"Jeanelle! Would you please get off the phone and pick up all your crap?!" I snapped. There was absolutely no place whatsoever to walk, or even move, in this bedroom. Flip flops, makeup bags, and bathing suits completely covered every square inch of the carpet. Tank tops were draped across chairs and lampshades. Even my old navy sweatshirt from summer camp three years ago was buried under a pile of beach bags and shampoo bottles. I could just barely make out the fuzzy white hood from underneath it all. There was absolutely no way I was going to be finding my phone charger in this mess. I could've probably set a bomb off in here and it would've been cleaner.
I kicked an old pair of someone's denim shorts into the closet and slammed the door impatiently. Jeanelle, sitting cross legged across the room on the floor, jumped and dropped her silver-covered phone in her lap. She turned and glared at me. I just crossed my arms and leaned casually against the closet door frame like I had nothing better to do than watch my sister talk on the phone for six hours when we were supposed to be packing.
"We only have an hour, Nel! Come on! Will can wait two hours till we get to the lake, okay?! It's not gonna kill him!" One week into summer and Jeanelle's already spending every second of her free time on the phone with her stupid boyfriend. If she's using up all our minutes, I'm not gonna be happy.
Jeanelle rolled her eyes at me and turned back to her phone conversation. I threw a black flip flop at her head and missed terribly. It bounced off the bright purple walls (that desperately need to be repainted, it's only been fifteen years...) and landed right in my dirty laundry basket. Not exactly surprising. I've never been good at that stuff; shooting, aiming, scoring...not for me. That's Jeanelle's thing. She's all Mrs. Softball slash Soccer slash Lacrosse slash Swimming slash Track slash Every Sport Available to Freshmen. I much prefer my spot at the top of the pyramid, with fourteen other cheerleaders in tiny black and blue uniforms underneath me. All I have to do is smile big, look pretty, and pray to God my teammates will catch me when I twirl back down into their arms. But I have nothing to worry about, really; they always catch me. Clifton has been in regional competitions for years, and I'm not looking to change that anytime soon. Plus, there's always the benefit of being the center of attention all the time. And I adore that. The only time Jeanelle does is when she scores goals and wins games. Other than that, she's happier in a huge group of people. Sometimes I forget we're even related....
Jeanelle scoffed sarcastically at my pathetic miss, picked up a blue eyeliner pencil off the floor, and began drawing a tiny blue heart on her cheek.
"I knooow," she said into the phone. As much as I hated to admit it, she sounded a lot more like me at that moment than I care to explain. She scooted forward a smidge and examined the minuscule blue blobbish thing on her face. Somehow she must have felt my eyes burning a hole through the back of her head, because she turned around slowly and held up one finger pleadingly. All patience had drained from by body; I glared back at her. Once again, my frustration was ignored and she leaned in closer to the mirror, this time holding MY black eyeliner in her hand, drawing a tiny star on her other cheek!
"Aw, I'm gonna miss you too!" she cooed. I threw my hands up in the air, exasperated. Ignored. Again. Jeanelle was totally lost in her sappy phone conversation and facial geometry. I'd all but given up on getting through to her about packing before Dad ripped both our heads off and left them to rot in the yard while the rest of the family was off at beautiful Lake Winnepesauki for two weeks!
"Fine, Nel," I said, pulling HER white tank top right out of her open suitcase and pulling it over my messy-ponytailed head. My suitcase, hot pink and had been stacked with clothes for a week, sat zipped up and ready to go on my bed. Hers was open, one step up from empty, and lay on the floor beside her, dead as ever.
"I'm not dealing with Daddy when he finds out you were on the phone for an hour and not packed. He's all yours." I felt like a little kid, talking to her like that, but it gave me some sense of satisfaction, and that was enough for me.
To prove my point, I dragged my suitcase off the bed and started rolling it over towards the door. Naturally, before I had even taken my third step, I tripped over my flip flop and ran right into my nightstand. A gigantic stack of Vogues and Seventeens toppled to the floor, and I had to drop my suitcase on the floor and grab my fifty year old antique lamp to keep it from falling off and meeting its long-awaited death. Jeanelle snicked quietly from her corner. I put my hand on my hip, blew my brunette bangs that had somehow escaped the twelve hundred bobby pins on my head out of my face, and counted to ten.
When most people think of twins, they think of cute little girls in pigtails and matching pink outfits, getting their names confused and mixed up almost as much as they breathed. Jeanelle and I have always hated that stereotype, because although we're twins, basically the only things we share are our bedroom, birthday, and last name. Other than that, we might as well have been two completely different girls from two completely different families.
We're not identical, so if you know us, its not too hard to tell us apart. For one thing, my hair's always curly or scrunched, and Jeanelle's is usually straight if its not in some kind of ponytail or messy bun. I have fake nails, currently painted bright yellow. Jeanelle chews her nails off. I wear pink. Jeanelle wears blue. I don't see it as much, but people tell us I'm more outgoing. I guess that seems obvious, since I'm always out somewhere or with someone while Jeanelle's at one of her six hundred sporting events. But then again, I'm also the one without the boyfriend. Not that I want one; I've been down that road four too many times my freshman year, and I would just love to forget it. Which is half the reason I'm so excited for this vacation. Lots of cute guys with their shirts off at the lake!
Anyway, it's been an hour since I finished packing, and twenty minutes since Jeanelle started. Mom eventually found her on the phone with Will and grabbed her charger right out of the wall, so her phone died within ten minutes. I respectfully took that opportunity to leave the room and go downstairs to the kitchen and make myself a pancake, as I was trying to swallow my laughs.
"Tay!" Jeanelle breathed, dragging her suitcase down the stairs, "I can't carry this fricken thing down all these stairs by myself! Help me!"
I glanced up from the syrup bottle I was studying and smirked. She was struggling down the stairs with her gigantic black suitcase bumping down behind her, very nearly about to run her over and send them both sprawling down the stairs. I could see something orange sticking out; probably a bathing suit, since Jeanelle didn't own anything else orange. It was too "preppy" in her opinion.
I was feeling rather daring; so I whipped my phone out of my pocket and pretended to call someone. "Hello? Oh hey, how's it goin? Yeah we're leaving soon..." I got up from my seat at the table and walked into the living room, leaving Jeanelle stranded on the stairs with a bewildered look on her face. I walked in circles around the coffee table, having a conversation with myself, and eventually wandered back into the kitchen. Jeanelle hadn't moved; except now, her arms were crossed and she was glaring at me. I said an extremely fake goodbye, closed my phone, and put it on the counter. It was absolutely killing me not to smirk. Jeanelle sat down on the stair behind her. I sat back down in my chair. Two seconds went by, and then Jeanelle cracked a smile. I stared at her, trying my hardest to keep my face blank. This is how it always went with us - one of us did something stupid, the other rubbed it in her face, and then the one that originally did something stupid made a joke of it so we would forgive each other. Sometimes it was a good thing; now it was just annoying.
I cocked my head to one side and continued staring at my sister. She crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue. That was it; I was cracking up.
"Jeanelle, you suck," I said, shaking my head and getting up to leave.
"Yeah I know, thanks," she said with a smile, "and you know what else?"
"What?"
"You suck at faking phone calls."
I walked out the front door to the driveway, still shaking my head.
"Tay!" she yelled again.
"What!?"
"I still need help getting my bag down the stairs."
Lake Winnepesauki is only about 2 hours away, but when you're sitting in a Highlander with Jeanelle's iPod blasting in your ears right next to you, an annoying twirp of a twelve-year-old sister that won't shut up about her new AP astronomy class, and two parents who can't for the life of them agree on which exit to get off of, it seems like 10. I pinned my bangs up (again!) and changed my playlist to one that could at least attempt to drown out Jeanelle's ridiculous We the Kings crap. Some old Taylor Swift song came on. Next. Lifehouse. Nope. Pussycat Dolls. Hmm. I turned up the volume and leaned back in my seat; my eyes closed slowly and I pictured myself lying on the beach in my new pink polka dot bikini and Chanel sunglasses, getting stares from every guy that walked by. Mmm...
"Okay guys, don't go anywhere; we have an entire car to unload here," Dad said, already sounding impatient as he turned off the engine and unlocked all the doors. I shoved my iPod into the pocket of my white shorts, pulled my sunglasses down onto my face, and stepped out. It was sunny, and really warm. My flip-flopped feet crunched on the gravel driveway as I walked around the car to the trunk. Mom and Dad were already back there, unloading suitcases and buckets of beach towels and sand toys. Jeanelle was asleep in the back seat, her iPod still blaring as she breathed. And I hadn't the slightest clue where Rebecca had run off to. A millimeter of a second later, she came running out from the back of the teeny white cottage in front of me, smiling like a Cheshire cat.
"Guys!" she yelled, sprinting across the driveway, "there's a wicked nice porch in the back with no trees blocking the view! It's perfect for sighting Orion!"
I rolled my eyes and grabbed my tote bag and suitcase out of the back of the car. Typical Rebecca. If she wasn't spewing off random scientific facts, she was droning on about sightseeing and worshiping the ground we walked on...basically, things nobody cares about. Personally I would love to just LOOK at the pretty stars, and not have to listen to an endless stream of "fiery balls of light" facts for hours on end. It pretty much kills the whole effect, if you get what I'm saying.
"Don't you roll your eyes at me, Miss Priss," Rebecca snapped, glaring at me from under her dorky oval glasses. I turned on my heel and tried to throw darts at her with my eyes. Didn't seem to work, 'cause she just stared back at me with a satisfied expression on her face. "Don't blame me because all you know about astronomy is that stars are fiery balls of light..." she murmured. I opened my mouth to respond, but Mom butt in before I could get out a single syllable.
"Rebecca, enough. Get your stuff and go in the house, please," she said, sounding rather tired. I smiled at both her and Rebecca.
A door slammed, and Jeanelle stumbled out of the car, still looking groggy and half asleep.
"Mom, Taylor is being rude!" Rebecca pouted, putting her hands on her hips and looking at my mother. Mom totally ignored her, grabbing a huge basket full of beach towels and carrying it to the huge front porch. Rebecca, completely unabashed, pulled her "pocket sized" guide to the constellations out of the back pocket of her cargo shorts and started walking back towards the front of the car, her head completely buried in the tiny little book. "According to this manual, the constellation of Orion was first discovered in-"
Jeanelle, apparently having no patience for these kind of annoyances this morning, abruptly stuck out her foot and sent Rebecca sprawling into the dirt. I choked back a laugh as Rebecca fell to her knees with a muffled screech, dropping her precious constellation book on the ground beside her.
Jeanelle quickly turned around, grabbed a few bags of groceries out of the trunk, and started speed walking towards the cottage. I took her hint and hurried to catch up with her, dragging by eighty pound pieces of luggage behind me.