Also, it’s cold. Like stick-your-tongue-to-a-flagpole cold. So when you visit, ask Mom to pack more long johns, please. A dozen. And something with extra warmth, like a fur coat (the non-animal-harming kind)?

Moving away for a semester isn’t going to change the fact that you are my sister, my twin, and we are connected by something even your science can’t explain. All the calculations in the world can’t define why I know exactly when you’re sad or feeling awkward or embarrassed. Even without being side by side, you know when I’m out of sorts. Remember the night the end of freshman year when you couldn’t sleep, and I called you the next day to tell you about my breakup with Mike? No one can explain that, not even you.

I don’t know when I’m going to email this off just yet, because I know how upset you were when I left. Maybe give it a few days? It is true I’ve been in my own little world the last three years with Alpha Delta Beta while you’ve been knee-deep in premed, but I think we’ve also had the chance to grow up and find our own identities (she said, with a furtive glance. “Right?”). If you ever want me to come home, just say the word. I mean it.

This email account will be used to document my adventures abroad. Reply here with any tips you have for me in Paris from that big ole brain of yours. Snail mail or messages in Coke cans plucked from the Atlantic are also cool. I love you. Please don’t be mad anymore.

Bisous (“kisses” in French),

Angela

*Edit: I’m sending this to you. Twin for the win.*

Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Just before I opened the email from Seb declaring my sister was missing, my hands had been clutching the silver frame of my smartphone case. I was laughing. Doubled over, wishing for a glass of red wine. A state grant I applied for was set to be announced that week, and I was checking my inbox every hour; any and all money was needed to pay for the next four years of medical school, even though half the tuition was covered thanks to my parents’ estate.

The smart tweed dress I had chosen for UC San Diego’s medical school social hour was itching the tops of my knees, but I didn’t care. Everyone was friendly, excited to begin this next chapter in our journey toward becoming doctors, and I was tossing educated quips right and left. Rare, like AB negative, am I right? A circle had formed around me—young men and women, and Tiberius, the token salt-and-pepper student. I felt alive, awake where I had been asleep for the last three years mourning the loss of my parents. I felt like Angela.