Twelve Nights (5 page)

As she drove out of the remnants of Atlanta traffic and
headed west on I-85, Aggie wondered again what her sister was up to. She knew
Angela must have a plan, but she couldn’t imagine what it would be. Still the
outfit was nice. She’d take Andrew to a movie and dazzle him when she got home.

“Dad!” Angela screamed out the window as the car pulled into
the driveway.

Their father was picking up magnolia buds from the front
lawn. He stood up and dropped the kitchen tongs that protected his fingers from
the sticky cones.

“Blossom!” he called out his old nickname for the slightly
older twin. He hurried to the passenger side of the car and pulled open the
door. Angela jumped into his arms and they danced around the front yard in an
ecstatic hug.

“I’m here too, Dad,” Aggie reminded them.

Still holding Angela’s hand, Gordon Trout turned to his
other daughter.

“Peach Fuzz!” He opened his arms. Aggie stepped stiffly into
the embrace, then melted as her father’s free hand rubbed up and down her back.

“I can’t believe you’re both here,” he crowed. “Let’s go
inside. I’ll get you a drink.”

At sixty-three, their father was still in excellent physical
condition, his back straight and his hair a thick silver thatch. Aggie looked
at him proudly as he turned to lead them up the stairs to the front porch. Then
he stumbled and she glanced at her sister, who shook her head. He righted
himself and held onto the railing as he climbed the rest of the stairs.

“Damn things,” he muttered, glaring at the stairs and
smiling at his daughters at the same time. “Always trip me up.”

Inside, the house was immaculate and untidy at the same
time, spotless wherever their father hadn’t managed to drop something since
Mary had cleaned.

“What can I get you girls?”

“I’ll make a pot of coffee, Dad,” Aggie offered.

Angela nodded. “I just want coffee.”

“I’ll call Mary, then. I know she’ll want to come right over
and see you. She’s cooking a turkey.”

“Thanksgiving at home,” Angela smiled. “What a treat.”

Aggie glared at her sister behind her father’s back. This
sweetness and light bit was not Angela. The older twin smiled back as their
father left the room. Even her eyes were laughing, Aggie noted suspiciously.
Angela took a sip of coffee, her finger crooked in the air in a C.

“I’m going to run over and pick Mary up,” their father
announced as he walked back into the room. “You girls make yourselves at home.”

“We will,” Angela smiled. “Take your time.”

After the door closed behind their father, Angela put down
her coffee mug and stood up from the sofa.

“Time to get to work,” she announced as she dragged her
sister up by the elbow.

“What do you mean?”

“Let’s change while he’s out and we’ll try the twin thing
when they get back.”

“I won’t let you be nasty to Mary.”

“I like Mary,” Angela insisted. “I just want to see if we
still have the old touch.”

Angela hugged her sister.

“Please,” she begged.

Aggie shrugged her shoulders and dislodged her arms.

“Okay,” she sighed. “I just wish I knew what you were really
up to.”

The two sisters walked arm in arm down the hall toward their
old bedroom, bags in hand. Angela went straight to the ensuite bathroom and
scrubbed the makeup off her face. Aggie opened the bags and pulled out the new
clothes. Within a minute, she was changed.

“This is a nice outfit,” she commented as she turned in
front of the mirror. The gray pants hugged her hips then fell in a straight
line to the floor. The sweater clung to her breasts then draped softly. The crochet
flowers on the shoulders emphasized her straight posture, the reward of twelve
years of ballet.

“You look good,” Angela commented as she emerged from the
bathroom. She quickly stripped and put on her matching clothing. Then she
walked over to the mirror and stood beside Aggie.

“Who are you?” she teased her younger twin. It was an old
joke.

“I don’t know,” Aggie responded as per formula. “Who are
you?”

The young women turned and surveyed their bodies. Aggie
reached up her arm and Angela mimicked her movement. Aggie smiled and reached
down to put her right hand on her left knee. Her sister followed. Smiling,
Aggie contorted herself every which way and giggled as her sister struggled to
follow.

“Enough!” Angela finally cried.

“Don’t you think we need a little makeup?” Aggie asked.

Her sister stared dumbfounded.

“I’m doing you,” Aggie explained, still giggling.

“Maybe just a little,” Angela sounded reluctantly Aggie-ish.
She pulled a lipstick out of her purse and made up first her own and then her
sister’s lips.

“Mascara?” Angela asked.

Aggie nodded and Angela retrieved a wand from her overnight
bag. She swept the dark brown fluid expertly over her own eyelashes, then
handed the applicator to her sister. Aggie held the wand awkwardly but left
only one smudge under her left eye. Angela wiped the spot then took her
sister’s chin in her hand.

“This is weird,” she commented.

“I know,” Aggie agreed. The doppelganger effect unnerved
her. Angela had even altered her voice, losing a slight New York twang. They sounded
as identical as they looked. “I don’t think anybody will be able to tell us
apart.”

“Good,” Angela grinned. Both twins heard a car pull into the
driveway. “You go out first and be yourself for a few minutes. Say I’m busy.
Then come back here and I’ll go out as you.”

“Tell me again why we’re doing this,” Aggie asked.

“Just go.” Angela pushed her twin out the bedroom door.

Aggie greeted her father at the front door.

“Blossom?” he asked.

“No, it’s Aggie. I changed.” A butterfly woke up in her
stomach.

“Here’s Mary,” her father gestured.

“Hi, Aggie. You look great.”

The butterfly stretched its wings.

“Thanks, Mary.” Aggie reached out and drew her father’s
girlfriend into a hug. “You do too.”

“What can I get you to drink?” her father asked them both.

“I still have some coffee,” Aggie jumped in ahead of Mary,
who caught her eye and nodded.

“Let’s all have coffee,” Mary agreed.

Aggie’s father shrugged and walked into the kitchen.

“Is he drinking a lot?” Aggie asked Mary.

“Not too much.” Mary was covering and they both knew it.

Suddenly the homecoming and the charade and drinking were
too much for Aggie. The butterfly was frantically searching for a way to
escape. Its wings battered Aggie’s stomach and she thought she might retch.

“I’ll be back in a minute,” she told Mary over her shoulder
as she walked out of the room.

“I don’t like any of this,” Aggie stated as she closed the
bedroom door. “I feel weird. Dad’s drinking again.”

“I’ll go back,” Angela offered. “You come out in five
minutes or so.”

Aggie heard muffled voices from the living room as she sat
huddled on the edge of her childhood bed. A hidden memory surfaced; she used to
listen here as her parents fought. Drunken arguments had been the background
music of her childhood. But now the voices weren’t raised. Aggie straightened
her shoulders and stood. Time to rejoin the family and end the charade.

“Blossom,” her father greeted her. “Come sit.”

The warmth of his tone brought a sheen of moisture to
Aggie’s eyes. Was his voice that affectionate when he knew he spoke to her?

“No,” she began, unable to continue the imposture. Angela’s
voice interrupted her.

“Angela has a headache, Dad,” she explained.

Aggie walked to sit next to her father. She smelled brandy
in his coffee. She closed her eyes and leaned back into the sofa.

“I’m Aggie, Dad,” she blurted before Angela could interrupt.

“Dad,” her sister complained. “I don’t know what Angela’s
trying to pull, but I’m Aggie.”

“Girls,” Mary admonished. “This isn’t very funny.”

“I agree,” Aggie stated. “I’m Aggie and I’m going to go
change clothes.”

“I’m Aggie,” her twin insisted. “Dad, Mary, can’t you tell?”

“All right. That’s enough.” Their father’s voice had the
rough boozy edge he usually hid carefully. “Let me look behind your ear.”

“What?” Mary asked and their father explained.

“Angela fell off the top of the swing set when she was
three. She has a scar from the stitches behind her right ear.”

Aggie swept back her hair and showed her unblemished skin to
her father. “See, I’m Aggie. Angela, the charade’s over. Give it up.”

Her sister swept back her hair and showed her equally
unmarked skin.

“No scar,” she whispered.

Aggie burst into tears and ran from the room.

A few minutes later, her sister walked into the bedroom and
took the still sobbing Aggie in her arms.

“It’s okay, Aggie,” she crooned. “I told them. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you doing this?” Aggie asked.

“Just for fun,” Angela answered. “Stop crying, Boo. You’re
making me feel bad.”

“This isn’t fun,” Aggie insisted. “I want my own identity.”

“Look,” Angela held out her hand. “I made us nametags.”

Aggie took the cards. The names read ‘Boo’ and ‘Boo’.

“Not funny.” She handed the cards back to her sister, who
turned them over. The flip sides read ‘Aggie’ and ‘the idiot’. Aggie flopped
back onto the bed.

“I have an idea,” Angela offered. “My apology, sort of.”

Aggie turned her head and looked at her twin.

“I won two free tickets to Vancouver,” Angela explained.
“Why don’t we go for a little holiday together?”

“How did you get the tickets?”

“A radio contest. They’re for December 13. That’s a
Saturday. Do you think you can come?”

Aggie thought about the deception Angela had pretty much
forced upon her. She thought about the library, and Andrew. Then she thought of
her father and the brandy in his coffee. Angela was family. More, she was her
twin. It was time to get reacquainted. She sat up and hugged Angela.

“Sure,” she agreed. “Let’s go to Vancouver. How long can we
stay?”

“The ticket is open ended,” Angela explained. “We can stay
as long as we like.”

“What about your job?”

“I’m taking some holidays. Can you get some time too?”

“Andrew and I are planning to go to England next summer.”
Aggie looked at her twin. Her sister’s eyes had a desperate longing in them
that she couldn’t resist. “I’ll take a few days.”

Jimmy Buko was a man of high emotion. He liked to say that
he lived life at two speeds: flat out and faster. He made money with passionate
intensity. He spent generously but without undue self-indulgence. Since he was
fourteen, his need for sex had outstripped all available supply. With rigid
self-control, he avoided inflicting himself and his insatiable needs on ‘good’
women and limited himself to one high class call girl a week. Tonight was the
night.

“I want a new girl,” he growled into the phone.

“Bambi was looking forward to tonight.”

“No. Send somebody new. Tall with red hair.”

“I do have a new girl, Amber.”

“Does anybody have a real name?”

“You can call your girl any name you choose, Mr. Buko.”

“Send Amber, but tell her that I want her to introduce
herself by her real name. Otherwise she’s out the door.”

“Of course, Mr. Buko. She’ll come to room 1036 of the Hyatt
at ten pm.”

Jimmy hung up without saying goodbye. The rest of the day
passed in a blur of meetings and signatures. At the end of the day, his
secretary reported that the companies’ holdings were now worth $527,468,124 and
change, up $1,417,892 from the previous close. A good day.

Jimmy went upstairs to his personal suite and changed into a
jogging suit. He decided to walk along the seawall and up Burrard to the hotel.
He’d stop in a small Hungarian restaurant along the way for goulash. Jimmy
cherished his anonymity. The day he couldn’t walk into a restaurant without
fuss was the day he’d move from Vancouver.

A private elevator delivered Jimmy to the apartment lobby.
Twenty feet high, the expanse was lit by a massive crystal chandelier. The
lobby sat several feet above the street that separated it from the ocean and
offered a sweeping view of English Bay. Jimmy stepped out the door and inhaled
the crisp fall air. For once, it wasn’t raining. To the right a massive rock
fountain gurgled in a raked sand garden. Jimmy reached into his pocket and
dropped a handful of change into the pool at the bottom of the rock. At night,
street people came and gathered the change, for some their only source of
income.

Jimmy strode across the narrow street as cars halted to give
him passage. Good for Vancouver. Though it was the Canadian way, nobody stopped
like that in Toronto anymore. The seawall encircled Stanley Park, a large
endowment of heavily treed land on a peninsula in the center of the city. Jimmy
had chosen for his apartment and office the two top floors of the waterfront
building closest to the park. To the tall white angular building Jimmy had
added five huge rounded bays on his
personal top floor. They housed living, dining bed and bath rooms and a
circular pool with surrounding track. Jimmy enjoyed the phallic symbolism of
his bulbous topped building.

The water of English Bay was calm and gray, almost sullen.
The sky was cloudy and the brown leaves sodden underfoot. Jimmy inhaled the
salt aroma of decaying plant and fish life as nature shut down the bay for the
winter. Barnacle encrusted rocks crowded the beach in front of the apartment,
though a few hundred yards away the expanse became a sandy public playpen each
summer. Jimmy preferred his rocks.

By the time he arrived at the Hyatt it was 9:30. Jimmy felt
invigorated by his walk and pleasantly full of goulash. An effort of will kept
his cock at half-mast, though he needed the sex tonight even more than usual.
He supposed it was the newspaper ad. Richard and Danny had narrowed the list to
twenty and the interviews would start in eight days. Twelve straight days of
sex. He would choose a strong woman.