I woke up on that normal day, sighing to know that life was mistake. The sun shined into my room blinding my sight. I close my eyes again, dreaming about princesses. I’m 4 years old, and I found out something that I never knew.

“Nicole, you’re going to be late!” Mommy burst into my room carrying a pink dress I would wear that day. I climbed out of my bed, almost tripping on my gigantic teddy bear. I undress groggily and she pulled the dress over me. “There. You look just like a pretty princess.” Mommy said in her honey sweet voice, as she took my hand and led me to the sink to brush my teeth. I brushed my teeth with sour apple flavored toothpaste while my mom combed my golden locks out, nice and even. She even did my pigtails, and put pink satin ribbons on each on for me. Today, the mom who came to wake me up was my nice mommy. Daddy came to came to kiss me on my forehead, and told me I was beautiful. He gave me a piece of my favorite gum. I popped it into my mouth. Daddy was the nice daddy too. Double nice today.

I came home that day after kindergarten, and found a totally different mommy. She didn’t carry my backpack for me; she didn’t ask me how my day was. She didn’t clap when I showed her the pictures I painted for her. Her face was sad, and she made me eat green stinky vegetables. Mean mommy. Daddy came home and I ran into his big arms. He patted my headed and carried me around on his shoulder. His wore a big smile as he handed me a blue popsicle from the top shelf of the freezer I couldn’t reach, even if I stood on the table and stood on my tiptoes. Nice daddy. One meanie, one nice.

The next day, daddy went to work in a hurry. He only stopped to kiss mommy, and didn’t even look at me. I bit my bottom lip, and put my hands on my hips. I must’ve looked like I was pretty jealous, because mommy came over to hug me. “I love you. Daddy loves you too.” She said, her beautiful eyes shining. I wondered if my eyes would ever sparkle like hers. I wondered if I would ever become was tall as daddy. I wondered if I would ever be as pretty as mommy, and as strong as daddy.

I looked around the classroom at kindergarten. My brother and I were the only pair of twins. I sighed. Why were the only mistakes in this world? The only world I knew was the kindergarten and our church. And we were still the only ones.

Mrs. Teacher came up to my seat and saw my uneaten pretzels. “Nicole, Nathan has already eaten his pretzels. Why don’t you start eating yours too?” I frowned, and slid my plate over to his. I wasn’t hungry anymore.

“What do want to be when you’re bigger? She asked me, trying to amuse me.

I answered, “I want to be like mommy and daddy. I want to be normal. I want to meet myself. ” I answered flatly.

She looked at me, confused. If I could, I would go back and explain to her what I meant. Since I don’t remember her name, I’ll write it here, hoping her eyes will cross this piece of writing some point in life.
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When I was little, I believed in the weirdest thing. Nobody ever told me about it, I made it up on my own, and just believed it. I thought it was comment sense. I found out that I was the only one who knew about my strange ideas when I was in first grade.

I believed that every person had two appearances. In my understanding, due to the faces of my parents, each person had a mean soul and a nice soul. The two people would have the same exact looks, like identical twins. I couldn’t tell the difference by looking at her, but her different behavior told me everything. There had to be two mommies. I often ate dinner watching the door if the “other” mommy would make a mistake and walk in through the door. I tried to stay up late when I could, to take a glimpse of my “four” parents talking in the kitchen. I never succeeded, of course.

And because I came up with that crazy thought, I began to think that my life was a mistake. I was a real life twin, and to my disgust my twin was a boy. Not that I hate him for who he is, it is just that at that time according to my idea about my “four” parents, I had to have another self too. But I didn’t. I thought that God had made a mistake and accidentally brought my “other” self to the world. I took my brother as a mistaken version of me. Sorry, Nathan, but I really did think that at that time. That is why I cut your hair so it would look like mine. That is why I beat you up all the time. That is why I insisted on wearing matching clothes.

Maybe I was crazy. This is really confusing to think about it now, and part of me is laughing hysterically. I wonder wear my ability to think about silly, worthless things so seriously came from. I could have noticed by looking around that things like that couldn’t exist. Why would I be living in a world where I only knew half of the world’s population? Where would all the “other people” hide at night? Plus, if everyone had two selves, then everyone would know that. There would be no need to hide. But then again, if everyone showed their other self, I would feel more left out. It feels really funny putting this on paper, but I hope someone will read this and tell me that I’m not crazy.