**Two Halves of One Soul**
When our family welcomed two identical daughters, though it wasn’t unexpected, my wife Marina still felt a flicker of fear in the hospital. The nurses brought the twins for feeding and left them with her in the ward.
*How will I tell them apart?* she thought. *Knowing twins were coming was one thing, but seeing them—my beautiful girls—so perfectly alike was another.*
Yet Marina soon learned to distinguish them by tiny, secret signs no one else noticed.
Emily and Sophie grew up inseparable, attending nursery and school side by side. By their teens, they’d heard all the old tales about twins—how the ancient Greeks believed them touched by the gods, how the constellation Gemini watched over them. Most of all, they knew the saying: twins share one soul between them, thinking as one.
And it was true. If Emily fell ill, Sophie would follow. They stumbled into the same mishaps, and strangers constantly mixed them up. Even their tastes aligned—right down to fancying the same boys.
When graduation neared, both planned for university. But that winter, Sophie fell terribly ill. Emily braced herself to catch it too, but days passed, and only Sophie worsened. Doctors found it quickly—a vicious blood disease.
“You should have come sooner,” they said, though admitted, “but without symptoms, who would?”
Six months later, spring took Sophie. Emily, at school when it happened, clutched her chest as if her heart might tear free. She nearly fainted.
We feared for Emily—would she survive losing half of herself? She waited to fall sick too, but tests showed nothing.
Grief draped our home. Emily kept asking, *Why her? Why not me?* She told her mother, “It’s like part of me is gone.”
Marina urged, “Love, your A-levels—do them for both of you now.” And Emily did, steeling herself to pass brilliantly.
Then one evening, she announced, “Mum, I’m going to med school. I want to fight these cursed illnesses.”
Marina held her. “Your father and I will help you. Always.”
Time dulled the pain, but Sophie’s absence ached. “Life’s split into *before* and *after*,” Emily often said, and Marina understood—she felt it too.
Years later, nearing graduation, Emily met James. For the first time since Sophie’s death, her smiles reached her eyes. Love seemed to breathe life back into her.
Three months in, Sophie visited her dream—waving, as if pointing somewhere. Emily woke unsettled. It was the first time Sophie had appeared since her death.
“I need to visit her grave,” Emily decided. “Then the church.” Marina agreed.
On her way to uni, she called James. They’d planned to meet after her lectures.
“James, I’m stopping by the cemetery first. I need to.”
“Alright, love. Do what you must,” he said.
Classes ended early. Emily visited the grave, lit a candle, then headed to James’s flat. Oddly, his door was unlocked. Inside, she froze—James was with another woman.
“Emily—” he stammered.
She fled, shouting, “We’re done!”
The betrayal cut deep, but clarity followed: *Better now than after vows.* James begged forgiveness, but she refused. “I’ll never trust you,” she spat.
Later, friends revealed he’d borrowed money in her name. She repaid it, furious but certain she’d dodged ruin.
Then she remembered Sophie’s dream—her sister had been warning her.
Years on, as a doctor, Emily was driving to a night shift when her Toyota stalled. After minutes of panic, it started—just in time to see a horrific crash ahead. Four cars mangled. At the hospital, a nurse wept—her brother had died in that wreck.
Emily went cold. *Sophie stopped me. She saved me.*
The garage found no fault with her car. “Just had it serviced,” they shrugged.
Another close call came at a café meet-up. As she stepped onto a crossing, Sophie’s bracelet snapped, beads scattering. Bending to gather them, Emily heard a screech—a car plowed into pedestrians where she’d nearly been.
That night, she studied Sophie’s photo. *You’re still here, aren’t you?*
She wasn’t superstitious, but she kept Sophie’s trinkets in a box. Others might discard such things, but to Emily, they were no more a reminder than her own breath. Sophie was part of her soul—always.
And so she lived. For them both.
