Walking into school, hand in hand with Luke, was a refreshingly normal feeling and one that I didn’t have too often. I was even getting used to the alternative high school full of its non-traditional students. Most of them, I had come to realize, were either too creative to survive a normal high school or too complicated with their own issues to worry about what mine were. My crying outburst on day one was already a side note. I heard no gossip; there were no whispers in my direction. Maybe I was home at last. The only thing missing was Molly. Unfortunately a twin sister was a pretty big deal to be missing. I longed to have her back with me so I could tell her all about Luke and all about the new school. Her ghost-self wasn’t much for conversation.

I stashed all of books that I didn’t need right away in my locker. When I closed the door, I was surprised by the sudden appearance of Rusty. I was so surprised in fact that I jumped and came alarmingly close to letting out a verbal yelp. He was standing beside me, looking terribly pale for a translucent ghostly figure. His face was ashen and his eyes looked tired. I wasn’t used to seeing him like this. I wanted to ask him what was wrong but the thought of speaking out loud to a guy no one else could see was just too much for me to take. I tried thinking, “what’s wrong, what’s wrong,” over and over in my head. Unfortunately that line of communication only seemed to go one way. I started to walk away and as I moved through the halls the walls and rows of lockers started to melt away. I was walking into darkness, into nothingness. Then, everything went quiet.

“Like this place so much you’re going to stay all night?” Julia bumped me with her shoulder as she sat down next to me, setting her portfolio down on the ground. “You’re still going to do the photo shoot with me tonight, right?”

This couldn’t be happening. Again? Already? My eyes rested firmly on Julia who was looking at me kind of like you would expect a nurse to look at a patient that suddenly woke from a five year coma without explanation.

“Oh yes, that thing, yea I can still do it.” I at least had a shred of memory about a photo shoot I had promised to do in a weak moment although Luke had warned me about her crazy art projects.

We were sitting outside in the courtyard where we normally would be eating lunch. The place was pretty empty and the sky was darkening. I had a sudden sinking feeling that I had missed the whole day. The last thing I remembered was, what? I recalled walking into the school, opening up my locker, and seeing a disturbing image of Rusty the loopy but normally friendly ghost. Now I was sitting on a bench outside in the cold, presumably hours later.

“Earth to Viv! Are you ok Vivian? You’ve been acting like a total mental case all day.” Julia waved a hand in front of my face.

“And how is that any different than any other day,” I asked with one eye brow lifted.

“Good point. It’s just, you’ve been distant. You hardly talked to any of us all day. I think Luke is depressed, seriously he looks like a lost puppy. I don’t think he fully understands where you guys are at.”

Great, so I couldn’t have been Katrina today, she wasn’t one for distance. She would have talked all day long. Rusty also would have rambled on nonstop, that leaves Miranda. Miranda? She wouldn’t do that to me. She wouldn’t mess around with my life like the others did. Not unless she needed to for some reason.

“I’m sorry. I can explain.”

Wait, had I just said that? What exactly did I think I was going to explain?

“Fantastic, let’s get going then. Luke is meeting us at my place.”

The best part about being with Julia was that I didn’t have to talk much. She had no problem carrying on both parts of the conversation if need be. The whole way to her house she talked about the pending photo shoot. I’m not sure I understood what it meant, something about showing emotions with my feet? Maybe I had heard that wrong, God, I hoped so.

At Julia’s things were awkward with my new boyfriend. Luke shuffled his feet back and forth, looking at the ground when he talked to me. He repeatedly pushed up the bridge of his glasses as if they were falling off. Which they wouldn’t be dong, I noted, if he would look at my face instead of the carpet.

“So if I did anything to upset you or anything, I mean, just tell me. I know it has to be something, you barely spoke to me at lunch and avoided me all day.”

“I’m really sorry Luke. I didn’t mean to ignore you. I swear I’m not mad at you or at anyone else. It’s been tough, moving here and starting over. I think I’m just exhausted.”

Julia entered the room with a large camera on a tripod and a canvas bag full of something lumpy and heavy. “Let’s get to work people! I need to have this done soon if I’m going to enter it into the photography contest. First prize is $500, maybe I can afford to you pay for your performance my dears.”

She dumped out the contents of the bag. Shoes of all types spilled out. Great, feet. Just what I had feared. We spent several hours photographing my emotions through pictures of my feet in different shoes and different positions. Feet in black combat boots taking a wide stance for angry. Feet in dainty little girly sandals, slightly turned inward to portray shyness. I wasn’t much of a model but luckily I didn’t get a lot of creative input anyway so it didn’t matter.

“I warned you about freaky art projects, don’t say I didn’t,” Luke told me when we were finished and helping pack up. Julia swooped around the room stashing things and generally making more of a mess than anything.

“What ever science-boy.! Seriously Viv, if an activity doesn’t involve a microscope he’s not that interested. Well, until you came along that is.” She giggled and threw herself down onto the couch.

I watched her and Luke pretend-arguing like brother and sister. For some reason this made me incredibly sad. Molly and I bickered over clothes, argued over what movies to watch, and screamed at each other over the stupidest things. I had no one to fight with like that anymore. I also had no one to confide in, not the way it used to be between me and Molly. She knew me better than I know myself. I could feel the warm tears sliding down my cheeks seconds before realizing that I was crying again.  

Luke was instantly at my side, concern spread openly across his face. His warm hands were on my shoulders. I looked up at him and saw the worry in his eyes. There was no way I could keep him and not tell him the truth. There was no other way to explain my behavior but to tell him about Molly.

“I have to tell you something; both of you. It will make knowing me slightly less mysterious I promise.”

I sucked in a large breath, hoping it would last me through the entire confession which I intended to make as quick as humanly possible.

“The reason my family wanted to move here, the reason I had to change schools, how do I say this? I had a sister. Her name was Molly. She killed herself six months ago. I was the first to find her, lying on our bathroom floor. She was cold already. It was already too late. I must have completely freaked out because I woke up in a mental hospital some time later.”

I said all of this without stopping and without looking up at either of my new friends. I felt Luke’s hands slide off my shoulders and wrap around my waist instead. My body shook with the heavy sobs I couldn’t control. My head rested on his chest and I cried for what seemed like an eternity.

“Well no wonder you’re so upset all the time Viv! I’d be a real space case myself if I had a death in the family like that. And your sister? My God!” Julia was up and rubbing my back as she went on and on with words I couldn’t even hear over my own sniffling.

“How old was she? What was she like?” Luke’s words were but a whisper and he spoke them slowly and carefully.

“My age. We were twins.” Then quietly I added, “ We even looked alike.”

The hugging and back rubbing immediately stopped. Now I had really shocked them. They stood before me, mouths open, their own eyes filling with tears.

I know what they were imagining. They were thinking about the horror of finding someone you loved dead; someone that looked exactly like you. Sometimes I was secretly thankful that I had missed the funeral. Who wants to see what they would look like in a casket?