✅ Younger Twin [NaNoWriMo2023]

5 - Taylor's Little Sister

We were staring in surprise as Dad came closer. We couldn't think of anything to say. We'd thought it wasn't such a big deal having a couple of years between us; even if Triana had some new interests, like going back to the cute childish stuff, we would still have been sisters. And we could have been as close as we'd ever been. But to suddenly see that our little brother wasn't even four years old yet – and hear that he hadn't been acting his age – was a whole different set of fears.

We turned to meet each other's gaze, and for the first time since we could remember, it was impossible to guess what the other was thinking. Not that we were exactly alike, of course, but we knew each other so well that it had never been a mystery before.

"I'm... four?" Triana asked, taken aback.

"Almost," Mum said, nodding slightly. "Is that not what you expected?"

"We... I..." Triana stammered, completely lost for words. And in that moment, I was sure that I needed to pick up the slack. We'd signed the contract; she would have to act like she was the same age as Nik. I was already feeling like I should be treating her as a child, and the kid wasn't even at the table. What would it be like for my sister? She had to act like a kid, but she even know how a three-year-old would behave in these circumstances?

"We thought he was closer to our age," I said. "Some of our friends said they saw you walking around town with a kid. They guessed he might be ten, or twelve. Troublemaker ages for boys."

"Oh!" Mrs Mattheson gasped. "I never thought... When you didn't ask, I thought you'd heard from that nice Miss Black. We talked about our needs with her, you see. We were looking for a child Nik's age, or within a year or two. And possibly a big brother to act as a role model too. We did have a trial period with a boy who was interested in joining our family, but his general attitude in those few days convinced us that he was more likely to bully Nik than to set a good example. Are you... I mean, is Triana comfortable with this change?"

"We need to look at the rules again," I said, feeling the family we'd dreamed of slipping out of our grasp so soon. "I mean, pretending to be a preteen would be something we can cope with, but he's practically a toddler. How can we–"

I stopped, because my sister was squeezing my hand there. She wanted to talk, I thought. But I didn't know any more than that. Would she be fighting against the compatibility training even to talk like an adult? The rules had said for her to act like she was Nik's age, and if that meant not speaking she might be uncomfortable even trying to express her discomfort. But when I looked at her, I knew I couldn't speak for her either, because I couldn't read her expression like I'd always been able to.

"No," Triana said after a long pause. "Let me do this. It's... I'm... hard to... I don't know how to act. But I can learn. Nik can show me how old we are. Let me try,"

"But..." I stammered. "Does he talk? I mean, I don't know much about toddlers, but that's like preschool age. I can't imagine you with a preschool vocabulary. What if you can't tell us when there's a problem?"

"I can talk," she said, but I could see that her instincts were already changing. Following the rules became a habit, the rules said to act like a little kid, and she didn't know if the kid she was supposed to be could talk. So saying anything right now must feel like cursing in class for her; every instinct protesting that this is something good girls don't do. Still, she was trying. "In your room. When Nik is out."

I took a deep breath, and tried to tell myself that it was okay. But I was scared for her, even if she didn't seem to be.as worried as I would have expected. This was my little sister, who I was supposed to protect from all the bad things in the world. How could I just let something like this happen to her?