Adolescence

Chapter 4

She appeared a long while later; I'd stayed on the bed the whole time, calming myself down, preparing myself, and running through my mind how I would apologise. I sat up quickly to face her. She stared at me uncertainly, but approached anyway. I stood, hanging my head in shame.

"I'm so sorry...something came over me...I didn't mean to..." It was hopeless; I couldn't make the words form and sound sincere. I felt awful, I saw her eyes were red, presumably from crying. She held a finger to my lips to silence me, and smiled.

"It's alright...I think I understand" She spoke carefully; I hoped she wasn't frightened of me now. She stroked my hair, smiling again, I tilted my head curiously.

"You do?" I asked, astonished that she'd figured it out when I hadn't. She nodded, smiling sweetly at me.

"You've never seen a teenage girl naked before so...you were curious" Her cheeks were tinged pink, and she looked out of the window as I had the previous night when she spoke. I nodded slowly, deciding this made sense, and that it had to be the reason. I grinned proudly at my clever twin.

"Yes! That has to be it!" I beamed at her, I carefully took her hand, so as not to startle her, and together we went down to our parents. We entered the kitchen holding hands as we always did, as if the events upstairs hadn't taken place. We stood at the doorway, as if waiting for them to announce us, once again the looked up at the pair of us, dressed neatly as we would always be (I had changed while contemplating on my unusual behaviour).

"What took you both so long? We're very busy you know." My mother declared impatiently. Rin and I glanced at one another, mutually agreeing not to mention our little encounter in the bathroom. Taking that as our cue, we both moved to the table at the same time, the way people expect twins to do everything. A way of reminding our parents of how close we were, we sat beside one another, closer than usual to emphasize this. We squeezed one another's hands praying for the best.

"Well we think it's time you both started sleeping in separate beds..." That was how the conversation began, the whole thing entailing the arguments we had heard the previous night about us being at 'that age', and being 'curious of one another', at which Rin and I glanced nervously at one another again. It seemed we were fighting a losing battle, but we still had our secret weapon. Rin stood up, teary eyed, and looked from mother to father very innocently, her large blue eyes filling their harsh expressions with guilt.

"Please, you can't separate us we're twins, a pair!" She whimpered pleadingly. She clasped her hands together as if in prayer; let a little sob escape from her lips to tug at their heartstrings. It seemed to be working, dad had a look of sorrow on his face at seeing his little girl in so much pain, and mom was also looking regretfully at Rin's teary blue eyes.

"Please daddy, mommy, give us a chance, if we give you any reason to separate us after this then by all means do so! But please, we've done nothing wrong, and this is like a punishment...Please!" She begged, letting the tears flow down her soft cheeks as she guilt tripped out gullible parents. I knew as well as she did she was putting the tears on, or at least exaggerating them, playing along, I kept a distressed look upon my face during the entire act, and finally with a couple of heavy sighs, our parents gave in, father first, and then at last mother as well.

"I suppose you're right...but the moment we feel something isn't right, we're separating you! Is that fair?" My mother finalized the terms and conditions of our agreement. We both nodded simultaneously and said 'thank you', as sweetly and innocently as possible, before leaving the kitchen grinning from ear to ear, we had won.