Twins

Juli eyed the paper warily. Its corner had been tucked just under the succulent on the window sill, the window with the curtains she never opened.

Whoever was doing this knew how to hurt her. She'd read the other five, which was why she wanted to throw this one away without reading it. But something held her back.

They had all been printer paper, with the thin vertical stripe that her printer put on everything. Her printer. Each page held basically the same wording, though they had become increasingly frantic and slightly threatening.

“Juli,” this one read, “get your vapid brain moving. I can see you’re in danger, why can’t you? Don’t be stupid like you were when you let him in! You’ll end up dead if you ignore me.” The paper had a phone number she didn’t recognise, and told her to press * 1 1 7 after it answered, then wait for two minutes before checking under the neighbour’s door across the hall.

Juli chewed her lip and pushed a stray dark strand of hair out of her eye. The paper unnerved her. Who was leaving these? And why did the writer seem to know her so well?

A door opened, followed by a grunt. Justin. Their apartment was small enough she knew he’d be around the corner in moments. Juli turned to face him with a smile as he appeared from the short hallway.

“Hey babe, you got anything to… what’s that?” He stopped rubbing the back of his neck and circled the grubby couch between him and her. The way he moved reminded her of a leopard stalking something.

Somewhere inside, Juli knew she should speak, but a seething fear clamped her tongue down.

Justin slid over and took the paper from her shaking hand. He glanced at it briefly, snorted, then stuffed it back in her hand.

“You writing again?” He turned around and walked into their small kitchen, foraging.

Juli heart slowed, and she latched onto that. “Yeah, new story,” she answered. “I thought I’d put you in it.” She meant it to be a gift, something nice for him. But he turned and glared at her like she had threatened him.

His face softened abruptly, though his voice didn’t lose its edge. “You’re gonna make it nice, right? Like, I’m the hero, right?” He walked towards her with a beer in his hand.

Juli could only think leopard, stalking, prey. She nodded, her words leaving her again.

Justin smiled and kissed her, hard. Juli tried to enjoy it, but he had turned and was headed for the door before she had the chance. “I don’t want you gettin’ hurt, so just stay in here. No phone calls.”

Like she had anyone to call. His back was the only thing talking to her. Then he was gone, out the door. Like every day.

Juli crumpled the paper and threw it in the trash.

~

Bright light. She was staring out the window - the one she never opened. Her heart jumped. She shut her eyes against the sunlight and the view of the distant mountains, and snapped the curtains shut.

Justin had gone, she remembered that. But nothing else.

Bleary and unsteady, she walked to the kitchen, passing by the one thing Justin had let her keep - a little black book with a pen clipped on the front. It sat alone in a small bookshelf, a gift from a teacher. Back when.

Juli shook her head and grabbed a bottled water from the fridge. Out of the corner of her eye she saw another one of those papers. It lay at the bottom of the sink. Juli glanced around, but as always, there was no sign of anyone else here.

She took another sip, then cocked her head to read it without picking it up.

“Six times! I’ve tried six times and you still won’t listen! May as well not even have a brain. If I start throwing sticks around instead of words, will you follow then?”

It went on like usual, but Juli stopped reading. A bottomless darkness opened up inside her chest, and the only thing she could see was that horrible paper. She picked it up and tore it in half, then in half again. And another tear. Another. Frantic. She was not stupid. She loved Justin. She could help him. Justin was everything she wanted.

She felt water on her face and her feet. Startled, she stopped and wiped her eyes. Dozens of shreds of paper lay on the floor, some limp and dark with water. Her t-shirt and ragged jeans had wet spots, as did her face.

Then she noticed the bottle of water on the floor. It had sprayed all over the kitchen when she’d dropped it.

Juli looked around the kitchen for the towel she knew wasn’t there. And then she sat down and sobbed into her hands.

~

A watch on her left wrist. The tiny watch face showed a colourful, smiling fish with blue and red coral for hands. A gift from her mother on her 11th birthday. Juli had forgotten it even existed. What was it doing on her wrist?

Then she noticed a cold feeling in her right hand. A handgun.

A gun? Juli dropped it and recoiled, stumbling backwards. Something took her feet out from under her and she fell with a cry. But it was only the bed.

Breathing fast, she sat up, then went to the dresser where she had been standing moments before.

A gun. In the drawer Justin always kept locked. To the left of the gun, sitting on a crumpled white shirt, was her little black book.

Justin did not write. She wasn’t sure he could even read. And hadn’t she seen this in the bookshelf earlier? She picked up the book, then piled some clothes on the gun.

Suddenly this little book felt dangerous. If Justin found her… but he wouldn’t. The bathroom. A locked door. That’s where she had to go.

Juli slipped a small elastic strap from the cover and eyed the book again. Slowly, she lifted the cover and looked at the first page.

“Juliana”. The name was hand-written, made of graceful flourishes and decorations that took up half the page. That was all. Juliana. It was the name her mother had always called her. Juli forced down a fresh wave of tears and turned the page. More writing here. Fragments of stories she had started when she was in high school. Drawings, or attempted drawings at least, of her classmates. A flower she had pressed, in memory.

Her notes ended halfway through the book. She turned the page, wishing she had written more during those years.

And then she froze. “I’m sorry I started like I did,” she read. It had been two years since Juli had seen something new in this book.

“You are so much better than me.” The writing continued. “Please forgive me. Please forgive you.”

There was nothing more. She grabbed the page, about to turn it, but stopped. There was something about that writing that nagged at her.

For a moment, she flipped back and forth between this new writing, and her old notes and stories. Then she carefully unclipped the pen. Writing just below the new words that had appeared there somehow, she wrote. She sat back on the toilet seat, her thoughts whirling.

The handwriting matched exactly.

The writing she had just done was hesitant and a little wobbly. But there were the same big O’s, the same curve to the letters, the same long, curling downstroke on the Y.

She turned the page, and read, “We have so much life left. So after you’re done forgiving us, write me a note. Then please, please save us both.”

Three minutes later, Juli cracked open the door to the apartment. She didn't have anyone to call, but she decided to at least trust herself, or her other self anyway.

She opened the door just enough to peek out. Down one way, then the other. No sound, no movement. She crept across the hall and crouched down. An envelope’s small corner was visible under the door where her fingers could just pry it out.

Inside was cash. A lot of it. Juli’ heart skipped. Twenty bills, a thousand each. She’d never seen this much money. Her heart pounded as she opened the little black book, snuck the envelope inside its back cover, then stuffed the book in her pocket.

She didn’t have a key, so she closed her apartment door. Juli knew which way Justin walked down this hallway when he came home. Heart racing, she walked the other way, trying to remember what it was like to simply walk.

As she went, the last line her other self had written replayed over and over in her head.

“There is a new life waiting for us, far away. Go find it.”