Janet Flora | Writer

          I'm waiting for the doctor to call with the results of Lena's lab tests. I'm always waiting on Lena. I sip my coffee and look out the window onto Second Avenue. They're restoring the cast-iron fence around St. Mark's Cemetery—it's one of the few structures left unchanged in the neighborhood.
         “Irena, can you come zip this for me?" Lena calls from the bedroom. She never could do anything herself.
         I take another sip of coffee.
         "Irena? Irena, are you coming?"
         "Yeah, I'm coming. I'll be there in a minute." I push the chair back from the window and put my cup down on the kitchen table.
         Lena is standing facing the full-length mirror in our bedroom. The straps of her brassiere are twisted. I start to straighten one, but realize it would have to be removed to completely unravel all the tangles and knots. So I just zip the pale-blue, paisley dress, and start to walk away.
         "Wait. Fasten my pearls," Lena says, holding the strand by the ends.
         I take them and inspect the clasp. These are mine. I'm sure of it. She always does this. Hers have the yellow-gold clasp. This one is pink-gold. Poppa made them that way—so we'd always be able to tell them apart. Oh God, how many times have I wanted to strangle her with these pearls?
         "Lena, aren't these mine?" I ask.
         "No, they're mine," she says, as I stand behind her staring at her in the mirror. It looks like we are one body with two heads.
         When we were girls at least Mama and Poppa could tell us apart, but now at 82 no one bothers. And why would they? The only thing unique about an old, shriveled Ukrainian woman is that there is one more who looks exactly the same.
         "Did the doctor call yet?" Lena asks.
         I keep examining the clasp on the pearls. It would be just like her to get really sick and die now. All my life I've wanted to be separate—to be one—rather than one of. But now? Now it hardly matters.
         "Well, did he, Irena? Did he call yet?" she asks again.
         I look up at her reflection. "No, not yet," I say. "He'll call soon."
         If mirrors reverse images, I wonder which of us is asking and which is answering?


         I am the first born. Older by four minutes, and one pound heavier at birth. I got my second teeth before Lena, and was an inch taller until we were sixteen. Lena was a bit sickly, always a step behind, and always trying to catch up. She was the one Mama coddled. Lena would sneeze and Mama was there putting her lips to Lena's forehead to take her temperature.
         "Mama, me too," I'd beg. "Take my temperature too."
         But she'd just shoo me away with the back of her hand and say, "Irena, you're fine, you're strong, like Poppa. Lena is delicate like me."
         On the days Lena stayed home sick, I loved going to school by myself. I didn't have to wait while she got ready, or help her get ready. Lena always had to walk slowly. So when I was alone I'd run almost all the way. But when I got there no one knew it was me—until I sat in my seat. The teachers always kept us far apart in the classroom so they'd know who was who. Lena always wanted to change places; she thought it would be fun to fool the teacher, but I never thought it would be fun at all.


          Now there is nobody left to fool. Unless you count that dumb model next door who is waiting for us to die so she can buy our apartment and break through. But she's so stupid she probably doesn't realize there are two of us, and her calculations about how long she'll have to wait are likely to be wrong.
         "Come on, Irena," Lena says, "fasten the pearls. We'll be late for our appointment at the beauty parlor."
         "You'd better go without me," I say .
         "Oh, please come. I hate going without you."
         "I have to stay here in case the doctor calls." I tell her.
         But maybe while she's gone I'll go to the park. The one across town. I like it there. I like to talk to people. Some of the old ones, who have lost spouses, tell me how lonely they are living alone, after a lifetime of togetherness. I just say, "Yes, I know all about togetherness."


          As girls, we played beauty parlor for hours. Sitting with our backs to each other at Mama's vanity, we painted our lips and curled our hair, Lena using one end of the three-paneled mirror while I used the other. Then we would face the middle panel together to see what we had created. And even though I could exaggerate my lips with more precision, and sketch my eyebrows with more of an arch, we still looked identical. The same pointy chin, slender nose, dark wavy hair and two pairs of green eyes.
         I would look at our reflection multiplied in the side panels, reproducing us over and over again.


         There is no three-way mirror in our bedroom today. But it still feels the same. As if the image I see repeats itself—not only beyond the mirror, but the room—and even the world outside.


         Only once was it different. We were 17 the summer I met Frank. We were seeing each other a month before I told him there was more than one of me.
         We were all sitting on the stoop the day that he came to meet my family. I was next to Poppa on the top step, and Lena was next to Mama just two steps below. I saw him as he turned the corner to our street. I wondered if I should stand up and wave or do something so he'd be sure to know it was me.
         As he got nearer I watched as he looked at Lena, then up at me, and then back to Lena. Then he put his hand toward Lena.
         "Hi. I'm Frank. You must be Lena."
         Later when we were alone, I asked him if he could really see the difference between us.
         "She's beautiful too," he said. "But not like you. I'd be able to tell you apart in the fog."
         That was the best year of my life.
         Then the war happened and Frank was gone. His remains were sent home from Germany six months later.


         The phone rings.
         "Do you think that's the doctor?" Lena asks.
         I look up at our reflections in the mirror. Now our eyebrows are sparse, our gray hair bends rather than waves, and no amount of lipstick can define our shrunken lips. Two pairs of eyes stare back at me. I straighten the pearls on Lena's neck. She grabs my hand and squeezes it. Her neck is thinner than mine now—more delicate. Mama was right. I am the stronger one.
         "I'll be right back," I say. And I go to answer the phone.