Broken Glass 1 Haylee

Even with all the warnings and the bad stories out there, whose mother wouldn’t have a hard time believing her daughter would do something like this? Everybody thinks they’re raising angels. I saw that from the way my friends’ parents talked about them. How could their daughter be doing something as terrible as carrying on a romance over the Internet with an older man? And right under their noses? This was all especially true for our mother.

Simon Adams was right. Examples of this were constantly on the news. But our mother was always very confident that we wouldn’t do anything that was so forbidden or so stupid. In her eyes, we were such goody-goodies. I hated it when she bragged about us and people looked at us as if we were right out of a fairy tale about two identical princesses, Cinderella clones without so much as a blemish on our behavior or complexions.

When we were little, both of us used to believe that we hadn’t been born. We had descended from a cloud of angels and just floated into the delivery room. The stork really did bring us.

Mother had no idea how many things we had done recently that she wouldn’t approve of, mainly things I had done and that my dear abused sister would have to go along with or at least keep secret. Kaylee would have been suspected less. After all, no matter what Mother told other people or even what she told us, I knew in my heart that she favored Kaylee, despite her effort not to show any bias.

However, I had no doubt that her favoring Kaylee gave her nightmares. What if I could tell—or anyone else could tell, for that matter—that she really did favor one of us over the other? How horrible for her. All our lives, she had made an effort to treat us equally and to think of us as halves of the same perfect image of a daughter she had created. The smallest thing that could make one of us different from the other was vigorously avoided. She was adamant about not loving one of us more than the other.

No one suffered more under this rule than Daddy, who sometimes accidentally and sometimes deliberately tried to treat us as individuals. I pretended to be as upset about that as Mother wanted us to be, but in my secret chest of feelings and thoughts, shut away from Mother’s eyes, I was pleased, even when he did something for Kaylee that I might envy. At least, in his thinking, there was a difference, and we weren’t simply duplicates or clones, as some of Mother’s friends occasionally referred to us. It always annoyed me that she didn’t mind when people said that. I did. Who wanted to be a clone?

I was tired of hearing how we were monozygotic twins developed from a single egg-and-sperm combination that split a few days after conception, that our DNA originated from the same source. I didn’t even have my own DNA like most everyone else. I had to share everything with Kaylee from the moment I was conceived. Mother often told people that we even took up equal space in her womb and that everything that had come from her to nourish us was consumed in “perfectly equal amounts.” I never knew how she could know that, but she would say, “How else could they be so identical at birth?”

According to Mother’s logic and beliefs, how could I ever even exist without Kaylee? Our hearts beat with the same rhythm. We took the same number of breaths each day. If one of us sneezed, the other soon would, and that was true for every yawn, every ache, and every shiver. We were the mirror sisters; we lived in each other’s reflected image.

Well, maybe not now; maybe finally not now. I could walk away, and Kaylee would be stuck in the glass looking out. Come back, come help me! she would cry. Help yourself, I would say. I did. That’s why you’re trapped in the mirror.

Another patrol car arrived on the scene, and before we went home, we all drove around, Mother in one car and me in the other, searching for any signs of Kaylee. Sometimes the officers would stop to ask a pedestrian if they had seen a girl who looked like me, and I would have to make myself more visible. On one stop, I actually stepped out of the vehicle.

“She’s wearing the same clothes,” they told potential witnesses. They all shook their heads and apologized for not having seen Kaylee. One elderly man looked as if he might have something to tell them. He was studying me so closely my heart stopped in anticipation, but after another moment, he shook his head and told us his eyesight wasn’t what it used to be.

It seemed like we drove for hours. At one point, we passed the closed-down coffee shop, and I held my breath again. Was Kaylee still there, maybe lying on the side of the road? How would I react to that? It was deserted. There was no one on the sidewalks, no one in the street, and no one sitting in any vehicle. Even the shadows looked lonely.

Simon was left behind to wait at the movie theater in case Kaylee showed up there. When we returned and saw him alone looking confused and helpless, Mother grew more frantic. She wanted more police, more cars, and insisted that they knock on every door within a mile of the theater.

“He wanted Kaylee to meet him nearby,” she said. “He has to live somewhere in this neighborhood.”

They tried to reason with her, but she spun around on Officer Donald, the first policeman who had arrived at the theater, and screamed, “Do something! Don’t you understand? My daughter’s been kidnapped, or she would have been back by now. She’s being held somewhere against her will or taken so far away we’ll never find her. Every minute that passes is terrible!”

“You’ve got to stay calm, Mrs. Fitzgerald,” he told her, and looked to me to do something to help her, but I just lowered my head and looked as powerless as they felt.

A policewoman arrived, probably called in by one of the other cops to help handle Mother. To be truthful, even I was shocked at how she was behaving. Kaylee and I had seen her upset many times, of course. She used to pound on herself so hard when she screamed that she would have black-and-blue marks, but she was lashing out now and throwing her arms about so wildly that I thought they would fly off her body. She began screaming at me again for keeping Kaylee’s secret.

“Don’t you understand that you’ve been kidnapped, too?” she cried.

Everyone looked at her oddly then. I had to explain what she meant, how she believed that nothing ever happened to either of us without it happening to the other. Of course, it still made no sense to the police. It was then that I told Officer Donald about Daddy and how Mother’s insisting on both of us being treated exactly the same had led to their divorce.

“It became too much for my father,” I said.

They looked sympathetic. They didn’t have to say it. I could see it in their faces. It would have been too much for them, too, maybe for anyone.

Officer Monday returned to the patrol car to see about getting in touch with Daddy.

At one point, Mother broke away and started running up the street, insisting that the search go on and that we shouldn’t wait for additional assistance. We were wasting precious time. She had started toward someone’s front door when they rushed up to her. She was pulling her own hair and had to be forcibly restrained. The policewoman, Officer Denker, asked me for the name of our doctor.

“She has to be calmed down. She could hurt herself,” she told me.

I gave her Dr. Bloom’s name. Simon Adams stood off to the side now, looking too stunned to speak. I laughed to myself, imagining that he was thinking, What did I get myself into? I was surprised when Officer Monday came over to tell me they had located my father and that he was going to meet us at our house. I had thought for sure he was on some business trip miles and miles away.

We hadn’t had much contact with Daddy after the divorce had been finalized. Mother seemed to keep up with the news about him and his girlfriend. Apparently, from the last we were told, that romance had ended, and Daddy was living in an apartment by himself. We were supposed to go to dinner with him a week from now. Almost daily, Mother warned us that he would try to play on our sympathies.

“Poor him,” she said. “He’s alone again. But he’s always been alone. He prefers it, no matter what he tells you. He’s too selfish to be with anyone,” she assured us. “Don’t waste a tear on him.”

Mother had practically passed out by this time, emotionally exhausted. Officer Denker was with her in the rear of one of the patrol cars, commiserating. I had heard her tell Mother that she, too, had a teenage daughter. Mother looked at her and shook her head. Kaylee wasn’t simply a teenage daughter. Didn’t she understand? Kaylee and I were special.

Naturally, all the police activity in front of the movie theater had drawn a crowd. Anyone who showed up was questioned, but as I expected and hoped, no one knew anything. Two plainclothes detectives arrived, and I had to tell my story again. A Lieutenant Cowan asked the questions. He was older than Detective Simpson, who I didn’t think was much older than a college student. He was by far better-looking, with sort of rusty light-brown hair and greenish-brown eyes. Every time I answered one of Lieutenant Cowan’s questions, I looked at Detective Simpson to see his reaction. I even smiled at him once.

“We’ll need your sister’s computer,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “Your dad’s on his way, and your family doctor is coming to your home for your mother, so why don’t you ride back with us and keep telling us all you know, all you remember?”

“I’d better ask my mother,” I said, looking at the patrol car she was in.

“Better to just come along,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “She’s calmed a bit. They’ll start for your house.”

I shrugged and followed them to their car. Before I got in, I looked at Simon Adams. He appeared to be totally lost now and not sure if he should remain waiting.

“My mother’s date doesn’t know anything,” I told Detective Simpson. “Maybe you should tell him to go home. My father’s coming,” I added, implying that this might be a problem.

He looked at Simon and then at Lieutenant Cowan, who nodded.

“Get his name, address, and contact numbers,” Lieutenant Cowan told him.

I got into the backseat.

The patrol car taking my mother started to leave. When it pulled in front of us, I saw her spin around in the backseat and press her face to the rear window, looking as if she was clawing at it with her hands while she screamed. I looked down quickly, mostly embarrassed by her. Everyone will see how pathetic she is, but the good news is that most will feel sorry for me, I thought. Not only have I probably lost my sister, my other half, but my mother won’t be the same.

They’d be right about that. Mother was going to need me. She’d need me twice as much as she ever had, especially with Daddy not living with us. I’d have to be more like Kaylee sometimes, but that was all right, because I could go right back to being myself. Without Kaylee there, I could do many new things, and everything I wore would seem to be mine alone. There would be no one imitating me, duplicating me.

“Keep thinking about this,” Lieutenant Cowan said as we waited for Detective Simpson. “Every little detail that comes to mind will be helpful. Don’t think anything is too small to be important.”

“I really don’t know all that much,” I said. “I didn’t want my sister to continue corresponding with him, and she knew it, so she kept most of it from me.”

Detective Simpson got in.

“She told you his name, you said,” Lieutenant Cowan said as he pulled away from the curb.

“Bob Brukowski. But to be honest, I think she made it up,” I said. “She was afraid I might do a search or something and find out that he was a criminal.”

“You two are pretty close, though, right?” Detective Simpson asked.

“Two sisters couldn’t be any closer unless they were physically attached,” I said. “We never kept secrets from each other, but Kaylee was determined to be more of her own person, and I didn’t want to stand in her way.”

Neither spoke for a while.

“Did she ever print anything out from him to show you, or show you his picture? Maybe you know where that is?”

“No. Everything I knew she told me. I never saw anything. She was possessive about her new relationship. It was the first real thing she had that I didn’t.”

“You didn’t share boyfriends,” Lieutenant Cowan said. I was silent. He turned back to glance at me. “Did you?”

“Sorta, sometimes,” I said. “We were very respectful of each other’s opinions.”

The two detectives looked at each other and were silent for a while. Detective Simpson had been checking on the name I had given them.

“There’s no one with that name living in the vicinity. The closest one that’s come up lives in Cape May, but it looks like he’s in his seventies.”

“Predators don’t seem to be limited by age. Let’s see what we can get off her computer,” Lieutenant Cowan said.

Yes, let’s see, I thought, and smiled to myself.

Daddy and Dr. Bloom were at our house when we arrived. Mother had already been taken in quickly. Dr. Bloom had followed her up to her bedroom.

The moment I entered, Daddy turned to me. “What’s going on here, Haylee? Kaylee was involved with an older man on the Internet?” he asked, astounded.

Why would you be surprised? I wanted to ask him. For years now, you’ve known less about us than most of our neighbors. You were too busy trying to make a new life for yourself.

“That’s what she told me, Daddy. I told her it was wrong and dangerous. She kept most of it secret,” I added. “She made me promise not to say anything. I thought she would grow out of it, realize it was stupid, and that would be that.”

“But you worked out a sneaky way for her to meet him tonight?”

“I didn’t; she did. I wanted to go along to protect her when she met him, but she thought I was trying to compete with her for his attention or something, so I didn’t go. I was very worried, but she promised that if he was strange or anything, she would come right back to the movie theater.”

Daddy looked at the detectives. “What do we do?” he asked.

“We’ll continue a physical search of the vicinity, hoping to find a witness. In the meantime, we’ll need her computer,” Lieutenant Cowan told him.

“Sure,” Daddy said. “Show them, Haylee.”

“How’s Mother?” I asked.

“Dr. Bloom’s going to give her something to calm her, and we’ll see,” he said. “I’ll stay here tonight. Don’t worry,” he added quickly.

“She blames me, but I couldn’t stop Kaylee without her hating me, Daddy. It was hard,” I whined. “You don’t know how hard it was for me to go to sleep every night thinking about the trouble she might get into. I felt bad about it all the time, but I couldn’t have Kaylee hate me. I couldn’t just tell on her. I couldn’t!”

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll stay here until the situation is resolved.”

“I’m so glad, Daddy,” I said, and hugged him. I held on to him tightly.

“You’d better help the policemen,” Daddy whispered.

I let go, sucked back a sob, and led them up to Kaylee’s bedroom. They unplugged the computer, and Officer Donald took it.

“We just need the hard drive,” Detective Simpson told me. “Do you know how they communicated? Emails, Twitter, Facebook, what?”

I shook my head. “As I said, I never saw any of it. My sister wanted to keep everything secret. It was her thing, not mine. She had to share so much in her life with me, practically everything. I understood why she was upset about it, because it bothered us both. This romance with an older man was her own thing. She told me what she was doing, and I told her how worried I was, but she kept saying she knew what she was doing.”

My voice kept cracking when I spoke. I was on the cusp of more tears, but I thought I was doing well, explaining things well.

“I don’t understand when you say you two had to share everything,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “What exactly does that mean?”

“It’s just as I said, everything. We have the same clothes, shoes, games, dolls. Whatever I own she owns, and vice versa, and it has to be exactly the same. We even have identical toothbrushes. That’s why we were wearing the same thing tonight,” I said. “Mother likes it that way, even at our age now.”

The two detectives looked at me with expressions of amazement.

“Why?” Detective Simpson asked.

“We’re identical twins, monozygotic twins. We have the same DNA. There are very few like us. Mother brought us up to share. We’re two halves of her perfect daughter,” I added, and forced a smile as if I thought it was wonderful. Then I changed expression quickly. “That’s why she’s extra upset. Half of us is missing.”

They looked at each other with expressions that said, We’ve heard it all now. I knew they wouldn’t blame me in any way after hearing all this. Mother was the kook.

“We’ll be back in the morning,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “Write down anything that might help us, anything you remember. We can’t stress it too much. Details are critical.”

“You’ll probably find it all on her computer,” I said. “That’s where she told me it all came about, but I don’t know any real details more than I told you,” I emphasized.

They left Kaylee’s room. I stood there for a moment looking around. If Mother has her way, I thought, she’ll turn it into a shrine. Nothing will be touched or changed, but it will be kept as clean as ever. After all, someday Kaylee will return, won’t she?

A new great thought occurred like a surprise bonus. If she did that, I’d be able to make significant changes in my room. She wouldn’t want mine to be a shrine. If she tried to duplicate it, I’d stress how important it was to preserve Kaylee’s room exactly as it was, even when I added something to mine or changed something. Finally, I could put up some posters of rock singers and movie stars I liked but Kaylee didn’t. There was so much I could do now. New doors were opening every passing moment. I felt like I could breathe better.

Mother was sedated and sleeping. I saw Daddy talking to Dr. Bloom in the hallway. They were practically whispering, and Dr. Bloom kept shaking his head as Daddy spoke. He was probably describing how nutty Mother was, I thought. Dr. Bloom patted Daddy on the shoulder to boost his hopes, and then he left and the house was quiet.

“I’m going to sleep down here,” Daddy told me. “Just call me if you need anything.”

“Why don’t you sleep in Kaylee’s room, Daddy?” I suggested. “Sleep in a comfortable bed instead of on a couch.”

He considered it.

“I like the idea that you’ll be right next door to me, Daddy. I’m not going to have an easy time falling asleep. I’ll probably have nightmares. I’m having trouble keeping from thinking about what she could be going through right now, how scared she must be.”

“Okay, sweetheart,” he said. “I’ll do that.”

I smiled. He called us sweetheart when he lived with us, but it was always sweethearts, not sweetheart. Tonight it was just me.

And it would be that way in the morning, I was sure.

Everything would be changing now.

I actually felt as if I had just been born, and all that had happened to me before, my whole life until now, was the nightmare I feared.

If I could only wipe my memory clean the way I could delete everything on a computer, life would really be perfect.

I would even be the perfect daughter all by myself.