You know how some people say that their deepest, darkest secret is this or that? Others claim that they don't have one. Well, I do. Mind you, it's not dark, not at all. It's a bit odd, but that's okay.
Well, maybe it's more than odd...actually it's quite scary. To other children, that is. Because of it, I'm known as the 'freak', the 'liar', the 'idiot', nearly anything that's not very good. I'll tell you if you don't laugh at me. Okay?
Here it is: I can stop time. There, I told someone, something that I don't do very often. Telling people that I could stop time only got me into trouble. My parents don't even believe me. The only person that believes me is my twin sister. Know why that is? She can do it too. Weird, huh?
Anyway, I'm Cindy, and my sister's name is Samantha. We're identical twins, with pale blonde hair that reaches the middle of our backs and bright blue eyes. We're eleven and four foot ten inches. Although both of our parents wear glasses, neither Sam nor I do. Luckily, we've also never needed braces.
My favorite color is pink, and Sam likes yellow, but we prefer pastel shades of them both. Sam and I play basketball and soccer, and make straight A's. I think before I act, and Sam jumps into things. Unfortunately, I didn't think about what would happen if I made it known that I could stop time.
On that subject, the time stopping comes in handy. I don't ever have homework, because I do it as soon as I get it. I just think, I want to stop time, everything freezes, and I get it done.
Sam does it too. I know because I'll be in the middle of class, and then I'll be the only one moving, even though I didn't want time to stop. Now I know that I can stop time for Sam, and she can stop it for me.
Time stopping is also useful when I want more sleep, or need more time to get ready. My classmates wonder why Sam and I don't have to get up at six to get ready, and why we don't ride the bus. Well, we wouldn't ride the bus anyway, because we live about ten minutes away from our school, walking.
Now that Sam and I are in middle school, time stopping really comes in handy. I would never finish my class work and homework without staying up too late. It also makes research projects so much easier, because I can work on it for hours during a forty five minute class.
That's another reason why kids don't like Sam or I very much. We always get our work done, when they don't. We raise the bar for everyone else, but I don't care, and I know that Sam doesn't either.
Everything changed when Sam and I got our letters. Last week, two owls flew up to our window. Sam opened the window for them, and one flew to her and the other flew to me. They each had a letter tied to their leg. Both of our letters said the same thing: We'd been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Of course, my first thought was, What? Well, Sam had the same reaction, not surprisingly. Anyway, a couple seconds later, we heard a soft pop, and someone knocked at our door. I opened it for a man with a long white beard and who clearly didn't have any fashion sense. Behind me, Sam was having trouble suppressing a giggle. I wasn't worried, because if anything went wrong, Sam or I would stop time and get to safety.
He smiled and said, "Ladies, may I come in?"
What else could I say? "Sure," I backed up and let him come in.
"Ah, I see you've received your letters."
"Pardon?" I was thoroughly confused. How did he know about our letters?
"Oh, excuse me. I'm Professor Dumbledore, Headmaster at Hogwarts. You two ladies will hopefully be attending."
"Hello Professor. I'm Cindy Houston, and that's Samantha."
"So this isn't a joke?" Sam had finally regained and was staring at the professor like she would a boy at our school; not in a good way.
"No, this isn't a joke." Professor Dumbledore didn't seem the slightest bit offended. In fact, he looked rather amused.
"Where is Hogwarts?" I asked. The letter hadn't said anything about that."
"Ah, it's hidden. Your parents won't be able to see it. They're what people in the Wizarding world call "Muggles". It just means that they can't do magic."
I glanced at Sam, and said, "Professor, I think there's been a mistake. I can't do magic..."
"Really? I understand that you both have the rare ability to stop time?" Sam and I nodded, and he continued "Therefore, you both are witches. No Muggle could stop time."
"Oh..." At that moment, our parents walked in, and Professor Dumbledore explained everything to them. They were extremely excited, and they gave each Sam and I a bunch of money to buy whatever we needed. They told us that if it wasn't enough, they'd give us more. Later, Sam and I talked about it, and we decided that they were just happy to get rid of us. We knew that they had plenty of money, and they even started talking about adopting a little girl. Sam and I were fine with this, but it felt weird. We hadn't even left yet, and our parents were already replacing us. They had, however, agreed to take us shopping the next day, and while we were out, they'd pick up some stuff for our new little sister. Sam and I stayed up late that night, and she finally slumped off to her room, and I fell into bed.
The next morning, we woke up to find our parents had left early. They left us a note saying that they would be back, and that we needed to fix breakfast for ourselves. We did, and while we were eating, the phone rang. I answered it, and got another huge surprise. Sam kept asking who it was, but I waved her off. After I hung up, I turned to her and told her everything. It had been a lady from America calling about the little girl our parents wanted to adopt. She said that they had been looking to adopt this girl for almost a year, and they finally could.