The twins

“This is going to be the most boring school trip EVER!” Ayla glances over her shoulder at me. “Oh come on Izabel, museums can be very interesting too!” “Ughhhhhh” Ayla laughs. Ayla’s laugh is very pretty. When she laughs it feels like she shines and everything gets a little bit brighter. Maybe the school trip won’t be that bad if my best friend is with me.

We will be visiting an art museum. I honestly don’t understand why people get excited to look at some dead man’s paintings. The bus drive was a lot of fun though. We joked, laughed and sang loudly. Our teacher was a little bit annoyed, but we didn’t care too much. When we arrived we got some cool-looking bracelets as tickets to enter the museum. First a lady showed us their current limited collection and after we were allowed to explore by ourselves. Ayla and I wandered around and joked about the artists’ names.

Suddenly I saw a girl with the same hair as mine walking around the corner. I didn’t see her anymore, so I didn’t think anything of it. A lot of people have the same boring brown hair as I do. Ayla already entered the next room so I hurried to follow her. “Wow this painting looks impressive”, she said. “Meh.”, was everything I felt when I looked at it. On the other side of the room I saw a weird-looking doll in a glass cage and wanted to give it a closer look. When I bended down, I saw a face on the other side through the glass. We both jumped and looked shocked into each other’s eyes. We were both startled and shocked to see how much she resembled me. Apart from that long straight brown hair, her eyes were exactly the same shape and colour as mine. She had the same full lips and complexion. For a minute I wasn‘t sure if she was real or I was looking in a mirror, but her clothes made me realise and come down to Earth that I was looking at my twin, an unknown twin. What a shock?

We slowly approached each other and she uttered a word „Wow, who are you?“. I didn‘t know what to say and quietly asked her the same „And who are you?“. We were both silent and looking at each other without uttering a word. I had so many questions, but I waited before asking them.  We sat on a bench in the museum and started talking.  She told me her name was Natasha.  We had the same hobbies, the same style of dressing, even the same favourite foods.  We were exactly the same.  After we talked, it turned out that our mother broke up with our father when we were born and they separated us. Which is pretty unfair, because they didn‘t even tell us about each other. I heard someone shouting my name all over the museum.  It was Ayla looking for me.  I had to go.  But when I got up from the bench, Natasha took my hand and said, „I know this is going to sound crazy, but let‘s swap for a day.“  I flatly refused because we all know it would be a mess.  Ayla was already approaching us and I had to hurry.  I didn‘t want her to see my twin because she would ask a lot of questions that I wouldn‘t be able to answer.  But Natasha wouldn‘t let me go.  Just when Ayla came to us, Natasha pushed me to a plant and pretended to be me, in front of Ayla.

  I couldn‘t believe that Ayla didn‘t see that it wasn‘t me.  Then the two together went to the other part of the group.  I didn‘t know what to do until a tall man in a suit came up to me.  He just said, „Here you are“, grabbed me, and led me to a car.  I didn‘t know where I was going or who this man was.  So I started asking questions to gather information.  I realized that this was my sister‘s butler.  And that we went to her house.  There was a big house with a lot of flowers.  It wasn‘t very old, but also not very new.  Then I saw him on the stairs.  Our father.  According to my mother‘s stories, he left us when I was little.  But he didn‘t look like that type of man at all.  When I went to him he asked me how it went in the museum. 

He was very kind and had nothing to do with my mother‘s stories. There was a certain concern in me about how I would get home.  Natasha and I exchanged phone numbers and that‘s why I decided to call her.  She also didn‘t know how we would swap again.  So I decided it was time to tell my father I wasn‘t the right twin.  I explained to him how we met and swapped.  He was shocked at first, but then he was glad to see me.  He agreed to take me home.  When we arrived and I went inside, my mother was looking at me and my sister and she was out of breath.  We calmed  her down and explained everything.  In the end, neither of them was angry.  And for nothing, after all, they are the ones who divided us.  All I know is that this was my craziest day.  You wouldn’t find your secret twin every day.

This short story was created by Lachezara and Maya from Bulgaria and Vanessa from Germany for the project ERA+ Integrated learning challenges.