All-in-One-Complete

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin., how you don't really finish each other's sentences. You don't read each other's mind. It's simply that in all your life, there has been a single minute, a full count of sixty or so, when you didn't know him, and you can't help but know what's going to come out of his mouth when you've been that close, that long. All of your life. You've been there for every story that comes out of his mouth. You've heard those stories so often that you know when the punch-line is going to be, where the dramatic pauses are. You can't read his mind.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, that you don't like to be called "the twins," you're FredandGeorge, or Fred and George, or just Fred or just George, thankyouverymuch. You have names, and it isn't really that funny when someone laughs that they can't tell you apart. It doesn't work that way, you both could tell them, in identical pitch and phrasing; we get to say it, you're just an idiot. A twin is a unit, a partnership, all-in-one-complete.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, that you don't always know what the other is thinking. You don't live in their head, you don't have that connection, although that doesn't take away how much it hurts when someone says: You're twins. You should have known. Why didn't you know. Because even though you're separate people, you're a partnership, you've got your own name, you're all-in-one-complete, you didn't know.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, and now you don't either.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, and you wonder if you ever really were. Surely if you really were a twin, all-in-one-complete, you would have known. Known when those first curses hit him. Known when his heart stopped. Yet you didn't: You should have known. But you didn't. It took you three days to even imagine that something was wrong. Even longer to realize that the part of you that was him was real, was physical, and you're missing a limb as surely as if one had been cut off.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, that when he is with you, it is a different feeling than being with anybody else you've ever known. Different from the laughter you share with Ginny, the smile your mother gives you, the pride that your father feels for both of you. With him, you're complete in a way that has no words, no need to even look for them, you're simply all there. All you. You talk faster and nobody can keep up with the way your mind works, so much better as Two than One, and the conversation belongs to the two of you. You look at each other and don't even need to speak before the both of you burst out laughing. I know exactly what you mean.

Nobody knows what it's like to be a twin, and when you stand alone, for the first time in your life, and count the minutes to add to that first minute of your life, before you knew him and now that you don't know him anymore, you find yourself slowly forgetting.