Her Fearful Symmetry

by Audrey Niffenegger

  Elspeth watched the twins puzzling over her very ordinary belongings. She listened to their American accents. They're strangers; I didn't expect that.

  Behind the kitchen was a small bedroom. It was full to the brim with boxes and dusty furniture. There was a tiny, plain bathroom attached to it. The twins realised that it must have been intended for a servant. Here was the back door and the fire escape, here an almost-empty pantry. 'Mmm,' said Julia. 'Rice.'

  Back to the hall ('We should collect two hundred dollars every time we go through here,' said Valentina) and into the bedrooms. There were two, connected by a splendid white marble-tiled bathroom. Each bedroom had a fireplace, elaborate built-in bookshelves, windows with window seats.

  The other bedroom, which had obviously been Elspeth's, overlooked the back garden, and Highgate Cemetery.

  'Look, Julia.' Valentina stood at the window, marvelling.

  Vautravers' back garden was small and austere. Though the front yard was a deranged tangle of bushes, trees and clumpy grass, this little back garden was almost Japanese in its arrangement of gravelled sloping walks, a stone bench and modest plants.

  'I can't believe it's so green in January,' said Julia. Back home in Lake Forest the snow lay ten inches thick on the ground.

  There was a green wooden door in the brick wall that separated the garden from the cemetery.

  'I wonder if anyone goes in,' said Valentina. The ivy around the door was tidily clipped back.

  'I will,' said Julia. 'We'll go on picnics.'

  'Mmm.'

  Beyond the wall, Highgate Cemetery spread before them, vast and chaotic. Because they were on a hill, they might have seen quite far down into the cemetery, but the density of the trees prevented this; the branches were bare, but they formed a latticework that confused the eye. They could see the top of a large mausoleum, and a number of smaller graves. As they watched, a group of people strolled towards them along a path and then stopped, evidently discussing one of the graves. Then the group continued towards them and disappeared behind the wall. Hundreds of crows rose into the air as one. Even through the closed window they could hear the rush of wings. The sun abruptly came out again and the cemetery changed from deep shade and grey to dappled yellow and pale green. The gravestones turned white and seemed to be edged with silver; they hovered, tooth-like amid the ivy.

  Valentina said, 'It's a fairyland.' She had been nervous about the cemetery. She had imagined smells and vandalism and creepiness. Instead it was verdant, full of mossy stone and the soft tapping noises of the trees. The group of people wandered away from them, strolling down the path on the opposite side from which they'd come. Julia said, 'They must be tourists, with a guide.'

  'We should do that. Go on the tour.'

  'Okay.' Julia turned and considered Elspeth's bedroom. There was a huge nest-like bed, with numerous pillows, a chenille bedspread and an elaborate painted wooden headboard. 'I vote we sleep in here.'

  Valentina surveyed the room. It was nicer than the other bedroom; larger, cosier, brighter. 'Are you sure we want the room that overlooks the cemetery? It seems weird, you know; like, if this was a movie, there would be all these zombies or something creeping out of there at night and climbing up the ivy and grabbing us by our hair and turning us into zombies. Plus it was Aunt Elspeth's bedroom. What if she died in here? I mean, it seems like we're sort of asking for it, you know?'

  Julia felt impatience rise up in her throat. She wanted to say, Don't be an idiot, Valentina, but that was not the way to soothe the Mouse when she was being irrational. 'Hey, Mouse,' she cooed. 'You know she died in the hospital, not here. That's what the lawyer told Mom, remember?'

  'Ye-ssss,' Valentina replied.

  Julia sat down on the bed and patted the coverlet, inviting. Valentina walked over and sat next to Julia. They both lay back on the soft bed, their thin white legs dangling over the edge. Julia sighed. Her eyelids wanted to close for just a second, just a moment more, just one more minute ...

  'This must be jet lag,' Valentina said, but Julia didn't hear her. In a minute Valentina too was asleep.

  Elspeth walked over to the bed. Here you are, all grown up. How strange this is, you here. I wish you had come before ... I didn't realise, it would have been so simple. Too late, like everything else. Now Elspeth leaned over the twins and touched them very lightly. Her reading glasses hung around her neck, and they brushed against Valentina's shoulder as Elspeth bent over her. She saw how the little mole by Julia's right ear repeated itself by Valentina's left ear. She put her head on their chests and listened to their hearts. Valentina's had a disturbing swoosh, a whisper instead of a beat. Elspeth sat on the bed next to Julia and petted Julia's hair: it barely moved, as though a miniature breeze had come in through the closed windows.

  Like, but unlike. Elspeth saw in Julia and Valentina the strangeness, the oneness that had always so discomfited people in herself and Edie. She thought of things that Edie had written to her about the twins. Do you mind Julia bossing you all the time, Valentina? Have either of you got any friends? Lovers? Aren't you a bit old to be dressing alike? Elspeth laughed. I sound like a nagging mother. She felt exhilarated. They're here! She wished she could welcome the twins somehow, sing a little song, do an elaborate pantomime demonstrating how glad she was that they'd arrived to alleviate the boredom of the afterlife. Instead she gave each twin a delicate kiss on the forehead and settled cat-like on the pillows to watch over their sleep.

  Almost an hour later, Valentina stirred. She had a little dream as she woke. She was a child, and Edie's voice came floating into her ears, telling her to get up, it was snowing and they would have to leave early for school.

  'Mom?'

  Valentina sat up hurriedly and found herself in a strange room. It took her a moment to think where she was. Julia was still asleep. Valentina wanted to call their mother, but their cell phones didn't work internationally. She found a telephone by the bed, but when she raised the receiver it was disconnected. No one can call us, and we can't call anyone. Valentina started to feel lonely, in the enjoyable manner of those who are seldom alone. If I left now, before Julia wakes up, no one could find me. I could just vanish. She slid off the bed carefully. Julia didn't stir. There was a dressing room connected to Aunt Elspeth's bedroom, a kind of walkin closet with a built-in dresser and a full-length mirror. Valentina glanced at herself in the mirror: as always, she looked more like Julia than herself. She opened a drawer in the dresser, found a vibrator, and shut the drawer again, embarrassed. Elspeth stood in the doorway, slightly apprehensive. She watched as Valentina tried on a pair of red platform heels. They were just a bit long, maybe a half-size. They would fit Julia better. Valentina took a grey Persian-lamb coat off its hanger and put it on. Elspeth thought, She's a mouse in sheep's clothing. Valentina rehung the coat and went back into the bedroom. Elspeth let her walk through her. Valentina shivered and rubbed her upper arms briskly with her hands.

  Julia woke and turned her face towards Valentina. 'Mouse,' she said thickly.

  'I'm here.' Valentina climbed back onto the bed. 'Are you cold?' She pulled the bedspread over the two of them and twined her fingers into Julia's hair.

  Julia said, 'No.' She closed her eyes. 'I had such a bizarre dream.'

  Valentina waited but she did not continue.

  Eventually Julia said, 'So?'

  '... Yes.' They smiled at each other, their faces pumpkin-coloured in the filtered light under the chenille.

  Elspeth stood watching them, fused together into a single form under the coverlet. She had not seriously worried that they might refuse her, but she was still giddy with pleasure now that she understood that they would stay. Think of all the things that will happen to you - to us! Adventures, meals ... Books will be taken off shelves and opened. There will be music and perhaps parties. Elspeth twirled around the bedroom a few times. She swapped the red wool jumper and brown corduroy trousers she'd been wearing for a bottle-green strapless gown she had once worn to a
summer ball up at Oxford. She hummed to herself, twirling out through the bedroom door, into the hall where she danced up the walls and across the ceiling a la Fred Astaire. I've always wanted to do that. Hee hee.

  'Did you hear something?' asked Valentina.

  'Huh? No,' replied Julia.

  'It sounded like mice.'

  'Zombies.' They giggled. Julia got off the bed and stretched. 'Let's bring up the luggage,' she said. Elspeth followed them to the door and made little skipping steps as she watched the twins dragging their belongings into her flat, ecstatic with novelty as they hung their clothes next to hers, stuck bottles of shampoo in the shower and plugged their laptops in to charge. After some discussion, they set up Valentina's sewing machine in the guest bedroom, where it was to gather dust for months. Elspeth watched them with delight. You're beautiful, she thought, and was surprised to be so surprised. You're mine. She felt something like love for these girls, these strangers.

  'Well, here we are,' said Julia, after they had emptied their suitcases and fussed over the placement of every sweater and hairbrush.

  'Yep,' agreed Valentina. 'I guess.'

  MR ROCHE

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING Julia and Valentina went to see Mr Xavier Roche, their solicitor. Actually, he was Elspeth's solicitor; the twins had inherited him along with the rest of Elspeth's things. For many months now Mr Roche had been sending them papers to be signed, as well as instructions and keys and dry, admonitory emails.

  Their cab deposited them in front of a faux-Tudor Hampstead office block. The firm of Roche, Elderidge, Potts & Lefley was above a travel agency. The twins climbed the narrow stairs and found themselves in a small anteroom which contained a door, a bare desk, a swivel chair, two uncomfortable armchairs, a small table and a copy of The Times. The twins sat in the armchairs for ten minutes, feeling anxious, but nothing happened. Finally Julia got up and opened the door. She beckoned to Valentina.

  In the next room was another desk, but this one was occupied by a neat, elderly secretary and an enormous beige computer. The office was done in a style that Elspeth had always referred to as 'Early Thatcher'. To the twins it seemed oddly modest; it was their introduction to the British proclivity for making certain things important and shabby, expensive and self-deprecating all at once. The secretary ushered them into another office decorated in the same style but with more books, and said, 'Please sit down. Mr Roche will be with you directly.'

  Mr Roche, when he arrived, was startling, even Dickensian, but not in the way the twins had imagined. He was an old man. He had been quite small to begin with and had shrunk with age; he walked using a stick, slowly, so that the twins had plenty of time to consider his comb-over, his prodigious eyebrows and his well-made but loose-fitting suit as he crossed the carpet and took each of their hands in turn, gently. 'The Misses Poole,' he said, in a grave voice. 'It is a great pleasure to meet you both.' He had dark eyes and a prominent nose. Julia thought, He looks like Mom's gnome cookie jar. Elspeth had sometimes called him Mr Imp, though never in his hearing.

  'Let's sit here at the table, shall we?' he said, moving incrementally. Valentina pulled out a chair for him and then the twins stood and waited while he eased himself into it. 'It's so much nicer and more informal than the desk, don't you think? Constance will bring us some tea. Oh, thank you, my dear. Now then, tell me all about your adventures. What have you done since you've arrived?'

  'Slept, mostly,' said Julia. 'We're pretty jet-lagged.'

  'And has Robert Fanshaw been to see you?'

  'Um, no. But we just got here yesterday,' Julia said.

  'Ah, well, I expect he'll come by today, then. He's very eager to meet you.' Mr Roche smiled and looked at each of them in turn. 'You are astonishingly like your mother's side of the family. If I didn't know better I'd think I was sitting with Edie and Elspeth, twenty years ago.' He poured them each some tea.

  Valentina asked, 'You knew them then?' Mr Roche was so ancient that she would have believed it if he claimed acquaintance with Queen Victoria.

  He smiled. 'Dear child, my father was your great-grandfather's solicitor. I dandled your grandfather on my knee when he was tiny, and when your mother and aunt were small they used to sit on that carpet and play with blocks whilst I talked to their parents, just as the three of us are talking now.' The twins smiled back at him. 'It's a pity that Elspeth is no longer here to greet you. But I can tell you that she was excited about your coming to live here, and she has provided for you quite handsomely. I hope the terms of the will are clear?'

  'We have to live in the flat for a year before we can sell it,' said Julia.

  'Mom and Dad can't visit us,' said Valentina.

  'No, no,' said Mr Roche. 'I certainly hope your parents will come and visit you; that isn't what Elspeth meant. She only stipulated that they aren't to be in the flat.'

  'But why not?' said Valentina.

  'Ah.' Mr Roche looked regretful. He spread his gnarled hands, tilted his head. 'Elspeth often kept her own counsel. Have you asked your mother? No, I imagine she wouldn't want to discuss it.' Mr Roche watched the twins as he spoke. It seemed to Julia that he was expecting some kind of reaction from them. 'People can be odd about their wills. All sorts of strange things get put into wills, often with unintended effects.'

  He waited for them to say something. The twins shifted in their chairs, embarrassed by his scrutiny. Finally Julia said, 'Oh?' But Mr Roche only lowered his eyes and reached for a folder.

  'Now then,' he said, 'let me show you how your money is invested.' The twins found the next half-hour confusing but thrilling. They had made money babysitting, and had spent one summer as counsellors at a Girl Scout camp in Wisconsin, but they had never imagined possessing the sums Mr Roche spread before them.

  'How much is there all together?' Julia asked.

  'Two and a half million pounds or so, if we include the value of the flat.'

  Julia glanced at Valentina. 'We can live on that pretty much forever,' she said. Valentina frowned.

  Mr Roche shook his head very slightly. 'Not in London. You'll be surprised at what things cost.'

  Valentina said, 'Can we work here?'

  'You don't have the proper visas, but we can certainly apply. What sort of work do you do?'

  Valentina said, 'We aren't sure yet. But we're planning to go back to school.'

  'Actually, we're done with school,' said Julia.

  Mr Roche looked from one to the other and said, 'Ah.'

  'We were curious,' said Julia. 'Why did Aunt Elspeth leave everything to us? I mean, we're really grateful and all, but we don't understand why she never came to see us but she left us her stuff.'

  Mr Roche was silent for a moment. 'Elspeth was not a very ... nurturing sort of woman, but she did have a strong family feeling.' He added, 'I'm afraid I really couldn't say why, but here we are.'

  Couldn't say, or wouldn't say? the twins wondered.

  'Can I answer any other questions?'

  Valentina said, 'We don't exactly understand how the heating works in the apartment. It was kind of cold in there last night.'

  'Robert can help you with that; he's a very practical chap,' Mr Roche said. 'Do say hello to him for me, and ask him to give me a ring - there are one or two things we ought to go over.' He bid them goodbye. Julia turned back as they were leaving and found him standing with both hands on his stick, watching them with a bemused expression.

  When they got back to Vautravers the building was quiet and cheerless. In the front hall Julia said, 'Maybe we should just knock on his door.'

  'Who?'

  'This Robert Fanshaw guy. We could ask about the heat.'

  Valentina shrugged. Julia knocked; she could hear the sound of a television playing faintly in the flat. Julia waited and then knocked again, louder, but no one came to the door. 'Oh well,' she said, and they went upstairs.

  THE UPSTAIRS NEIGHBOUR

  MARTIN PUT THE phone down on the bed. The bed was an island. Around the bed was a sea of
contamination. Martin had been crouching on the bed for four hours. Luckily there were survival tools there in bed with him: the telephone, some bread and cheese, his worn copy of Pliny. Martin wanted very much to leave the bed. He needed to pee, and he was hoping to get some work done today. His computer sat waiting for him in the office. But somehow Martin sensed, he knew, that there had been a hideous accident in the night. The bedroom floor was covered with filth. Germs, shit, vomit: someone had got into the flat and smeared this horrible slime over the floor. Why? Martin wondered. Why does this always happen? Is this possible? No, it's not real. But what can I do about it?

  As if he had asked the question out loud, an answer came to him: Count backwards from a thousand, in Roman numerals. Touch the headboard while you do it. Of course! Martin began to comply, but faltered at DCCXXIII and had to start again. As he counted, he wondered, with a separate part of his brain, why this was necessary. He lost track again, started again.

  The telephone rang. Martin ignored it and tried to focus on counting. It rang three more times, then the answering machine picked up. Hello, this is Martin and Marijke Wells. We're not here now. Please leave a message. Beep. A pause. 'Martin? Come on, pick up, I know you're there. You're always there.' Robert's voice. 'Martin.' A click. Martin realised that he had lost track of his counting again. He threw the telephone across the bedroom. It smashed against the wall and began to buzz. Martin was horrified. Now he would have to replace the phone. It was on the floor, contaminated. The light in the bedroom was afternoon light, slanted. He had failed to escape from the bed. Once again, he had allowed his madness to rule him.

  But an idea came to him. Yes: he would simply move the bed. The bed was large, wooden, antique. Martin clambered to the footboard and began to rock the bed, to propel the bed towards the bathroom. The bed moved in inches, its small wooden wheels scraping the floorboards. But it did move. Martin was sweating, concentrating, almost joyous. He rode the bed across the bedroom, inch by inch, and finally, stepping onto the bath mat, he was free.

  A few minutes later, just as he had finished peeing and was beginning to wash his hands, Martin heard Robert moving through the flat and calling his name. He waited until Robert was in the bedroom before he said, 'In here.' He heard a sound which he thought was probably Robert moving the bed back to its usual location.