There were three of us once.
Me, Leila, and Nora.
I know that sounds like the beginning of a story told by someone who has finally made peace with the ending. But I never truly made peace with ours.
Not really.
I simply learned how to talk around it without falling apart in public.
After Nora died, people started calling Leila and me twins because it was easier for them. Easier than saying “the surviving two.” Easier than watching our mother’s face crumble whenever someone asked where the third girl was.
But Leila and I never felt like twins.
We felt like two broken pieces of something that had once been whole.
Nora was older than us by seven minutes, and somehow she carried herself as if those seven minutes made her responsible for the entire world.
She reminded us constantly.
“I’m older,” she would say, lifting her chin like she had been crowned queen of the nursery. “That means I decide.”
Leila hated hearing that.
