Chapter Text
The house was large enough to make silence feel deliberate.
It stood at the end of a long private drive, behind black iron gates and a row of clipped trees that never seemed to lose a leaf. The windows were tall. The floors were pale marble. Every room had been arranged to look as though no one had ever lived in it.
The house belonged in a magazine.
That was what their mother always said.
“Stand up straight.”
“Don’t wrinkle your clothes.”
“Smile properly.”
“People notice these things.”
Their father rarely said anything at all. He didn’t need to. His silence had its own weight, settling over breakfast and dinner and every carefully arranged family photograph.
The twins learned early that there were two different kinds of attention in the house.
There was the attention given to expensive objects, the watch their father kept in a glass display case, the paintings imported from overseas, the crystal chandelier that their mother dusted twice a week.
And then there was the attention given to children.
The first kind was careful.
The second was mostly corrective.
Wemmbu sat at the end of the dining table with her hands folded in her lap. Her dress was pale blue, stiff around the collar and embroidered with tiny silver flowers. Her mother had chosen it that morning, along with matching shoes and a ribbon for her hair.
“Try not to fidget,” her mother said.
Wemmbu stopped moving.
Across the table, Loppezz swung one foot beneath his chair. He wore a dark jacket with a red tie, both of which had been selected by their father. The tie was too tight around his neck. He had tried to loosen it before breakfast, but their father had noticed.
“Leave it,” he had said.
So Loppezz had left it.
The twins looked nothing alike at first glance. Wemmbu had long purple hair that fell over her shoulders in a shining curtain. Loppezz’s hair was the same colour, though his had been cut short whenever their mother decided it looked “untidy”.
They shared the same grey eyes.
Their mother called them unusual.
Their father called them striking.
Neither of them called them beautiful.
“Your aunt and uncle will be here at eleven,” their mother said. “I expect both of you to behave.”
Loppezz’s foot stopped swinging.
“Why?” he asked.
Their father looked up from his phone.
It was not an angry look. That would have been easier. Anger could be understood. It came and went.
His expression was merely flat.
“Because you are representing this family.”
Loppezz looked down at his plate.
Wemmbu stared at the silver fork beside her hand. Her reflection bent strangely across its polished surface. A pale face. A ribbon. A dress that did not feel like hers.
She wondered what it would be like to wear Loppezz’s jacket.
Not because it was nicer. It wasn’t. The shoulders were too broad, and the sleeves were slightly too long.
She simply wanted to know what it would feel like to put it on.
Their mother picked up her coffee.
“Wemmbu, you’ll stay with me in the sitting room when they arrive. Loppezz, your father wants you to show your uncle the new study.”
“Why?” Loppezz asked.
“Because he’s interested in the renovation.”
“I don’t know anything about the renovation.”
“You’ll manage.”
Loppezz looked at Wemmbu.
It was a brief glance. Almost invisible.
But Wemmbu understood it perfectly.
They were both trapped.
She lowered her eyes to her plate so their parents wouldn’t see her smile.
It was the first smile of the day.
Their parents liked to say that the twins had everything.
They had the house.
They had private tutors.
They had holidays in places where the ocean was so blue it looked artificial.
They had a driver, a gardener, a housekeeper and a chef who prepared meals neither of them was allowed to choose.
They had wardrobes full of clothes they didn’t wear.
They had rooms larger than some people’s entire homes.
Whenever the twins complained, their mother reminded them how lucky they were.
“Do you know how many children would be grateful for this?” she asked.
Wemmbu never knew what to say to that.
She was grateful for the heated floors. She was grateful for the library. She was grateful that Loppezz was always only a few doors away.
But none of those things made her want to be a girl.
None of them made Loppezz want to be a boy.
They had tried, at first.
Wemmbu had tried to like dresses. She had tried to sit with her knees together and let her mother brush her hair. She had tried to feel something when people called her pretty.
Loppezz had tried to like rugby. He had tried to laugh when his father praised him for being strong. He had tried to stand taller whenever someone called him handsome.
The words slid over them without finding anywhere to settle.
Pretty.
Handsome.
Young lady.
Young man.
Daughter.
Son.
The twins heard them all the time.
They never felt like any of them.
No one had told them there was anything strange about that.
So they assumed the strangeness belonged to them.
Their aunt arrived at eleven minutes past eleven.
Their mother disliked lateness, even when she was the one being kept waiting.
By then, the twins had been placed in the sitting room, where their mother arranged them on opposite sides of a cream-coloured sofa. Wemmbu’s hands were folded. Loppezz’s hands were also folded, though he kept rubbing his thumb against the side of his finger.
“Stop that,” their mother whispered.
He stopped.
The front doors opened.
Voices filled the entrance hall. Their aunt laughed loudly, their uncle complained about traffic, and someone carried in a box of flowers that was immediately handed to the housekeeper.
Then came the introductions, although everyone already knew one another.
“There’s my beautiful girl,” their aunt said, bending to kiss Wemmbu’s cheek.
Wemmbu held still.
“And there’s my handsome boy.”
Loppezz received a kiss on the forehead.
His face tightened.
Their aunt sat beside their mother. Their uncle stood near the fireplace, speaking to their father about property prices. The twins were asked questions they were expected to answer in the correct way.
“How was school?”
“Fine.”
“Are you excited for the holidays?”
“Yes.”
“What have you been learning?”
“Lots.”
Their aunt did not seem to notice that they gave the same answers in the same tone.
She asked Wemmbu about music lessons. She asked Loppezz about sport. When Wemmbu said she didn’t like piano, her mother placed a hand on her shoulder.
“She’s being modest,” she said. “She plays beautifully.”
When Loppezz said he didn’t want to join the tennis club, his father frowned.
“He needs to be more disciplined.”
The conversation moved on.
The twins sat beside each other, close enough that their elbows touched.
Wemmbu could feel the warmth of Loppezz’s arm through the fabric of his jacket.
That was the only part of the afternoon that felt real.
At lunch, their aunt talked about a family they knew whose daughter had dyed her hair green.
“Can you imagine?” she said.
Their mother shuddered. “Some parents don’t teach their children any standards.”
Wemmbu’s fingers tightened around her glass.
The water trembled.
Beside her, Loppezz stared at his plate.
Their father said, “It’s attention-seeking.”
The adults continued talking.
Neither twin said anything.
They had both been thinking about hair.
Wemmbu wondered what it would feel like if her purple hair belonged to her because she had chosen it, instead of because her mother liked the colour.
Loppezz wondered what it would feel like if his hair were long.
Neither of them knew that the other was thinking the same thing.
Not yet.
After lunch, their parents sent them upstairs.
“Go and do something useful,” their mother said.
The twins walked side by side through the corridor.
Their footsteps echoed across the marble floor. Sunlight poured through the high windows, turning the polished surfaces white.
At the top of the stairs, Loppezz waited until they were out of sight.
Then he pulled at his tie.
“It’s choking me.”
Wemmbu glanced towards the staircase.
“No one can see.”
“That’s not the point.”
He loosened it and tucked the tie into his pocket.
Wemmbu looked at him.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re staring.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
She smiled despite herself.
Loppezz tugged at the collar of his shirt. “It’s horrible.”
“It is.”
He glanced down at her dress.
“Yours is worse.”
“I know.”
For a few seconds, they stood in the corridor, looking at each other.
Then Loppezz said, “Do you want to trade?”
Wemmbu blinked.
“What?”
“Our clothes.”
She looked towards the stairs again.
“What if someone sees?”
“No one comes upstairs during lunch.”
“Our mother might.”
“She won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because she hates the upstairs carpet.”
Wemmbu considered this.
It was true. Their mother had complained about the carpet for months, even though it was new and cost more than most cars.
Loppezz opened the door to his room.
“Come on.”
His room was dark because the curtains were closed. His father had decided that the space looked more sophisticated that way. There were bookshelves, a desk, a leather chair and a bed that was always made, even though Loppezz hated making it.
Wemmbu closed the door behind them.
For the first time that day, they were alone.
Really alone.
No adults. No guests. No one watching.
Loppezz shrugged off his jacket.
Wemmbu took off her shoes.
They exchanged clothes clumsily, each of them trying not to laugh. The dress was difficult to pull over Loppezz’s head, and the jacket hung strangely from Wemmbu’s shoulders. He had to roll the sleeves several times. She kept catching her hair beneath the collar.
When they were finished, they stood in front of the full-length mirror.
Loppezz looked down at himself.
The pale blue dress fell to his knees. It was too loose around the waist and too short in the sleeves, but he reached for the ribbon in his hair anyway.
Wemmbu wore the dark jacket. The red tie was still in Loppezz’s pocket, but she took it out and held it against her chest.
Neither of them spoke.
The person in the mirror looked unfamiliar.
Not wrong.
Just unfamiliar.
Loppezz touched the skirt.
“It’s soft,” he said.
Wemmbu adjusted the jacket collar.
“It’s not as bad as I thought.”
“You thought it would be bad?”
“I thought it would feel like your clothes.”
“It does feel like my clothes.”
“No, I mean…”
Wemmbu stopped.
She didn’t know how to explain it.
The jacket did not make her feel like Loppezz. It did not make her feel like she was pretending to be her brother.
It simply made her feel less like someone else.
Loppezz was still looking at the mirror.
“Do I look stupid?”
“No.”
“Do I look like a girl?”
Wemmbu watched his reflection.
She wanted to say yes. She wanted to say no. She wanted to say something that would make the question disappear.
Instead, she said, “You look like you.”
Loppezz turned to her.
The room was quiet.
“Really?”
“Really.”
He looked back at the mirror.
After a moment, Wemmbu stood beside him.
“You look happier.”
Loppezz’s mouth opened slightly.
Then he smiled.
It was small and uncertain, like he had forgotten how.
“You do too,” he said.
Wemmbu looked at herself.
The jacket was too big. The sleeves covered her hands. The tie hung crookedly around her neck.
She looked ridiculous.
She also looked relieved.
“I don’t know why,” she whispered.
Loppezz shook his head.
“Me neither.”
They stayed in front of the mirror until someone knocked on the door.
Both of them jumped.
“Are you two in there?” their mother called.
Wemmbu and Loppezz stared at each other.
The silence stretched.
“Answer me.”
Loppezz grabbed the dress at his knees.
Wemmbu pulled the jacket off.
They changed as quickly as they could, stepping on hems, catching hair, muffling their laughter against their hands. By the time their mother opened the door, both twins were back in their own clothes.
Mostly.
Wemmbu had put the jacket on backwards.
Loppezz’s shirt was untucked.
Their mother looked at them with suspicion.
“What were you doing?”
“Nothing,” they said together.
Her eyes narrowed.
“Go and fix yourselves.”
She closed the door.
For another moment, the twins stood still.
Then Loppezz began to laugh.
Wemmbu tried to hold it in, but she failed. Soon they were both laughing so hard that they had to sit on the floor.
The sound felt too loud for the house.
It felt dangerous.
It felt wonderful.
That night, Wemmbu lay in bed with her hair spread across the pillow.
Her room was decorated in cream, gold and soft pink. There were framed photographs on the walls, most of them chosen by her mother. In every picture, Wemmbu was smiling.
She did not remember smiling for any of them.
Across the corridor, Loppezz was probably awake too. He often was. The house made strange noises at night: pipes knocking inside the walls, the lift moving between floors, footsteps from the night staff.
Sometimes Wemmbu imagined that the house was restless because it knew it was empty.
She rolled onto her side.
A soft knock came at her door.
Loppezz stepped inside without waiting for permission.
He had changed into pyjamas. His hair was still damp from the shower.
“Can’t sleep?” he asked.
“No.”
“Me neither.”
He sat on the edge of her bed.
For a while, neither of them said anything.
They didn’t need to.
The day had left a bruise beneath both their ribs, but it was easier to breathe when they were together.
Loppezz looked towards the wardrobe.
“Do you think we could do it again?”
“The clothes?”
“Maybe.”
Wemmbu considered the idea.
“Tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.”
“And no one can know.”
“Obviously.”
She turned onto her back and stared at the ceiling.
“What if we keep doing it?”
Loppezz looked at her.
“What if we do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then we don’t have to know yet.”
Wemmbu turned her head.
He was smiling again.
Not the smile from the family photographs. Not the careful one their mother liked. This one was crooked and bright and completely his.
She smiled back.
Outside, the house stood beneath the dark sky, enormous and perfect and silent.
Inside, the twins held on to one small secret.
It was not much.
It was only a jacket, a dress, a mirror and two children who had not yet found the words for what they needed.
But when they were alone together, neither of them had to pretend.
And for now, that was enough.