Good Morning, Little Ones!
Thank you so much to Mel and Jill!
.: Ein :.
"Izzy! Come help me unload the groceries!"
Identical pairs of hickory eyes turn in unison from the television where a plucky witch is struggling with her own domestic problems, and land on the form of the petite blonde trying to maneuver through the front door, laden with bags. The girls look at each other, holding between them the type of silent communication that is often reserved only to twins. Isla, probably the older of the girls by a total of five minutes, pulls rank.
Isabella, who in her own mind secretly believes she is actually the older twin, rolls her eyes and stands from the sofa, moving to the front door to help their mother. Isla and Isabella are identical, down to the freckles across their faces. By some strange coincidence in life, one could not get cut, bruised, or marked in any way without the other one ending up with a near identical injury only a few days later.
Despite the perfect synchronicity of the girls, Isabella and Isla are not good friends. It is on good authority that no one knows exactly which girl had been born first, and in an act of egocentrism, Isla declared herself the oldest when the girls were only eight years old.
No one but Isabella argued.
It's been nearly ten years since, and Isla has remained the accepted eldest child of the Swan family.
Isabella—Izzy to her parents, though she desperately prefers the softer Bella, which is a nickname her twin cannot share with her—heads outside to the car, ducking her head against the misting rain.
It is a miserable day, as most days are in Forks, Washington. Isabella's rain boots—hastily stuffed on as she headed out the door—squeak and squelch against the wet concrete of the walkway in front of her parents' house.
It is a nice house: small but tidy. A lot of pride has gone into the maintenance and upkeep of the yard, the trees neatly trimmed, the lawn uniformly clipped in straight rows. The bright blue shutters against the white house are due for a new coat of paint, something they will be treated to during the summer.
Isabella reaches the open back of her mother's Buick Wagon and loads grocery bags into her arms, grunting under the weight of the paper bags. She hopes they hold up long enough for her to get inside.
Isabella reaches out to the trunk, trying to slam it shut while she's still weighed down. It takes more strength than she's ready to exert, but eventually she manages to shut the door, right the groceries, and make her way back up to the house.
Though it's a misting rain, it is consistent, and by the time she gets past the bright red door, Isabella's hair is soaked and frizzy around her face.
She kicks her rain boots off in the entry before shuffling into the kitchen with her haul.
Her mother is halfway inside the refrigerator unloading bags, and barely glances up when Isabella sets the groceries on the table. "Thanks, Iz," her mother says, distracted. Isabella frowns. Her mother likely doesn't know which daughter brought in the groceries, but the credit will go to Isla. It almost always does.
Isabella turns from the kitchen, escaping before her mother can ask her to do anything else. If she wants help, she can ask Isla.
Isabella slips upstairs, retreating into her room. It is the only space in the world that is hers, and hers alone, and Isabella cherishes it for that reason. Her room is bright yellow—an attempt to drive out the shadows that gather in corners of the rooms in Washington. Her bed is small, but it's hers, and she has a light lavender bedspread over it that almost always makes her smile when she sees it. Her mother hates the color, saying it's not quite the right shade of purple to be lovely.
It's the color of pale eyelids, Renée always says. It's creepy.
Isabella stretches out on the bed now, enjoying the softness and the comfort it brings her. This room is really the only thing that fully separates her identity from Isla's.
Outside her window, the gentle mist gathers into droplets that beat steadily against the old glass. It's a sound that soothes her, and within moments of stretching over the soft cotton bed, Isabella is asleep.