Switched, Bothered and Bewildered

1

 
“
You want me to do
what?
”
Jana Lee Tompkins Stivers bolted upright in her
spa bed and stared at her twin. She quickly pulled
up the sheet to cover her naked breasts. Jillian
’
s in
sane request just proved that her sister had truly cracked up.

“
Jana Lee, I know I don
’
t deserve to ask anything
of you, but I
’
m completely burned out. I can
’
t bear
facing people in my office again. I
—
I stood in the lunchroom screaming like a crazy woman at the
vending machine because I got Mounds instead of
an Almond Joy. I kept hitting the damn thing with
my fists. I said terrible things to that machine. They
had to detach me from it.
”
Jillian
’
s voice cracked.

“
You should have called me sooner.
”
Jana Lee
thumped back down on the spa bed. Leave it to

her sister to take whatever peace their life had and twist it until it couldn't ever be put back into its former shape.

"I'm just not ready to go back. A week here hasn't even made a dent in my stress levels. They won't give me another day off from work. I can't stay in Serenity Spa forever. Just let me have an extra week away from work. I've never asked you for this big of a favor, ever. And it's not long. I mean, after a week at that old boring Seabridge beach house you call home I'll have my sanity back and go politely back to my office."

Jana Lee shook her head. "I could never pull it off. We can't play that old switch trick on people anymore, Jillian. This isn't like the Mike and Todd boyfriend swap for the ninth-grade Sadie Hawkins dance. It's not just two dumb boys; it's your job we're talking about. Our lives are too complicated now."

Jana Lee didn't mention the
other
switch they'd done. The switch that had created years of resentment between her and her sister; the switch that had ended her engagement to Elliot the idiot.

But it was obvious that her sister really was on the edge of some sort of breakdown. It was noticeable. Jana Lee had only seen Jillian cry three times before in their entire lives. And right now she definitely heard her sister suppressing a sob.

The minute she'd gotten the call from Serenity Spa and heard Jillian begging her to join her for a

long weekend at this place, she'd known something was up. Either Jillian was trying to mend fences between them, or she had personal reasons. Turns out it was a little of both.

"My job is like
four
dumb boys instead. Mike and Todd were harder than this would ever be! You did an
amazing
job of being me that night, remember? We can do it again. Don't make me pull a Bette Davis
Dead Ringer
thing on you."

"I'd rather be drowned by Bette Davis than take your place at Pitman Toys.
I'm
the one who'd have to do all the lying! You won't have to fool anyone. I'd never allow you to fib to my daughter, and Monty Python dog will see right through you. Your perfume is more expensive than mine. He'll want canned dog food on a regular basis the minute you show up," Jana Lee said.

"I can play you at the PTA or something. Wouldn't you love to skip out on some responsibilities for a while? Besides, we are
actresses."
Jil-lian's voice sounded so unusually desperate.

"We are
not
actresses." Jana turned her head toward Jillian to be sure she heard her clearly. "Being the Little Princesses on the
Harvey the Dragon Show when we were kids does not count, dear. I can't believe you didn't call me and tell me how stressed out you've been. What is that about? I'm
only
your twin sister, for crying out loud. I thought we'd made some progress in putting things behind us.

"I knew something was wrong back in November at Thanksgiving, but you told me it wasn't. Don't lie to me about things like this anymore." Jana Lee sat up stiffly but obediently as the spa assistant wrapped the last strip of herbal-soaked linen around her boobs. She felt... exposed ... and somewhat mummified. "I feel like King Tut," she sighed.

"That makes me sushi." Jillian
was
sushi. Jil-lian's personal spa guy had painted her with green goo and wrapped seaweed over every part of her body except her face.

"I smell way better than you do," Jana Lee said.

"True, but I'm exfoliating. I just need a little pickled ginger on the side and I'll be done," Jillian replied. "All this food talk is making me hungry."

"Try not to think about it." Jana Lee tried to relax while Sumiko, her personal spa attendant, smeared mud on her face with a soft brush. She peeked over at her sister's spa bed to see whether she was doing better at relaxing while her guy piled on the mud. Jillian didn't look very relaxed. She looked as tight as a violin string, and they weren't done with this subject, that was for sure.

"Please,
Jana Lee, I need you to help me out. I've been gone a week already. If I don't go back, or if someone doesn't go back and
be
me, I'll get fired for sure. There's this overzealous junior accounting executive witch just itching for my job. I used my extra vacation time for this year going to the

Bahamas
with that dolt I broke up with. At least I got a tan out of it."

"You'll have to tell me more about the Ron thing. I thought
he
broke up with
you?"

"It was mutual/' Jillian said flatly.

Jana Lee remembered distinctly that that wasn't the case. "I'm going to lie here and think about your request, so stop yammering." She tried to let the tension flow out of her like . . . what was it Sumiko said? Like a tropical waterfall gently flowing down upon her, while the scent of plumaria drifted around her. She was to let the images wash her stress away. Washhh.

Oh, geez, did she leave a wet load of wash in the Maytag back home? It would be a total mildewed nightmare by the time she got back from this emergency weekend with Jillian.

Maybe her daughter would drop in at home to get something, smell it, and rescue the load.

Maybe pigs would fly.

"I've left a load of clothes in the washer and they're going to mold. Everything molds in
Washington
." Jana Lee felt her mud start to harden up. Sumiko put a warm towel over the top of her head and several across her wrapped body, which felt wonderful. Maybe she could forget about laundry for once.

"Okay, I brought you here to help me feel normal again, and to give you a much deserved break, so
  
no
  
laundry
  
or
  
cooking
  
or
  
mommy-type

thoughts for one weekend. Those are the rules. Besides, you needed this as much as I did, admit it. You're letting yourself get away with something at last—a weekend of pampering at a spa. You can feel guilty about it for at least the next year. Can we heap on any more guilt? Maybe you'll guilt out and help me?"

"I can feel guilty that my evil twin sister had to pay for me to come here and keep her company while she recovered from a minor nervous collapse instead of me knowing she was in trouble."

"I'm not the evil twin, you are, r-r-r-remember?" Jillian rolled her r's and did her evil twin voice, which sounded a little like Bela Lugosi in an old vampire movie.

Jana Lee felt the thick brown facial mud crack at the corner of her mouth as she started to laugh. "Cut that out, I'm breaking up."

"It's true. You
are
the evil twin, and you know it," Jillian said.

"No, you are," Jana Lee replied through her pursed lips, trying not to laugh at their old joke. "I justzws/zlwas."

That
was true. She'd spent much of her life wishing she were more like Jillian. Jillian was pushy and brave and lived on the edge. Jillian had always had more fun and caused more trouble. She'd envied her and wanted to be more like her—if that was possible for an identical twin—that is, until Jillian had taken Elliot away from her in college, anyway.

Then she hadn't wanted to be anything like her sister anymore. But hey Jillian had suffered plenty when Elliot had cheated on her and she'd ended up divorced. Neither Jana Lee nor Jillian had seen the truth. Elliot was an ass.

And if Jillian hadn't stolen Elliot away from Jana Lee, Jana Lee might have ended up married to him, instead of to Bill. She'd learned during their short time together that Bill was ten times the man Elliot was.

She'd learned a lot about her sister, too. Jillian had spent months with them after Bill died, helping Jana Lee get back on her feet, helping Carly deal with school. That counted for a whole lot in Jana Lee's book. They'd missed so much time together while Jillian had been married to Elliot. It felt good to see Jillian reaching out to her again instead of hiding away.

Jana Lee was actually worried about Jillian for the first time in years. Her time at Serenity Spa had only unwound Jillian a few notches, not enough to cope with her high-pressure job at Pitman Toys back in
San Francisco. The truth was, Jillian was right—she was on the verge of a bad breakdown.

"I know what you're thinking. You're thinking I have more fun than you do. Well, I do. I've had so much fun I'm exhausted. That's why we're here. But the difference is I have no spa guilt. How could we have turned out so differently that way?

You know, I've never felt guilty about a facial or a massage in my entire life. How come you got the martyr gene and I didn't?"

Jana Lee waited for Jillian to answer her own question, something she did often.

"I know, I know, you're more like Mom, and I'm more like Dad. That's obvious. But you know, Bill would be happy to see you doing this. He'd want you to get on with your life. Two years of mourning is long enough."

Jana Lee felt the old familiar twinge in the pit of her stomach. Maybe two years was enough, maybe it wasn't. Jillian always knew how to push her buttons. And it wasn't that she was a martyr; it's just that she'd made different choices than her sister, and her choice had led her to being a wife and mother, and unfortunately ... a widow.

"You should talk. You're a complete workaholic. It's just as much of a strain for you to sit still and be pampered as it is for me. Look at you, you're a wreck, and you know it. Now quit it. We're supposed to be relaxing."

As soon as she said it, Jana Lee knew she'd lashed out at Jillian just because of her own pain. "I'm sorry, Jillian. You touched a nerve." Jana Lee wiggled her toes to make sure the weird body wrap she was in hadn't cut off her circulation. She sighed and breathed in the soothing eucalyptus scent to calm herself down. She wished Jillian hadn't mentioned Bill.

She looked up through the glass-paneled roof to the beautiful
California
sky above her. The heat made her feel better. It thawed out her cold bones. The steamy hot wrap and hot towels helped too.

It seemed to her that she'd been unable to stay warm for the last two years; that the absence other husband in their bed at night had left her unable to sustain any body heat at all. She often slept in her old gray sweats and his Husky sweatshirt—
Go Dawgs,
Bill's favorite college football team.

Jana Lee had kept herself silent for a while.

Jillian spoke softly. "Jana Lee, I'm sorry. You're right. And we are supposed to be relaxing. It's a rare moment for both of us, and I'm grateful we are spending time together, even if it was brought on by my nerves going haywire. I've got such a big mouth. Ignore me, okay?"

"I'm very good at that," Jana Lee said.

"I know. Actually everyone is good at it these days. Only a few people actually saw my meltdown. They all think I'm on vacation. I swear I could show up to work in a clown suit and no one in the office would notice."

"That used to work for us, didn't it? Literally. Of course
Harvey the big blue idiot dragon would get all jealous and make wardrobe stitch him up a clown hat and collar. But we're not kids anymore, Jillian. There is nothing special about us now. We're not the Little Princesses anymore."

"Speak for yourself! I'm very special. I'm still a

princess at heart, even if I did get us fired off the damn
Harvey the Psycho Dragon show. It's just that no one knows I'm a princess anymore."

A surprised Aussie voice came from behind Jil-lian's left shoulder. "You were the Little Princesses on
Harvey
the Big Blue Dragon?
You're
those
Tompkins twins? Hey, Sumiko, these are the Tompkins twins!"

Sumiko said something in Japanese to Jana Lee, then grinned and started in singing
. . .the song.
Akk.

We are happy little princesses in the land of make-believe,
we have a big blue dragon,
and he will never leave
—
because he loves us, he loves us,
and yes he loves you too.