Identity [ON HIATUS]

2. Daisy Does Rose's Homework

Once our feet hit the sidewalk, Rose placed a cigarette between her lips and pulled out a lighter from her pocket and began flipping it in front of her. We both watched it somersault before she offered me one.

"You know, you really shouldn't do that."

"What?" Her voice muffled from the cigarette as she lit it. "I'm only being polite."

"No, Rose." I sighed, kicking a small stone out of my way. "Tease mom and dad like that. They're just trying to help."

"Not you too..." I didn't really want to push it, the topic was so touchy. In the last year I watched my sister fall further and further away from the three of us, more my parents than me. But the gap between us was achingly obvious. Not only did we look different, despite the chromosomes, but she spoke differently and liked different things, and one of those things was a guy two years older than her with a reputation.

It was the icing on top of the cake that was her image. That's all he was right? An accessory to her image, he completed her look of rebellion. She was a force to be reckoned with, and had a hard-ass boyfriend to prove it.

I'd never met Charlie, but I'd heard some nasty stuff. The thought of my sweet, caring twin sister being with him made my stomach turn.

"Speaking of trying to help..." I brought my satchel around and rummaged through it until I came across stapled papers. I passed them to Rose, who took it from me like it was a piece of radioactive trash.

"What the Hell is this?"

"Your History report." I answered meekly, watching my shoes clip clop against the sidewalk. I couldn't look her. I felt accomplished yet a suck up whenever I did her homework for her.

"Daisy, what have I told you about doing this?" She waved it about, as if broadcasting it to the entire world that I do my hard-ass sister's homework.

"You're gonna flunk otherwise! You're failing everything else. I thought if I just copied my own and threw a few different words in there, took a few out, it'd work."

Rose sighed. "D, I love you, but you can't pull this shit with me. This isn't your responsibility." She looked at it in her hands, now crumpled from her harsh grip. She studied it for a few seconds before shoving it in her backpack. "This is the last time ok? Don't do it again...but thank you."

"To make up for it, why don't you turn up for dinner tonight?"

Rose's gratefulness disappeared and was taken over by a roll of the eyes and a tensing of the shoulders. If Rose did turn up for dinner the least she did was chat with us as she left to take her food to her room. Sitting with us and talking to us was not an option. Be it hormones or teen punk rebellion, Rose wasn't into bonding with our parents. She must have known that mom put me up to this, but she can't decline a favour from me; I just did her homework.

"I'm at Charlie's tonight."

"Can't you come home early?"

"How early?"

"...6?"

"Make it 7 and I'll try my best." We linked pinkies as a promise, before she turned down a separate path that led to another part of the school. Nowadays I barely had a class with Rose and I was thankful; the constant comparison got tiring by the time middle school was over. So tiring that Rose changed everything about her.

The day she dyed her black was the day the 'Kane Twins' died and 'Daisy and Rose' were born. I was grateful, but a little sad to see the title go. I'd known everything about my sister because she was me; sometimes we even spoke in unison just to freak people out.

But now, Rosie was the ghost of Rose's past. And Rose who 'didn't give a fuck', her words not mine, was a wall I couldn't tear down. I knew nothing about her other than she enjoyed pissing people off and the colour black and boys with tattoos.

And so, as usual, I walked to class alone.