Stranger and Stranger (7 page)

Cats and I have given up the search for oddities, quirks, peculiarities, anomalies, and eccentricities in Silifordville and are now hanging out in a small park near the high school. The park features a basic half-pipe with a tight transition and not much flat bottom—rides kinda fast. And a couple stationary rails for grinding. Standard light graffiti. Crushed soda cans. Litterbugs.

Have skated the stuffing out of everything. Somewhat fun but also somewhat pathetic. It’s been more entertaining just to sit on the bench with Mystery, watching the boy cats amuse themselves on the ramp and rails. Good times!

I have half a mind to bring some tools and lumber here tomorrow night and build improvements but am doubtful whether the local teens deserve this. Will probably do it anyway, since there are so few skateable alternatives in this town. (Note: Skateable Alternatives sounds like something I would have named a band…when I was like four.)

Later

Alarm! Alarm! I hear teens approaching in the distance. Am slinking into the bushes.

Later

Seven of your regular typical normal boring teens have arrived to skate their little park. I refuse to write another sentence about how standard, basic, average, and common they are.

—Oops.

Later

Had to resort to the sewers to get home without being seen by local teens. Did not have my sewer-diving suit with me and got home in an unspeakable state. On the upside, the stuff I scraped off my shoes and clothing has sparked a bit of a brainwave
involving the jar of liquid black rock that I brought back from my ancestral home. I know that generations of scientists in my family used the stuff in all kinds of experiments, but until now it hasn’t occurred to me (I blame the move) to try it in the duplicator project. Anyway, am getting down to work now. Will write more later.

LATER—OH MAN OH MAN OH MAN

UNBELIEVABLE NIGHT!!!!

I AM A SCIENTIFIC GENIUS!!!!!!!!!!

OK. Will slow down and start at the beginning.

That little brainwave on the liquid black rock was definitely what I’d been waiting for. Not that my success was easy. I tried this and that: dabbing the tarlike black rock on the transponder, spraying a fine mist of diluted black rock on the capacitor, hooking up an IV drip of black rock to the modulator, etc. And finally got my first good results: I soaked the motherboard in black rock, then hooked everything back up and turned on the power, flipped the switch, and BAM, I had TWO identical, living, squirming tapeworms instead of one.

Hopped around the room screeching with excitement and freaking out the cats for a bit, then made a few modifications and was about to try the device on Raven when the Oddisee’s clock started to chime—which it hasn’t done since I don’t know when. Probably the last time there was a lunar eclipse or something.
And then my mirror, my big antique mirror that Mom says has been in the family forever, started to creak like it was going to fall off the wall. So I jumped up to go hold the mirror steady, which meant that I was standing in the duplicator’s fieldframe when the clock chimed 13. And then Mystery got spooked, yowled, leaped onto the Oddisee, and was scrabbling around on it, so I reached over to shoo her off, and then CRASH the mirror went and fell on me. Glass everywhere, and I didn’t dare open my eyes because there were shards in my hair. Finally got it all shaken out—looked up—and THEN I saw her—ME—HER!!

Long black hair…black dress…MY face…MY voice saying, “What the hagflax…”

But I wasn’t talking…SHE was.

Time slowed down into weird split-second moments of wild emotions as the two of us stared at each other:

Moment of horror—

Moment of terror—

Moment of anxiety as I questioned my own sanity—

Moment of horror again as I thought about how I would explain this to Mom—

Moment of instinctive, protective, territorial rage that any other human had dared to enter MY room—

Moment of glee as I thought of all the cool pranks I could pull off with an identical twin—

ANOTHER moment of glee—

And then, “OK,” we both said, and then we both started laughing.

M
E
: Um, this is gonna sound dumb, but are you, by any chance, ME?

O
THER
M
E
: Uh, maybe. Emily Strange, right?

M
E
: Last I checked, yeah. Four cats, favorite color black, wicked bad? Etcetera?

OM: That’s me all right. Hey…mind if I just…[Reaching out to me cautiously and pinching me on the arm.]…Wow. You’re…real?

M
E
: Yeah. Are YOU?

OM: [Pinching herself on the arm.] Really Really Real, man.

M
E
: OK, what the jimjim happened?

OM: Oddisee chimed 13…

M
E
: Then the mirror crashed on me…

OM: On ME…[Both of us starting to laugh again.] So, wow, it works! I CAN duplicate people!

M
E
: Great, who’s next?

Then…it’s a little embarrassing to write about, actually, but…I mean, I’ve certainly never done anything like this in my life, but I guess we were both kind of exhilarated about what had happened, and…OK. Let’s just get right to it. We had a knockdown, bang-up, roll-around-on-the-floor GIGGLEFEST.

Right in the middle of the above-mentioned gigglefest, as the two of us were jumping like crazy on the bed and freaking the cats out and generally hyperventilating, Mom opened the door. I guess we didn’t hear her knock, what with all the hysterical
laughter. “Hey, E,” she was saying, “sorry to bug ya…Sabbath’s been eating something green, and it’s all over the kitchen floor.”

I bounced off the bed and was trying to catch my breath to introduce my twin when Mom spotted her still standing on the bed and promptly screamed a bloodcurdling scream.

Crabs! I rushed over and tried to calm her down and remind her what we promised the neighbors about screaming, but she was all like “AIIIEAIIEIIIAIIIEIIIE” and whipping her hands in the air like she does when she accidentally touches something dead, and the Other Me was sitting on the bed laughing like a crazy girl, and I could see the terror in Mom’s eyes and her total inability to process what she was seeing, and I suddenly felt kind of panicked, and hustled her downstairs to have a chat.

M
E
: Patti, it’s OK, it’s really nothing to worry about.

M
OM
: Please tell me…it was a…hologram?

M
E
: Uh…no, she’s really really real.

M: Cuz, E, you’ve done some pretty crazy stuff, I mean, it took me a while to wrap my mind around Raven being a…GOLEM, and I STILL have nightmares about her…

M
E
: Really? [Intrigued.] Good nightmares or bad nightmares?

M: [Starting to cry.] Emily…my nightmares are ALWAYS bad.

M
E
: Oh…sorry.

M: And that…girl upstairs? What is she, another golem, who looks like you, but has the mind of a…dead possum or something?

M
E
: Um, no…she’s…actually…

M: —Don’t say it—

M
E
: Me.

M: [Weeping freely.] No. Nope. Uh-uh, I can’t deal with that.

M
E
: But Patti, just THINK what the two of us could accomplish together!!!!!!

M: [Horrified expression. Fresh outburst of hysterical sobbing.] But…but we just moved here and the neighbors already hate us and NOW YOU WANT TO TELL ME THERE’S TWO OF YOU?????

M
E
: Oh, so I’m that awful.

M: [Sniffling. Backpedaling.] Oh no, E, it’s not that, you know you’re the…uh, jewel of my existence and all, but…uh, it’s just that having two of you may destroy me.

M
E
: Well, I don’t know what else to tell you. You want me to say I’ll go turn off the hologram machine and she’ll disappear?

M: Yes, please.

M
E
: [Sighing. Wishing Mom could be excited for
me on the day of my greatest achievement.] Is it enough if I just say you won’t see her again?

M:…OK, but you gotta promise me on this one.

M
E
: Fine. I promise to pretend there’s only one of me.

Cannot believe she made me promise. She never makes me promise.

Anyway, am now hanging out in the basement trying to put all this down on paper and get a grip on it. Am feeling another new emotion: mad at Mom. Believe it or not, have never in 13 years been mad at Mom. Reeeeeeally wish she could find the space in her brain to accept there being two of me. I mean, I’m ALSO having a hard time believing it’s true, but in a different way. I keep worrying that I’ll go back up to my bedroom to find out that Other Me has evaporated, or never happened at all.

I guess I could have tried to hide the truth from Mom, or make up some story instead of telling her straight out what happened, but it just didn’t occur to me.

Interesting.

Anyway.

Will go find the Other Me and let her know the developments. And see if she wants a Raven for herself.

Later

Man! I reeeeeeeeally like having an Other Me around. Here are
the top reasons so far:

1. She and I have both taken to calling each other “OtherMe,” said quickly, so as to sound a little like “Emily.” My First Nickname!!! (That I’ve liked. Much better than
   

• a. Halloween Girl
  
• b. Darkness
  
• c. Wednesday
  
• d. Doomsday
  
• e. Lilith Spookypants
  
• f. Deathily
  
• g. Vampira
  
• h. Freak
  
• i. Loner
  
• j. Riot Nrrrd
  
• k. Gothilocks
  
• l. Goth Moth
  
• m. Gothy McGothGoth.)
  

• 2. Can communicate essential ideas with a minimum of actual speaking.
  
• 3. Unlike conversations with other people, I don’t actually mind speaking to OtherMe. Have already said more to her in our first few hours together than I’ve said to most people. Ever.
  
• 4. Work on science projects ought to go twice as quickly.
  
• 5. New possibilities in advanced prankery opening up.
  
• 6. Can finally, at last, TRULY be in two places at once. Lifelong dream come true!!!!
  
• 7. Perfect built-in alibi for future mischief.
  
• 8. Cats will now have all the human real estate they need for cozy nighttime snuggling and can knock off fighting over my warm spots.
  
• 9. Am enjoying strange and blessedly false sense of being “normal” because I’m “socializing.”
  
• 10. Am enjoying seeing myself as if through someone else’s eyes. Am pleased to say I am pretty much exactly as I should be.
  
• 11. Am looking forward to 50% fewer days spent in school.
  
• 12. Can now commence setting high scores on all my video games in cooperative mode.
  
• 13. Finally have a reason to avoid getting any hideous, scarring wounds to the face. Will start wearing protection when I work with hot splattering chemicals!