II. Awakening
She was youthful, vibrant. He was strong, friendly, and benevolent. They were hopelessly, beautifully, impossibly in love. They always had been. You just don't see that anymore, really.
I'm not sure she ever really wanted kids. I think she would've been perfectly content to devote her life to him and only him. But he had always dreamt of having kids—boys in particular—to, you know, pass on the proud Sully name or whatever (Dad had no siblings), so of course Mom wasn't about to get in the way of that.
The two sat there, side-by-side, staring at the ground. Nora had her hands folded. Sam was drumming his fingers against the arm of his chair and shaking his leg in his usual antsy way. Nora briefly glanced at the magazines on the table, then at Sam. There was a palpable excitement in the cold waiting room, and it suddenly rose to a rapid and pungent crescendo as a soft thumping of footsteps came into earshot from the other side of the door. The footsteps grew louder and louder, ringing in the couple's ears. Sam and Nora looked up wide-eyed as the door creaked open to reveal a mousy lady dressed in pale blue medical scrubs.
"Your results are in, ma'am," said the nurse, closing the door behind her with her free hand; she pressed a stack of papers and folders to her chest as she entered. She looked at the bright-eyed pair with the air of someone about to reveal important news.
"And?" said Nora, bounding out of her chair. Sam rose too.
The woman smiled softly. "You're pregnant. Very pregnant."
There was a brief, loud pause. "Very pregnant?" repeated Sam, looking as ecstatic and confused as his wife at the nurse's words.
"Yes," said the nurse, nodding. She turned back to Nora. "Ma'am, you've got twins headed your way. Twin boys, to be exact."
Dad couldn't have been happier about the news. I assume Mom was thrilled, too, if only because Dad was.
I think she was the one who named me.
"Fine, you win. Thomas it is," said Sam, sighing in surrender, but still grinning and embracing her torso beneath the covers. "But I get to name the other one, all right?"
"Sure. What have you got in mind, honey?" asked Nora, readjusting her pillow and staring at the ceiling of their moonlit bedroom. "Pick something nice," she added teasingly, glancing down at him.
"I don't know," said Sam, pausing contemplatively. He looked up at her. "How about something like . . . Drew?"
"Drew? That's a lovely name."
"Actually, never mind," said Sam, shaking his head. There was a pause. "Maybe Josh? Josh Sully?"
"That sounds nice, too."
There was another pause, a protracted one that was finally interrupted by Sam. "You know, I've always liked the name Jake. My great grandfather was named Jake."
"Jake?" repeated Nora. She smiled somewhat. "Jake. It's okay, I suppose. Jacob then, right?"
"No, just Jake," said Sam firmly. "When I was younger, I hated when people called me Samuel. I always insisted on Sam, but nobody listened. It really got on my nerves. . . . You know," he added, smirking, "I still don't like it when people call me Samuel."
Nora giggled a bit. "Samuel is a perfectly fine name. All right, all right, Jake it is. Thomas and Jake." She looked back down at Sam. "We have lots of time to think about it, you know. We can change our minds. We can change one of the names later if we don't like it."
"Well, we're not changing Jake," said Sam defiantly.
"And we're not changing Thomas," said Nora, laughing. She kissed Sam on the head.
The final stage of reproduction is easy if you've got the money to pay for what's known as the 'no-pain procedure'. I figure Mom and Dad were pretty well off back then, because Mom told me the new anesthetic technology made the process virtually painless. The anesthesia did, however, make her feel dizzy and lightheaded as she gave birth.
"You did great, ma'am. They're two beautiful babies."
The midwife nurse held the screaming, bloody body of the just-conceived second baby in her arms. Nora could hardly make out anything in the midst of the noisy, bright blur of people and lights. She didn't even know Sam was in the room until she heard his deep voice ring through the haze.
"Jake," he said, looking at the bloody baby in the nurse's arms with a rapt expression of bliss and pride.
"Let me see him. Let me see them," said Nora absently. One of many nurses brought over Thomas and very carefully handed him over to the midwife nurse, who adjusted herself so that she cradled one baby in each arm. The nurse moved in close.
Nora inspected the babies carefully. They were identical, though it was a bit hard to tell since Jake was still covered in blood and screaming his head off.
"Sam," said Nora. He looked at her. She said softly, "Sam, they look . . . they look just like you, Sam."
I'm five minutes older than Jake. It's a fact I've always held over his head. But honestly, the way we each turned out, you'd think I was five years older than him. Or ten.
Mom never attempted to distinguish us from each other when we were very young. We wore the exact same clothing and we were given the exact same haircuts. There was two of everything, whether it was hats or shoes or toy cars or baseballs. We were carbon copies of each other. Dad finally confronted Mom about this before Christmas when we were three years old.
Her solution? She placed an order for two red sweaters, one with the letter T on it and the other with the letter J. Typical Mom. Unfortunately (for her) they messed up the order and we ended up getting just two T sweaters, one of which was slightly off-color. Mom was about to call and berate the company, but Dad told her to relax, and he took some white paint and daintily added a tail to one of the T's on the sweaters so that it resembled a J. Mom was not amused. We never wore those silly things anyway (I think Jake still keeps his out of nostalgia).
In truth, Mom never needed those sweaters.
We could've looked exactly the same every single day of every year and I'm sure everyone that knew us would be able to tell us apart.
Because for all our physical similarities, the truth is that Jake and I were really very different.