Homecoming

The town where he grew up had died in a thousand ways, and every change betrayed the years he had been gone. He felt something animal growl deep within him at every offending difference. The prim white house on the corner had been repainted a garish blue. The dog that used to perch like a sentinel on the bay window of the house two doors down was gone, and a potted plant stood in place of the spaniel. When the taxi cruised up next to the curb, Seth realized that at some point in the years since he had last been home, someone had cut down the tire swing. Perhaps it had fallen on its own. For a moment he pictured it lying there, a dark shape in the shade of the oak, the sun-bleached rope serpentine in the grass. The absence of it felt like missing a step climbing stairs in the dark. 

He slid out of the back seat, pulling his suitcase behind him, and saw his mother emerge from the house. She looked drawn, weary, staring at him as if she were seeing a ghost. As if she were looking at Liam. Even from a distance he could see fresh sorrow slacken her expression, and he understood. He had largely avoided mirrors the last two days, knowing full well that the features of his twin were still plain as they had been the day he was born, eight whole minutes after Liam. In the shape of his eyes, in the gold flecks that bordered his green irises. In the shape of his ears. The way his crooked grin formed on his face. It was all there. 

The rest of the day had slipped away precipitously after the phone call from his mother, and her raw sobs reverberated in his head as he booked his flight and packed a suitcase. He had sat there on the end of the bed feeling hollow and fidgety, uncomfortable in the realization that there were fifteen hours stretching languidly between him and his flight back home. He had avoided his own gaze in the bathroom mirror, and he stared off into nothing as he contemplated whether or not to shave off the short beard that he and Liam had both, by self-same coincidence, started to grow around the same time. It would be remarkable in its presence or in its absence, he realized. Leaving it felt like the lesser evil, and the disposable razor had clattered to the bottom of the bathroom trash can. That had felt like weeks ago. 

It was a fitful night, tossing and turning in the twin-sized bed, the faded glow-in-the-dark stars staring down at him from the popcorn ceiling. He could not recall the last time he had been in this room alone. It was small, just big enough for two small beds, two small dressers, a sliver of space in between, but it had always suited them. They had grown in tandem in closer quarters than this. 

The bed opposite him lay empty, the elephant in the room. He briefly considered stepping over his suitcase in the dark to stretch out on top of his brother’s comforter, green where his own was blue. To see if his twin’s identical form had formed identical craters in the mattress, if Liam’s head left the same timeless impression on the pillow as he had done on his own. Instead he rolled on his side, feeling the wall against his knees as he closed his eyes and prayed for the reprieve of sleep. 

He had felt painfully conspicuous when the family had gathered quietly in the small living room downstairs, a parade of starchy casseroles making their way through the doors like burnt offerings to an unseen god. Mourners looked at him the same, their expressions a mix of polite sadness and horror that would have been equally appropriate as if he had walked into the room with half his body missing. 

He had been unprepared; it was the first family gathering in years where he could not telegraph a litany of unsaid jokes and remarks to his brother. The flicker of a smile as Uncle Mark cracked an inappropriate joke. A quick eye roll as Auntie Janet explained her ailments at length to a captive audience. It was a series of Morse code signals that went unanswered into the void. Dot dot dot, dash dash dash, dot dot dot. 

Sleep eluded him still. His phone, plugged in on the small night stand, held a blank email titled Eulogy. His mind had rebelled against even the idea of writing it, and he had stared at the blinking cursor for half of the plane ride before shoving it back into his pocket. There was everything to say, and also nothing. 

For Seth, the most shocking part of Liam’s death was the part he knew he could not articulate to a crowd of family and friends gathered around a plain coffin. Time kept ticking, his own life an uncertain ellipsis, the standalone survivor of a matched pair. The most shocking part of Liam’s death was that his own had not followed after an eight minute delay.