The story is that our mother died giving birth to us. Everyone who was there is quite sober about the circumstances, so I fear we were a gruesome birth. Whenever I ask, Madame Plutard looks down at the floor or changes the subject and begins furiously ripping seams from costumes, her wrist flicking as her lips draw a line so firm that words dare not escape. Esmé has never asked. That we are twins shocks most people since there is such a sharp contrast between us. I’m the quiet one. The pensive one. Madame Plutard calls me the shadow twin.
I think she means that I am always following Esmé like a silhouette.
Yesterday after the performance, Esmé and I sat side by side at our matching ivory vanities. She was putting on and taking off makeup. “Who is older?” I asked. “You or me?”
It’s one of those things I’ve always wondered but never asked. There is no doubt in my mind that she knows the answer.
Esmé turned to me with a coy smile then sharply inhaled, like she was honing her reply. “I am. Why on earth would you ever think that you would be older?” Through her mirror she glared at me, a measure of disbelief at my apparent stupidity. Immediately she began busying herself, opening gold tops on ornate crystal bottles, dabbing things at her neck and face with a fury before finally emerging from this frenzy to steadily apply her lipstick—a garnet shade, nearly black—to her small, full lips. She smacked them and ground them together, then cocked her head and ran a nail along her upper lip to correct the errant border.
“I don’t know why you’re always so mean,” I said, sighing and pulling my long hair from its pins, then pulling it forward and picking at it before brushing the long silver strands.
She turned her body toward me, the nude bodysuit with black webbed piping she wore doing little to hide what was underneath. “No one wants to tell you, so I will. You shouldn’t even exist, you know. You are like an extra arm. Unnecessary.” She reached over to her vanity and handed me a tube of lipstick. “Here,” she said, holding the exquisite piped metal case out in her hand. “You need it.” Turning back to her mirror, she dabbed at her brows with a lace handkerchief. “I don’t even know why you have a vanity in my dressing room. It’s not like you have an act.”
Stung by her comment, I had no retort, so I leaned into my own mirror, busying my hands and studying my pale face. She wasn’t wrong. I was the only person in the circus without something to do, other than being “his” daughter. All my life—well, all of the life that I can remember—my sister has been tossing these barbs at me, hinting she knows more. In my heart, I have come to believe what she says: I am nothing. No wonder I lurk in the shadows.
“You still don’t remember, do you?” She brushed her silky hair, making the dark bob line up with her chin.
I didn’t answer, which was answer enough. The great shame of my life is that I’ve retained no memories of my childhood. It had never occurred to me that everyone didn’t suffer from this form of amnesia. A few years ago, I learned that even the performers serving out their sentences here recalled their childhoods quite fondly, even when it was obvious those memories were washed over and revised in their minds. I’d love to have this type of nostalgia, but it is as though I emerged from a clamshell at the age of eleven. The first memory etched in my mind is of a birthday cake, a pink tiered monstrosity with the words ONZE ANS written between layers. I was bewildered that day, not recognizing the celebrants around the table. Like a muscle memory, I knew to blow the candles out after the verse of “Joyeux Anniversaire” was sung, but I did not immediately answer to the name Cecile, as though it were foreign to me. Worse yet, I had no memory of the girl with the chin-length black hair who sat beside me.
This same girl sat beside me. Her words had a way of twisting around me and cutting off the circulation around my neck, causing me to feel breathless. In my head, I’ve kept a ledger of each insult. Without memories to anchor me, her accusations have begun to define me. She was beautiful, confident, and talented, yet I was nothing—a creature with no past and no purpose. I swallowed hard, having nothing to lose. “Quit hinting like a coward. Just tell me, for once. Why do you remember, but I don’t?” I faced her, ready for the confrontation. Or at least I thought I was, but her knowing smile struck fear in me.
The smile didn’t last long before her face twisted. I could tell calling her a coward had emboldened her, just as I knew it would. “He didn’t think you were strong enough, so he took your memories.”
I felt my world tilt. This comment was pure madness and yet it made all the sense in the world. Illness or injury was not the cause of my emptiness. My memories—my life—had been taken from me. That they’d been stolen was the only answer that made sense. And the he was most definitely our father. Gripping the vanity, I processed the knowledge for a moment. “Why?”
She was about to speak when we were interrupted by the sound of a loud yawn coming from the velvet chaise, where a fat tabby named Hercules watched Esmé’s movements intently. As though I were an afterthought, she focused on the cat and began to pet him.
