I recall a friend of mine once telling one of his children, "In our family, you don't inherit something from your father's side or your mother's side, you either inherit something or you don't." While his statement best explains his own family's complicated history, I apply a diluted version to my own family. Spending most of my young life inside a home with three other people who look just like me, I was surprised the first couple times I met people who weren't part of my family. The concept that there were people who didn't have green eyes and oily wavy brown hair struck me as foreign for a long time, but as I grew up and was able to remember more and more, I realized diversity was something important to the society that I rarely experienced.
As I said before, my family and I hardly ever left the house we lived in. While our parents did eventually explain to my brother and me when they deemed us old enough to understand, I had learned the truth through my own observations before they told us. One day when I was three I was wondering through the garage when I came across a box labeled "Smuggled stuff." I was afraid of what could be inside, but I summed up the courage to open it, and it was full of toys, video games, and photo albums. An album under an old green toy dinosaur with blue spikes and red eyes caught my attention. I removed the old dinosaur toy that must have not been played with in years since it was so dusty, and I didn't recall my brother or me ever owning this kind of dinosaur, to get the photo album that caught my attention.
I looked inside the albums, and at first it seemed as if they were baby pictures of my brother and me because the infants in the photos wore the same pink undershirt and turquoise overshirt that we used to wear as babies. The first thing that helped me identify who were the individuals in the photos was the fact that the quality of the photos was something that dated back to before my brother and I were born. Also, there were photos in other albums that looked like my parents and their friends in their preteen and teenage years. As I put everything back in the box, I came to the conclusion that my parents knew each other since they were kids.
About a year later I discovered some more evidence to back my parentage theory. One night I was having trouble sleeping. I got out of bed and walked through the dark hallway to the half-opened door of my parent's room. As I got closer to the door, more of the hallway became illuminated with the light from the lamps they had turned on inside. I didn't want to bother them because I knew they would be just as exhausted as I was, but I didn't know who else could help me.
I didn't expect to hear moaning sounds and heavy breathing when I reached the door, but I did. I was about to open the door when I caught a glimpse of what was occurring inside my parent's room, and nothing could have prepared me for this moment. I looked at the foot of the bed and saw the naked body of my father thrusting on my mother. I quickly turned away and hid behind the door, but I could still hear my parents inside their room.
As my parents continued, my mother moaned, "Oh brother!"
At first I thought she was referring to the expression that signifies astonishment with something, but then my father stopped kissing my mother's neck and cleavage and replied, "Oh brother? Oh sister!"
I stood behind the door, I didn't move because I was in shock of what I had just witnessed. I eventually broke out of my trance, and the first thing I thought of after that was getting back to mine and Bill's room. I ran back to our room, jumped into my bed, and buried my head in my pillows. I lied there contemplating what I had seen for at least a few minutes before I heard my parents' voice outside my room. I stayed still when I heard the door open, as to not give my parents the idea that I was awake. This turned out to be a great choice as I soon heard my father and mother talking.
"See, the kids are asleep," said my father to my curious mother.
"Okay, but I saw a small body run from the door, and I heard footsteps going in this direction," my mother said, replying to my father's observation.
"You're just imagining things," said my father as he shut the door before presumably going to sleep.
After that event, I didn't seem to have a need to go to sleep. I just sat in my bed thinking.
The final piece of evidence to back my theory came about a year later as well. I had just finished a book, and I was waiting for my Aunt Kimi to send me the sequel from her law school. Even though I had finished an entire book, I had an urge to read everything. I had finished reading everything that was out in the open in the house, so I went looking through closets and drawers to find any interesting text. I made my way to my parent's room and started looking through a drawer in their dresser. At the bottom of that drawer I found some hand-written notes, all written by my father. This one note in particular was dated Monday, June 14, 2004, and I can still remember what it said.
"My precious Lillian, it hurts me to say that I feel we have been growing apart in the last couple years. I feel as if this is somehow my fault. Maybe if I didn't anger you all the way back then, I wouldn't have driven you away. Driven you into the arms of Diane, Leslie, and, uhh, Brett. I hate them, I hate them all! I know they got into your head and made you move out of our room. It was at that moment that I truly understood the saying 'You don't truly miss something until it's gone.' Wally breaking up with me didn't help either. It was our breakup that made me realize that I was trying to substitute you with her. All the love and affection I gave her, was really for you. But, what I hate more is now that we're entering high school, you will surely grow even farther away from me. You are turning into a woman, I, a man, and that's what makes me want you even more. These kinds of thoughts have been in my mind for years now, all throughout middle school, I don't even see them as wrong anymore. Since I know that you'll never get to read these letters, they are really just for me to release my deepest secrets and desires, such as, every night I sleep with a pillow in my arms. I like to kiss it and pretend it's you. You'll never know how much I love you. I fear I love you so much that it clouds my judgment. I don't know what it is inside me, but I always manage to scare or gross out every boy who shows a bit of interest in you. If you ever catch on to me, I just want you to know that I can't help it. I love you Lillian Marie Jill DeVille. Love, your twin brother, no, your true love, Phillip Richard Bill DeVille."
I put the note on my lap as I was sitting with my legs crossed on the floor as I read the note. I thought about what I had just read, although I should say that my book did help "desensitize" me to these kinds of "twisted" and "demented" relationships. All I could think of was that I had the final piece of evidence to conclude that my hypothesis was correct. Also, I was still pretty young, but I had heard a bit about how people psychoanalyze writings, and I wanted to do that with this. I had no formal training at the time, but I theorized that my father was in some kind of depressed state, along with also being deeply angry and even very possessive when he wrote this note, in other words, all over the map.
I decided to look over the note again, just to make sure I had read it correctly. I sat there on the floor reading the note, I was so intrigued that I didn't notice my parents walk into their room.
My father asked in a worried tone, "What are you reading, Jillian?"
I brought the note down from my face, walked over to my father, and hugged him.
"Don't worry daddy, I still love you," I said with my head buried between his legs.
I looked up to see my father looking at my mother, the look in their eyes signified that they had been dreading this day for a long time, luckily they had each other. The look must have also signaled my mother to go get Bill, because while my father picked me up and sat me on his lap while he sat on his bed, my mother left the room and returned with Bill. I handed my father the note, and he reviewed it before speaking to us. Both of us were seated on our parent's laps when they tried their hardest to explain this to us. All of this was much easier for me to take in since I had suspected it for years already. I still remember the confused and rather scared look on Bill's face while he heard every word our parents said. My brother and I walked into that room with a mom, dad, and twin, but we came out with an aunt, uncle, and cousin as well.
