. Forgotten, just like I had forgotten so many things.
How had we reached this point? We were each other’s half since we were born. We didn't leave each other's side. We wore the same clothes. She was the fun one, I was the quiet one. It was as simple as that.
But my mask was slowly peeling off. She was much more adventurous and the loud sounds of her games were grating on my ears. The way she asked me when will I finish reading my book so that I would go out with her, left me agitated and unable to explain why I suddenly was mad. She watched me as I wrote in my diary, making me feel embarrassed about what I wanted to express to my imaginary friend. She read my diary in secret and I only knew about it when she mentioned something she read in it that I hadn't told her about. We were each other’s half, but it wasn't so simple. It always seemed like she was the larger half of the two. And that slowly I was shrinking.
***
Es perspective
I had never enjoyed reading. I didn't see the purpose of it, couldn't get myself to be immersed or to imagine very well. My sisters' novels are very long and tiring and they don't have any pictures in them.
It seems like she’s ignoring me again. I just want to know what's on her mind. Is she upset about something? Did anyone tell her anything bad?
I didn't think reading her diary would make her too upset. I like her diary entries. Mostly I was looking at the pictures she drew. My sister has doodled little faces on the sides of her pages. Looking through her diary is more fun than reading a novel.
I felt horrible when she stopped writing in her diary. But she started playing with me again. She smiled a lot more too. And so, just like that, I forgot that my sister was a quiet person. As long as we were a pair, I thought that we would be the happiest.
She hasn't beennreplying to my letters anymore, for a long time now. I want to know if she's upset or if someone said something mean. I want her to tell me if she feels homesick. I keep asking and asking and all I want is a response. Anything, to let me know what's on her mind.
I'm waking up feeling sick because I don't know if she'll ever come back, if we'll ever be a pair again. What will become of me then? I can have lots of friends but it's not the same. I didn't truly get to say goodbye to her before she left overseas. I was too scared to even hug her because I might not let go. I faked a smile and she gave me a smile back. But what was the meaning of that smile? I wanted all of her here, not just a smile that I can now hardly remember.
I wonder. Perhaps it was something within these books that my sister read that made her how she is.
Actually I've never seen this shelf before in my life. It might have appeared by magic or i was getting a little confused from staying indoors all day. I assumed those were her books since they were in her room, after all.
To my amazement, these books had pictures in them! Never before had I seen any of her books with pictures. I didn't think twice and started reading and enjoying the novels, one by one. Every day I'd check the mail for a reply, feel upset then read a chapter from a novel and feel immersed.
Finally one day I checked the mailbox and I had actually got a letter after all!
I wrote her a letter to tell her about how enjoyable her stories were. I wanted her to also feel close, just like how close I'd felt simply by reading her books. So I sent her a blue butterfly hairclip so that she'd feel better.
Then, a long time after, she still hadn't responded. So I did what I should have done from the start. I packed a suitcase and booked myself a flight with all my earnings.
I was going to see my sister. Everything will be alright.
***
The little prince's perspective
I have always wanted to make the world a better place. I want everyone to be happy. Especially those who have lost something close to them, theydeserve to be happiest to make up for all the hardship they ever faced . My father raises his eyebrows when I try to explain this to him. He says that happiness is elusive and that you couldn't make others happy just because you wanted them to be.
But I went and learnt everything i could about the philosophy of happiness to prove to my father that he was wrong about one thing. He was the King and highly intelligent and so I definitely knew not to play around. But by the time I was an adult, I was completely serious. Everyone deserved a chance to be happy.
My father believed in many concepts and was highly intelligent in all of them. His words were immediately obeyed because there was nobody wiser than him in the courtroom. There was no kingdom more efficient, more richer, that everyone's talents were recognised, more than his kingdom. He knew the correct way to deal with criminals that made them reformed. A short while after I brought up my topic that all people deserve to be happy, the King called me to the balcony where we could oversee the kingdom. He asked me, if I had ever seen one suffering person in our kingdom. I told him I had not. I simply had read about them in storybooks and was sure that they existed in other kingdoms. My father said, that other kingdoms were none of his concern. And that they shouldn't be one of mine, either. The Kingdom had no extremely strict rules, for my father believed in leniency. Except for one rule, which was that exiting the Kingdom without his permission was punishable by death.
There was nothing in this kingdom that could help me on my journey of making everyone happy, for all people here were already happy. Except my father. I knew that he wasn't happy at all. But I didn't know what it was. Perhaps his fault lay beyond this kingdom, which he so strictly and in my opinion suspiciously forbade anyone leave without consent.
I collected my main belongings into a suitcase, and in the darkest of nights left the Kingdom.
Although my purpose was to look for people to make them happy, I ended up finding so much joy myself. There were so many unique Kingdoms to go through. There was so many beautiful sights but there were also heartbreaking sights that I felt immediately pulled towards. I've lived all my life in grandeur sometimes I wanted to go back and simply relax. But knowing that many people don't have that choice made me too upset for them. They deserved some joy too.
I made friends along the way, but lives get busy and none of them accompanied me on my travels for too long. Some people called me a Hero. Others called me a Healer. And yet others called me a Wanderer. I wasn't sure I was even slightly any of those I didn't plan on an entire lifetime of wandering.
One day, as it were inevitable, I planned my trip back to the Kingdom of my father.
However upon returning to the gates of the Kingdom it appeared that the lock had been replaced, that the flags were a different colour and emblem. My father was no longer the King of the Kingdom of my upbringing. He had left the Kingdom a long time ago, after changing into an unbearable monarch.
How long had it been since I first began my travels? It might have been months or years butI was the same person. The years or even the decades couldn't change me one bit. I was always going to search for happiness on behalf of others. And now, I was going to search for my father. I was equally determined either way.
How come that my father became a tyrant in the time I'd left? It mustn't be true, I tried to deny. But if it were true, it was perhaps because he was never truly happy at all. If I could find the answer to happiness already! But indeed there were only clues.
I knew what happiness looked like. I knew what sadness looked like. But by now I also knew it wasn't me who could make all those people happy. It was themselves. Sometimes I completely failed at making a person feel happy. Then I'd ignore them and act like that interaction didn't exist. It haunted me at the back of my mind. I just truly wanted my father to be of those who I could make happy.
Because it was too much to think that he could never be happy again.
***
Es perspective
I tried to reach out to my sister. I tried to console her with words of comfort as I know that words are her best friends.
But before I realised what I had been doing, I had wrote in my letters quotes from the books I'd read through. The books were so fun and cheerful and full of such wisdom and positivity. It was a bit strange since I remember my sister liked reading quite dreadful and too long stories. These books were however dreamy and positive.
But the more I read, the more artificial even I felt. She didnt seem any happier in her messages yet still I wrote her quotes that might cheer her up. Until I asked myself, tearful and confused, are these words even my words? Does my sister even feel like she's talking to me any longer? Aren't I simply repeating phrases that I don't quite understand?
My writing had always felt a bit foreign to me. But now it was completely alien and it was possible i was pushing my sister away.
When I reach her ill pull her into the tightest hug. Then everything will be okay.
The wind become fast very quickly and the rain pattered down heavier and it slapped my face that I leaned on a stone wall and hugged my clothes to myself but my coat felt like it was choking me in such a wind, and my feet were being picked off the ground.
Then the wind passed and I blinked slowly several times because what once was a busy street was now the opening of a dark cave that was so endless that i was immediately panicking.
The rain started again with intensity before I could even settle myself and the winds of a distant sea crashed.
'Come inside,' a voice beckoned me. I hesitated to move towards the flicker of light. I saw the light reveal a man who had a great curly beard and stone-like facial features.
'What brings you here?' He asked and I shivered. He lights up a fireplace and offers a blanket.
'I'm looking for my sister. I was at the address she lived at, just in the street in front, when, like magic, the storm started and I found myself near this cave,' I stuttered my way through my explanation.
He offered some bread and simply said, 'you must be quite distressed to be having visions.'
'But that is what I saw.'
'Have you had these kind of experiences before?'
He seemed genuinely concerned. My jaws were dropped. Still I gave him a chance, if only because I couldn't guess when the storm would end and how I could find my way out, 'I found novels in my sister's bedroom that I've never before seen there.'
'Ah. Novels. Those books that contain fictional stories yet feel real enough to youth.'
'Yes, well they only feel real. Nothing about them is real.'
'Yet you came up with a nearly believable one just now,' he said with a smile, 'it's nice to dream, as a child. But when it makes you do things that only prove your insanity, then what is the point of dreams? Anyhow. To come this far away from civilisation, what is it you seek my child?'
I gritted my teeth but I kept my manners despite the panic rising to my throat.
'My sister. I believe i said that already.'
'But,' his smile turned into a frown, 'I don't believe you. How could you think your sister is here, in such a remote location?'
'Then, what brings you here?'
'I'm a king. And I have decided that this is my kingdom. All people that wander come through this cave. And if they choose, I will rule over them and my Kingdom will be a peaceful one once again.'
He bit his food, 'oh but before I forget. Peace. Such an obscure concept isn't it? Peace cannot exist without rules. You may leave now if you wish, for the rain has settled. Or you may choose to stay, if you agree to every one of my rules. Choose wisely.'
I couldn't have been more ready to leave this madman and his imagined 'Kingdom' that was within an unknown cave. I wasn't the crazy one at all. If anyone it was him.
I went out but couldn't find any path to lead me back to the street where my sister's address was. I didn't know how far or in what direction I had to go.
Quickly we clashed on many levels. I refused to be a part of this man's imaginary Kingdom. He called himself Ego Rex. I got quickly annoyed of his words.
He could easily have showed me the little room with the story books, but he seemed to still hate novels to an extreme amount. Luckily I found it because it was the one place I could escape from his presence.
I wondered if I would find books like the ones I'd enjoyed. Instead I found the exact same ones that my sister used to enjoy. The dreary and too long ones. Every day id read one page. It was all I could bear at a time. As more days passed, the silence was even worse. Oh how I hated the silence. But I couldn't escape. Every day I was stuck deeper in my mind. I needed to read these books to find out what was wrong with my sister. I needed to solve the riddle. I simply couldn't believe that she thought nothing of me.
I'm mad. You're mad.
Lack of communication.
I was turning into stone just like my surroundings.
No longer human.
And then maybe I'd come across a glimmer of hope.
Somewhere my flower is there.
Somewhere…who is that who enters? Who is Ego Rex speaking to this time?
My hope that my sister needed me anymore was shrivelling up. Perhaps she was human and I was dead weight. Two twins, identical. They look the same. One is normal the other is in a faraway cave, slowly turning insane. Perhaps there was only one of us who needed to exist all along. Perhaps, there was only one of us, anyway.
This Wanderer hasn't left yet. He seems almost interested in Ego Rex. He hasn't called him insane like the others have. His face is covered with a hood and the material is also muffling his voice.
'We meet again, my Iost child,' I heard Ego Rex say the next morning. So this Wanderer still hasn't left. Does he really want to join Ego Rex's insane kingdom and be limited by all his rules? I wish I could stop questioning myself. Of course the answer was no, how could anyone say yes to something like that. This Wanderer must be really lost, just like I am. Perhaps I might invite him to this lonely library.
I finally met the Wanderer. Instantly I could tell his hesitance. I fixed my eyes where I thought his were and asked him if he’s read any of the books in this library.
He told me he read the first pages of some of them. Neither of us had anything to discuss about the books from there. Perhaps I'll never understand what my sister saw in these books. If only I wasn't afraid for my sanity, I'd forget all about books and simply run around screaming. But I had to control myself. I couldn't scare off the Wanderer just yet, either.
The Wanderer went especially quiet when I talked about Ego Rex. He would pay me more visits and I desperately wished I had more to show than my mutters that were an effort to string my thoughts into something coherent. I found myself accidentally repeating entire quotes from the books in an effort to tell him something. He would simply nod as if he understood. Then he'd thank me for letting him in and exit out of the library.
Hasten toward some hope.
Hope cannot be eluded forever.
Which one must I believe? Hope is destructive if it does not yield anything. But can someone be happy with nothing at all? I asked the Wanderer, if I am nothing, what does that mean? But I was afraid of the answer. Thankfully, the Wanderer let me change the topic. He definitely thought I was crazy in many ways but he wasn't going to say something so hurtful.
My thoughts stopped spinning so uncontrollably for those few minutes that he'd come in. I started to notice myself about beg him to stay a while longer. Ego Rex was always raving on about all the things that made me insecure. And yet, with the Wanderer around, Ego Rex's voice affected me much less.
I might have asked the Wanderer if he loved me at one point. I might have showed him my diary that contained my deranged thoughts and stories. I showed him stories that I'd drew of my twin sister, begging him to say something about these memories of mine, this love for her that I still clung on to. I needed him to see my thoughts so that I could be convinced that my thoughts were real. I think, therefore I am. That's what he told me. He told me I was perfect just as I am. I told him finally, finally relieved, finally feeling a string of hope, a string that I could see the end of, I am who I am.
It felt like a huge burden was off my chest when I could finally say that. All along id been questioning my identity. All this time I've been doubting that my sister missed me half as much as I missed her. I would try to see her, if possible. It will be difficult to let go off her after embracing her the most tightly I've ever done in my life. But if I could see her, just once, at least I'd know, she wasn't just a reflection. She wasn't just a picture I drew in my diary during a manic episode while staying in a cave. If only I could start this story from the beginning and never let her go. Because that's where our suffering began. Ill do everything she tells me to do, regardless of how I feel. Confusion is a plague indeed.
Goodbye Ego Rex. Tomorrow morning I will find my way out of here, even if that means you still think of me as a crazy being. Because, I must make my own way. Whatever reason my sister ignored me, I must be me.
***
Little prince/wanderer's perspective
I and the man in front of me once stood on a balcony. He proved to me that he was indeed a wise man. I had wanted to be wise like him, but in my own way.
'Ego Rex.'
This was not my father's name as he once was named. But he was my father indeed.
'Before I leave i have something to say,' I said to my father who still didn't know of my identity yet.
'I came here hoping to understand my self more. I thought I already knew how the world works. I hoped that I was a sort of Hero. But then I travelled through many kingdoms and found each one had troubles. I solved the troubles that were easy to fix, and ignored the ones that were too troublesome. When things got difficult for me, I convinced myself that the entire world was defected. Perhaps it is. Perhaps all of us are mad. I will admit, I felt strong urges to agree completely with Es and to turn away from you. Father, do you recognise me yet?'
I pulled down my hood. He came towards me slowly, looking all over my face, blinking madly.
'Son?' He laughed and I missed him so much, 'Well my little Prince? My very deeply lost child? How have your dreams been lately? Have you finally gotten over that saviour complex of yours?'
'I'm sorry,' i said in a mumble for I truly was naive back then, thinking I could make the entire universe happy again.
'Still im partly proud that i took the choice i did, father. Because here i met someone who i truly love, and not because I feel sorry for her. Despite her hardship, despite the fact that she felt betrayed, she still embraced the ambiguity of her identity. She is herself and that’s what I've always wanted to be. Just myself. Not a Wanderer, not a Prince either. I'm sorry that I failed you. But I'm glad that I didn't fail myself just this once.'
My father smiled his genuine smile, something I hadn't seen this entire time in the cave. And that is when I realised. My father, he was a great caring person. Before being wise or a strategic leader, before being a person who struggled with his ideals of strict rules versus gentle diplomacy, he was someone who was happiest when I was happy. And just like that, I might have solved the greatest puzzle of my entire life. I wonder if most people ever do.
***
Es twins' perspective
I wrote my sister a letter today. This one I'm not planning on sending to her as is. Instead I will go out to see her and read the letter out loud to her. That way I won't feel overwhelmed as I tell her exactly how I feel.
When she sent me those positive letters with happy quotes from those stories, I felt within myself a deep guilt. I know I should have tried to be happier for her sake. It is all my fault. But this guilt, it's so powerful, it feels like a huge weight is pinning me to my bed and i can't get up.
It reminded me of a short story i wrote once in my diary. A story I hadn't meant to make real.
In the story one of the sisters said 'I will drink poison. I really will.'
From a groggy sleep the other awoke. She took the second bottle in her hand. It weighed light, but felt heavy.
The sister thought to herself, Sister, i would do anything with you. But sister, i don't want you to die.
I check through the letters Es had sent me and see that the very last one has come since a while ago. This is unlike her. Is she okay?
I didn't mean to make my sister turn into me. Quiet, sullen and having too many thoughts. Please, sister, turn back to how you used to be.