You didn’t know I could see you…a breath of light was playing across your face as your body rose and fell against hers…but I could.  I could see you.  With breath coming in heavy gasps and sweat dripping down across your chiseled chest, you took her.  Were you thinking of me?

    You came home early that night.  You said, once again, that you would probably be holed up in the studio, tinkering with those tracks that just didn’t seem to sound right.  You told me not to wait up for you.  For a second, for a heartbeat, I believed your story.  You had fed me the same line so many times…but that night something told me not to climb the spiral staircase that leads to our bedroom.  Something told me to drink another glass of wine and just to wait.

    Carmen came to stay with us on Friday, remember?  It had been month since I’d seen my sister…with a new job and a lateral promotion on the line I hardly had time to see you, let alone my younger sister who lived four thousand miles away.  She was tired of Europe, she said.  Too much excitement, too much focusing on sophistication and appearances.  She missed the ease of America.  I could hardly afford to drop thousands of dollars on a direct flight from Amsterdam to Los Angeles, but you…you bought the ticket at the first hint I dropped about wanting to see her again.  Twins should never be separated for so long, you said.  And you bought the ticket and the next thing I knew my baby sister was sleeping across the hall in our guest room.

    Your eyes widened when you first saw her.  Did you know that?  You tried to hide it but your jaw dropped and I could see the beginnings of arousal stirring in those pressed wool pants you were so fond of.  Those blue eyes I had spent hours staring into grew cloudy with lust and desire, and I could see your Adam’s apple rise and fall as you swallowed a gasp.  I suppose I should have taken it as a compliment.  She does, after all, look exactly like me…chestnut ringlets, wide brown eyes, lips we always said were too full…but Carmen carries herself in a different way.  She prefers satins and velvets and laces and silks to my denims and cottons and wools.  She dresses in rich tones of burgundy and evergreen, so starkly contrasted to my simple monochromatic hues.  She is, in heart and body, far more sophisticated and sensual than I could ever be.

    You always told me that you liked me just the way I am.  You had murmured into my ear as your sweaty body lay pressed against mine that you were happiest deep inside of me, and nothing or no one could take that away.  I almost believed it.

    I ignored the spark in your eyes that day.  I played it off to your irrepressible friendliness and the delicious tang of meeting new people.  I know Carmen’s eyes like my own; I can read them like a book, which is why I should have been nervous that they never met mine…but I suppose I was too oblivious and happily ensconced in my new “perfect life” that I never saw it coming.

    There was a tension in the air over dinner that evening.  You pushed your salad, drenched in dressing like always, around your plate, only lifting your fork to your lips every so often.  It should have raised red flags in my mind, not to see you shovel your entire plate down your throat like some crazed chicken, but again, I ignored it.  I sipped my wine as you laughed at Carmen’s jokes and smiled into her eyes throughout the meal.

    I feigned a headache that night as you tried to touch me.  Your skin was like fire and I could feel the hot hard length of you pressing into my back, but I ignored it.  I shut my eyes tightly when your curious fingers wandered below the elastic waistband of my comfy pajamas, and I bit my lip nervously as your hot breath caressed my throat.

    “Please…” You begged.  “Baby PLEASE…”

    You finally gave up around quarter to one.  Angrily you threw your covers off the bed and padded down to the kitchen, flinging pots and pans around in frustration, angry and hungry and going nearly out of your mind with desire.  I heard Carmen get up about fifteen minutes later, and walk quietly down the stairs into the kitchen.  The angry noises ceased, and I lay in bed, my pillow cold and wet from my own tears.  I cried because of jealousy, because of frustration, because of the utter confusion that was clouding my mind at being angry at my own sister, over what I thought was nothing.

    It wasn’t nothing.  We both know that now.

    The days danced away and the three of us, for all intents and purposes, became inseparable…not because we were such great friends, but because I was the only connection between the two of you.  We’d go to clubs, Carmen in her sheer red dress and me in my more demure black shift, and spend the evening drinking.  Carmen would try to coax you onto the dance floor and you’d gaze imploringly at me, as though asking for permission.  I would simply wave my hand at the throngs of people gyrating to the loud house music, swallowing my own tears of hurt.  Not once did you ask me to dance.  Not once did you say that you loved me.

    “I love being around Carmen, Meg…she’s such a trip.  You’re so lucky to have a twin.”

    Lucky.  The thought revolts me.

    I’d watch the two of you dance, over and over, sometimes to slow, sweet ballads, and sometimes to nasty, sexy, sinful numbers with throbbing bass and sultry guitars.  Spanish numbers.  Smoky R&B.  Your hands would play across the supple curves of her ass and your lips would be grazing the soft hollow of her throat, and all the while I told myself that you were thinking of ME.  It was I that you wanted.  Right?  Not my twin.  Not someone with my body, my genetic code, my flesh and blood…but me.

    The ride back to our house was always quiet.  You would hold Carmen’s hand in your right and mine in your left, your thumbs idly tracing patterns over our skin.  Looking at our fingers, at the contours of our wrists, it is nearly impossible to tell us apart…but I prayed fervently that you would.  You had to.  We are different, Carmen and I.

    I first heard the noises that night.  You had left our bed sometime after midnight, pulling the sheets back and kissing my shoulder apologetically.  I thought that you were going to the basement, that the muse had bitten hard and it would be yet another night of your slavery to music, and so I rolled over and closed my eyes.

    I awoke sometime later to the sound of breathy moans.  I blinked my eyes in the heavy darkness, straining to hear beyond the closed door, when a groan floated past my ears.  Deep, thick, muffled, like something was pressed against a feverish mouth…and it was coming from you.

    “Oh…”

    I swallowed hard, sitting up in bed, my body rigid with fear and my stomach rumbling with sickness, straining through the deathly clear silence to hear…

    “Mmm…”

    A female’s voice, louder this time, breathy with passion and soaked with lust.  And then, moments later, the rhythmic creaking of old bedsprings.

    When we bought this house, you insisted on bringing your old bed into the guestroom.

    “It feels more like home, baby…I can’t explain why.  We’ll get a new bed for our room, but this one has to stay…”

    Even though I chided and teased and ribbed you about that old bed with it’s creaky springs, it still found its way into our guestroom…the room that now held my sister, and, I was sure, you.

    You made love to her for hours that night.  I watched the clock blink in silence as the tears rolled down my face and I bit hard into my pillow, begging you, silently, to stop.  It was after four in the morning when you finally came back to our bed.  I shut my eyes and willed my hitched breathing to calm as you slowly walked across the floor.  Kneeling down before me, you planted the most chaste of kisses across my forehead, tracing the outline of my lips with your index finger.  I could smell sex, heavy and acrid, on your body, and through squinted eyes I could see your lips, swollen and bruised from her kisses.

    “I’m sorry, baby,” You whispered, though you thought I couldn’t hear you, “I’m so sorry…”

    With that you crawled into bed beside me, drawing me into the circle of your arms and pressing your body tightly to mine.  Bile rose up in my throat and my stomach clenched hard as I caught her scent clinging to your arms, your hair, your body.  My sister.  My family.  Betrayed me.

    It continued for days that way…always the same lame excuses, and your hasty departure just after midnight.  After the third day you didn’t even bother to be discreet; you’d just jump out of bed and walk confidently to her room.

    But THAT NIGHT…that had been the worst kind of torture.  As I waited for you, in our bedroom, wearing the sheerest blue nightie in hopes of enticing you once again, you were downstairs…on our couch…with her.

    I watched the two of you…the way your strong, lean back moved with a dancer’s grace over hers…the way you bit your lip as she stroked you…your head thrown back in ecstasy as you finally sank down into her depths…and the rhythmic, frantic slapping of flesh on flesh.  You attached your lips to her breast, moaning and panting and groaning freely as she begged you to take her higher…and you obeyed.  It seemed like an eternity, watching the two of you as you waded more deeply into pools of erotic bliss…Finally, it was over and you came, arching your back and moaning long and low, like you had done with me.  The tenderness in your embrace as you held her against your sweaty, spent body broke my heart.  I couldn’t watch anymore.  I fled from the room and ran to our balcony, where I sat for hours.

    I left a note on our bed…

    Baby, went out for a bit.  Hope you had fun at the studio.  See you tonight…

    I watched from behind the shadows as you read it, before showering and slipping into your nightclothes.  I said a silent prayer that I would have enough resolve to carry out my plan.

    I woke you just after four AM, brushing a soft kiss across your torso, teasing your nipples with the tip of my tongue.  You opened your eyes sleepily, sitting up abruptly, trying to orient yourself to your surroundings.

    “Carmen?”  You mumbled, half-incoherently.

    I nodded, wearing the red lace teddy I stole from my sister while she lay sleeping.

    “Baby what are you doing here?  Meg’s gonna be home any second…” You stuttered, as I slowly untied the strings at the front of the silky garment.

    “I don’t care,” I whispered throatily, matching my voice to that of my sister’s.  “I just need you again…so bad…”

    “Unnnhhhh…baby…we can’t…”  Your skin gleamed softly against the pale light of the moon, and I could see your muscles twitch nervously at the sound of my voice.

    “Why not?” I asked seductively, the fire of rage and desire burning in my voice as I took a step closer to you.  “Don’t you wanna be a bad boy?”

    I could see your pupils dilate even in the dim light, your pink tongue darting out to lick already parted lips.

    “I told you, honey…we can’t do this…what we have is great…but…I love Meg….”

    I almost stopped right there.  I almost stopped and went into your arms and begged you to forgive me for such deceit, but I didn’t.  I wanted to see how far you would go.  Love, to me, means fidelity.  I wanted to know what it meant to you.

    “But don’t you want me, baby?” I breathed softly, watching the bulge in your boxers grow steadily more pronounced.  Slowly, like a cat, I walked over to you, sitting daintily on your lap, laughing quietly as you moaned into my hair.

    “Carmen…god…baby….what you do to me…”

    “Right…” I coaxed, a hint of venom tainting my words.  “Let Carmen make everything okay…”

    I kissed you then, slipping my tongue between your parted lips, swallowing your groan whole, biting and nipping and sucking at your lips and chin and jaw.  A shudder rippled through your body as your hands went to my hips, and I could feel your hardness pressed urgently against me.
 
    “Carmen…” You groaned again, and I felt my body fairly tremble with lust and rage and desire.  You guided yourself into me and I began to ride you, watching you as you gasped for air, your hips pounding frantically beneath me.

    “Say my name,” I spat, and your eyes snapped open, in shock and hazy desire.

    “Carmen…” You moaned, your pace growing more frenzied.

    “Say my NAME,” I repeated, feeling my own orgasm building, despite my fervent attempts to quell what your body always does to me.

    “Carmen,” You gasped, eyes boring into my own.  The sudden dominance excited you, I could tell, lust written clearly all over your beautiful, deceitful face.

    A second later and the annihilation began, my body spinning and spiraling and falling into an out-of-control pleasure vortex.  I could feel you bucking beneath me still and I pressed hard on your hips, stopping your movements almost completely.  Sitting bolt upright and shoving hard on your chest, you fell backward onto the bed, slipping out of me in the process.  A stunned look filled your eyes as you reached for me, but I stood up and shimmied out of reach, watching you for a reaction.

    “My name,” I said evenly, as your body teetered on the precipice of Armageddon, shaking and shuddering and begging for release, “Is MEGAN.”

    And I walked out.

    It’s been weeks since we’ve talked, despite your fervent pleas for me to return your calls.  I have not spoken a word to my sister, though I learned through our mother that she returned to Amsterdam.  Sometimes, as I look out the window of my newly-leased apartment, the one with a view of the house we used to live in, I wonder what I could have done differently to change this whole muddled scenario.  I wonder if the love I thought we had was never as strong as I had hoped and prayed and dreamed it was.  After all, it was shattered by merely an image, a reflection of someone not unlike myself, but nothing like me.  Maybe, as my friends constantly remind me, you really didn’t love me, and would have taken the first piece of ass that came along.  It just made it easier that THAT piece of ass looked like me.  I’m tired of worrying about it.  I’m tired of wondering and turning possibilities over in my exhausted mind.  I’m tired of looking in the mirror and wondering how to change the reflection.  In the end, all I see is me.  And all I wanted was you.