Morph
17. Father Knows

I count each red brick, scared to enter my own home. Its been a month, the longest I’ve ever been separated from my twin. The longest most eventful month of my entire life, and now I’d have to lie about it to my father’s face with fake stories of Venezuela, a place I’ve never even seen a picture of.

No matter, I need him now, I need his reassurance the kind he always gave me as a kid. Libra hasn’t spoken to me in a week, he’s avoided me like the plague only giving me a nod here and there. I had tried to apologize to him numerous times but the words just wouldn’t form, because am I really sorry?

With that and the fact that there’s now four mysterious creatures on the loose in Ecladias because of me, home is all that can keep me sane right now. “Don’t look so nervous, if a mother knows I’m sure a father does to.” Seconne says as I wrap my fingers around the cool doorknob. I trust Seconne to an extent, I can only trust to a certain point now that I know that not everyone has to be a threat to not mean me well, but he seems like a great person to have a friendship with.

Gemini demanded I not visit Earth alone, Seconne was the first person I could think to tag along, and he had no problem with it having never been to Earth before.

The door is locked once I finally muster the courage to turn the knob. My fear, anxiety I have disguised as fear, returns. Seconne sees this and bangs his fist twice on the door.

“I have always wanted to do that.” He beams with excitement just from knocking on a door. “Knock and not have the door talk, Dorraine does not know when to shut up.” Seconne complains, finally giving me a name to the door’s voice back at the manor. I laugh, some of the tension easing, it all returns once the door opens.

Only blue eyes don’t stare back at me, brown ones do. The stranger wears my mother’s robe, it grabs my attention immediately. She has short graying hair and a red coated smile. I can’t speak as I stare at the light grey of my mother’s robe. Seconne smiles and introduces himself, oblivious to why I’m still mute.

The woman turns to me, her smile never faltering. “Serenity? You look just like David!” She exclaims. “When he said you guys were twins- wow.” I roll my eyes, annoyed with the stranger and getting angrier as she speaks.

“Sam, who is it?” My father calls, he approaches the door, eyes wide when he sees me. “Serenity.” He smiles, crushing me in a hug before I can respond, I hug him back inhaling his scent, feeling at home.

His arms feel like home more than this house ever could and for the minute we hug I breath all my worries out silently. He lets me go, smiling widely. “Would it be bad if I didn’t miss you?” He jokes. I laugh and shake my head.

“Would it be wrong if I replaced your shampoo with Nair? You do seem to need a trim.” I giggle referring to his new inches of hair falling over his ears, the stranger laughing takes me from a joking state. Everyone’s attention goes to her and my father rushes us inside and to the kitchen. Seconne looks between us all, trying to figure out where the sudden tension came from.

Its so thick you could cut it with a saw, but the only thing I want to saw off is this Sam’s head. Then strip my mother’s robe off this impostor. We all take seats at the table, I make sure to sit right in front of the woman. “Honey, this is Samantha. My friend.” My father says.

Samantha looks at him as if to ask if he’s seriously addressing her as his friend, but he pays her no mind. I however, pay her much mind as Seconne and my father begin talking. I stare at her, disgusted with the way she smiles at my father as he asks Seconne how we met.

“Do your friends always wear mom’s robe? Or I dunno, open doors?” Everyone stops talking at the question. My father looks ashamed, his ‘friend’s’ jaw hangs open and Seconne looks as if he just found the piece of the puzzle that fits, whistling and staring at the ceiling as if to drown us all out.

“Serenity of course nor. She had nothing to wear, so I lent it to her.” I can hear the panic in my father’s voice, he probably thinks I’m on the verge of an attack at the mention of my mother, it has always been a trigger. Little does he know those attacks are long gone and have been replaced with something much worst, anger that has lead to a lot of things and people burning.

Its not me grasping for air, clutching my heart as I replay the incident with my mother in my head he should be worried about. No, its me not being able to control the raw hot anger that any little thing can cause and burning this entire house to the ground. “Oh so she’s wearing nothing under my mother’s robe? Dad I have to say, that makes it so much better.” I spit in sarcasm. Seconne starts drumming his fingers across the table cloth, scanning the room nervously.

“Hun, I think we got off on the wrong foot and for that I’m so sorry.” Samantha says. I breath out slowly, just as my coach has been teaching me to all week. Even her voice racks my nerves and if I accidentally burn her, I let out god knows what into Ecladias.

“Your basically naked, at my kitchen table, in my good as dead mother’s robe. I think my foot, just got off at the wrong house altogether.” As I focus on breathing and not the anger I feel a little of it go down. “Can you leave? I came to visit David, not partake in a reality show.” I can’t even call him my father right now, how dare he let this woman wear mom’s clothes.

Samantha looks at me stunned and a slight hurt flashes in David’s eyes. “Excuse me but that is very rude.”

“Sam please excuse her behavior. You should wait in the living room, you too son.” My sperm donor says to Seconne who darts up without a word, a look of relief on his pale face. They both leave and my dad looks at me, disappointment shining in his eyes.

“What is wrong with you Serenity-Ann? A month ago you would have never spoken that way.” The same disappointment laces his voice.

“A month ago I never knew of an anger that could eat you alive from the inside out just if somebody cut you in a Burger King line.” I mumble, the anger storing itself away for the time being. That’s what it does, it doesn’t leave me it simply puts itself on a shelf and waits to build with other anger. Like a tower of blocks that when stacked high enough won’t hesitate to fall.

“A month ago you didn’t know you were special.” He looks directly at me as he says this.

“You knew?” I gape, even my father is a liar.

“I knew from the moment I held you that you were my queen, my special girl, so it came as no surprise to me that you would rule others.” The disappointment is replaced with adoration.

“Its hard.” Is all I say, not knowing just how much my father knows about my situation and not wanting to burden him with any new information. “Sometimes I want to come back home, to just give up.” I say truthfully, I’d never admit this to anyone else but the thought crosses my mind on a daily.

“For my protection I’m not aloud to know all the details, so I’m not asking for any.” I nod in understanding. “But life is hard Spec.” My childhood nickname catches me by surprise, I haven’t heard it in forever. “Tying your shoe seemed hard but you had to either learn to, or trip. A lot of people need you, it would be selfish to let them all suffer.” His words make sense, his words hit home, it would be the most selfish act I’d ever partake in to let an entire world be damned all because I don’t want the responsibility of saving it.

“If you are really ready to come home though, come back, you always have a choice.” He says seriously. “I’d love to have you back, forget the danger, there’s nothing more dangerous than the fact that no cleaning lady can do a job like you.” We laugh slightly and I shake my head.

“You didn’t raise me to be selfish David.” I smile as he squeezes my hand, scolding me for calling him David again.

“Nor did I raise you to call your elders by their first name.” He fusses, I smirk at him.

I steer the conversation in another direction, seeking a break for all things Ecladias related. We talk about how he’s passed the time without me instead.

He’s joined a men’s book club and a cooking club full of grandma’s, first it was just to pass time but he ended up genuinely liking it. Twice a month he goes grocery shopping to let out his ‘inner housewife’ as he calls it. He has three friends from his book club, which sometimes gather at our home, and one from the granny’s cooking club. Samantha, who left an hour ago isn’t in any of these clubs, they met when she helped him learn to budget in the market last month.

We don’t stay on the subject of her too long, by wearing my mother’s clothes she disrespected me in a way I didn’t know possible, as well as my father for allowing her. For that I don’ think I could ever like Samantha, but just this once I’ll put something as serious as this behind my father and I for the sake of a break from everything, even if it is for a few hours.

Seconne and my father get along perfectly, Seconne seems to get along with everyone that way. They have the same buzzard sense of humor and so for hours I listen to them laugh at the stupidest things like how Albinos have started to dye their skin, which is not at all true but Seconne is now hell bent on dying his skin red to match his hair.

Before we know it, its time to head back.

“I’ll miss you Spec.” My father says, holding the door open.

“Dad, please.” I groan, we vowed that he would never call me that in front of people because of how embarrassed I was for the reason I got the nickname in the first place. He laughs, Seconne along with him and I scowl at them both.

My dad hugs me one more time before letting us leave. “I love you.” I call behind me.

“I love you too.” He replies. “Remember, if you don’t tie your shoes you will trip.” I nod, as I get into the carriage I etch his words into my mind. Tripping is the inevitable if I don’t tie my shoes, this I know, but this time others may trip over my shoes as well. An entire world full of others will fall if their not tied.

Seconne waves goodbye to my father and his words from earlier play in my mind. “If a mother knows I’m sure a father does to.” And he does know, my father has always known.