(Shin)
I didn’t know it for a long time and it shocked the hell out of me when I found out, but Trin was adopted. It was seriously news to me and I was sixteen at the time. She had kept it from me for ten years and when I found out, I actually thought that she was lying. I mean, Trin was and always would be a Possible in my eyes.
Trin had everything that I knew a Possible had. She had a brilliant brain, an open mind, crazy skills, and a lot of experience in all sorts of things. That was a Possible if never I saw one. So, I was a bit thrown off when she came out of the blue and asked if I desired to go with her to meet the people that created her.
I made a Frankenstein joke because she seriously used the term “created.” She refused to refer to them as her “biological parents” or something similar to that. She often used the term “those people that created me” or “those people that brought me into existence.” A few times, she used the phrase “the people that abandoned me.”
When she spoke of her birth mother, she often called her “that woman.” There didn’t seem to be any sort of connection between her and “that woman.” She spoke of her in her usual business-like tone. She might as well have been talking about a chair most of the time when she spoke of “that woman.”
With her birth father, she called him “that man” most of the time. I didn’t blame her for what she called them; it had to be hard to be abandoned, even if it was by shitty parents and everything worked out somewhat. At least she had much better parents now, but that didn’t seem to make things all right.
I had heard whispers and rumors about how Trin got into the hands of the doctors Possible. I just never believed it at all. That harpy was a Possible and whoever said otherwise was a complete idiot as far as I was concerned. I thought people were just trying to be mean-spirited as usual. I guess I was wrong for once.
I did wonder why Trin had waited so long to go see “the people that created” her. She explained that she had only just found them; they weren’t a top priority in her life, she claimed. I believed her and I should’ve guessed as much.
Well, I hopped right on that bandwagon. I wanted to see those people, the people that foolishly cast her away. They were the people that told her first, before the rest of the world, that she was nothing more than a trinket, a trivial creature. I had to see those people and probably boast to them that they were idiots and had thrown away gold. They had like a million dollar idea and they tossed her aside. Morons.
I wondered what I would’ve done in her place. What if my parents had left me in a mall? I would’ve died. I knew that right away. I wouldn’t have been able to last for a second if my mother left me alone somewhere. I would’ve just been crying for my mother like the baby I was.
Trin didn’t know which parent she was going to go see first; apparently, they weren’t living together, but she said she expected as much. We flipped a coin; hey, sometimes things were best left to fate. I had suggested we save the most fucked up parent for last. She didn’t look amused.
Damn it, she was going to be all serious about it, which meant that I wouldn’t have nearly as much fun as I expected, if I had any fun at all. Well, unless of course I liked to be kicked in the face and it would be the face if I was lucky. She always said that I didn’t have to worry about having kids. She was such a harpy.
She didn’t tell anyone, except for me, that she found “those people.” I suppose there were several reasons for that. She’d like to appear to not give a damn about “those people,” but obviously she did care just a bit since she wasted her time finding them.
I was certain that she didn’t tell anybody else because she didn’t want to look like she was ungrateful toward her actual parents; the people that took the time of day to raise her into the harpy that I know, love, and seem to share a spine with since we’re always together. She was probably pissed too that she took the time out of her life to find “those people.” She really didn’t want anyone to mistake the effort for emotions. Whatever the reason, I was and probably will always be the only person to know that Trin met her birth parents. It was always adventure with her.
The coin came up “heads” and we were going to see “that woman” first. Trin rented a car, being the one in our duo with driving skills and a banging fake ID that allowed her to rent the car. We set out one weekend with the intent of seeing both parents since they lived close to each other.
I was in charge of thinking up the lie since I will always be the liar of our pair. Trin always was into the whole honesty thing when it came to our folks and her siblings; honesty or silence, but she would never lie. She had the perfect poker face, though, so it was hard to tell if she was withholding information, so that made up for the fact that she didn’t lie. She could bluff her ass off.
I told the parents that we were going out to pick up some more computer equipment. No one questioned that since they knew we were computer junkies. All they did was tell us to not spend too much money on crap and not to eat donuts the whole weekend. After that, road trip!
I guess I shouldn’t have cheered. I mean, I would be trapped in a small area with my evil twin and she wasn’t in a fun mood. All I had was my laptop and some music. Trin and I, we always had the same taste in music thankfully. It calmed her down as we drove for her to hear some Mozart. I was safe.
(Trin)
I didn’t know that I was in such a tense mood. It wasn’t like I didn’t know what to expect. So, I wasn’t sure why I wasn’t my usual self. Sure, my usual self wasn’t cheerful, but I wasn’t gloomy either.
We arrived at the small house in the middleclass neighborhood. There were toys in the front yard. Shin looked surprised by the toys, but he decided to keep his big mouth shut for once. We went to the door and I knocked. A small boy answered the door without inquiring who it was, which was something that Shin always detested.
“Oh, come on, kid! We could be killers or something worse! Like salesmen. What the hell are you doing opening the door like that?” Shin barked and the child wisely slammed the door in his face.
“Way to go,” I grumbled. Shin and his zillion and one pet-peeves. I turned my attention back to the door and hoped that the boy was still there. “It’s all right. We’re not killers or salesmen. We just want to speak with your mother,” I said.
A moment passed before the door opened again. Instead of the same child, that woman answered the door. It will always bother me that I fucking look like her; I could also see how Shin was stunned by how much I resembled that woman. As long as the resemblance was skin deep, it wasn’t that bad. Well, I looked like her, but I looked much better. She was a tired looking woman, aged beyond her thirty some odd years from all kinds of bullshit.
“What can I do for you?” she asked. Shin looked at me, apparently curious as to what I would say. I had a plan, so as long as I wasn’t mysteriously stuck dumb, I was all right.
“We’d like to talk to you about someone named Trinket Bane,” I replied. Her face appeared shocked.
“What do you know about my little Trinket?” she asked. I was close to scoffing in her face from the question.
“May we come in?” I requested. I had little inclination of discussing the matter in the doorway.
“Please,” she replied and ushered us into her home.
She held the door open for us to walk in. I entered first and Shin followed; he seemed to still be in shock and was probably just pulled by the invisible line that connected us. He looked around the place and saw all kinds of toys just littering the house.
“Sorry about the mess,” she apologized.
She took us to the kitchen where there was a little table for us to sit and talk. The table took up most of the space in the small kitchen. Shin stood behind me while I sat down. She looked up at him; I think he made her nervous for some reason. It wasn’t like he was an imposing figure in any way. I adjusted my glasses and turned my attention to her.
“So, what do you know about my Trinket?” she asked as if she was concerned and eager for some news on a silly little girl that had meant so little to her long ago. She was so concerned that she had given up looking for that empty-headed creature a long time ago, thankfully.
“She’s alive and well. Her name’s not Trinket anymore. You probably don’t need any other information,” I replied.
Despite what people might have thought, I never cared about that woman or that man. I only wanted to see them up close and confirm if I wanted to do something to them or not. I didn’t even need to be near her any more than that minute. I knew how I felt; I never did care about her and that was affirmed.
“Come on,” I said to Shin and I was about to stand up. He didn’t look surprised; he probably knew that I wouldn’t want to be there any more than a minute anyway.
“Wait, where is she? I want to see her,” that woman said. I stared at her; she was actually curious. I sat back down. I could spare a moment to not be a bitch about things; I was bigger than that, I told myself.
“Do you mind if I smoke?” I inquired, not really caring what her answer was going to be. I might have been bigger than being a bitch, but I was still on edge. Shin handed me a cigarette and he lit it for me.
“You don’t look old enough to smoke,” she commented.
“I was unaware that there were age requirements to kill one’s self,” I replied. Shin and I only smoked for about a month or so. We had always picked up vices and dropped them easily. We were always fickle in so many ways.
“So, where’s Trinket?” she pressed.
“She’s not Trinket anymore. Her name’s Trin now. What does it even matter where she is?” I asked. I wanted to say that she never cared where I was before, but that wasn’t true. She always wanted to know where I was. I’m fairly sure she didn’t even abandon me on purpose, but that didn’t make up for the fact that the bitch left me in a fucking mall for a week and I was four years old.
“She’s my daughter,” that woman insisted. I didn’t miss a beat, though Shin looked skeptical for a brief moment.
“No, she’s not,” I replied smoothly. I didn’t change my facial expression or tone at all.
“She is.”
“No, she isn’t and you should get that silly notion out of your head—” I tried to say, but she didn’t give a chance to finish.
“You can’t tell me who my daughter is,” she barked.
“I can tell you. She isn’t your daughter. You never thought of her as a daughter back then—” I tried to point out, but she once again rudely interrupted me.
“I did,” she insisted and I think it was her foolish conviction that cracked my game plan. I wasn’t going to tell her who I was, but the next words I spoke hung me.
“You didn’t. You were always too busy trying to score your next hit and using me as a tool to make that jackass you were with stay with you or use me as a shield so he wouldn’t hit you. If I was your daughter, you would’ve been there for me instead of leaving me in a mall for a week. You would’ve had me at home instead of standing on a corner at night in freezing rain while you went to get high or do who knows what the hell else. You would’ve been there when I was plucking roaches and mice out my breakfast, if I was lucky enough to have breakfast. I was just a thing to you,” I stated. My voice was strong, but my words were very much an accident.
“You…” she whispered.
“I’m Trin, yes. So, I do know who’s your daughter and it’s not me. I’m not even interested in having this philosophical debate with you.”
“Then why’d you come here?” she asked. She seemed to under the very false impression that I wanted her in my life or something.
“Just to make sure you were the stranger I assumed you. I wanted to see what you looked like and where you lived. I suppose it’s nice to see you cleaned up,” I replied. It probably would’ve been nice had she been cleaned up when I was born, but I guess that would’ve made too much sense.
“You don’t know what I went through—” she actually tried to defend herself. The woman left me in a fucking mall and she was trying to defend her actions to me.
“Nor do I care to know. Nothing you can say to me is going to excuse the fact that I was a thing to you. I was an object that you could use to gain sympathy or use as a shield, and those were the only reasons I was there. I was a thing. Don’t act like you wanted me as a mother wants a child now. Even if you do, I don’t care,” I proclaimed because I didn’t.
I was curious if I was going to feel some connection to that woman, but I didn’t. It was as I said; she was a stranger to me. I felt nothing toward her. I could leave her and never think about her again, just like when someone walked by people on the street. She was a stranger.
“Trinket, you don’t—” she tried to say something that I didn’t want to hear.
“That’s not my name,” I stated and rose to my feet. I put my cigarette out with my fingers, as was my habit, and I put it in the garbage. “It might do you best to consider Trinket Bane dead. I can promise you that you won’t see me again,” I vowed.
“Trinket, please,” she had the nerve to beg me.
For a moment, I thought of all of those times that still were so vivid in my mind of me begging her not leave me. I remembered the frostbite that formed on my cheeks and nose when she left me in the cold without proper clothing; the drenching I received from downpours; the thirst from heat and just the day without water. I remembered begging her so many times not to leave me, but she left anyway because her drugs meant more to her than I ever did.
So, I ignored her pleading and started toward the door. Shin lingered for a moment and I thought that he might have things to say. But, he seemed to decide that he didn’t care and he followed me.
We passed through the living room and saw a pair of boys playing with some toys. They were that woman’s sons. She had sons. She had a husband. She had a life and she had moved on from the fact that she had lost that little thing, Trinket Bane, in a mall some years ago. It was all right; I did the same.
I knew I couldn’t assume what was going on in her heart or in her mind when she left me, but I knew how I felt and that was enough for me to never think of her again. I knew how she treated me when she did have me and that was enough for me to move on. I knew what I went through with her and that was enough for me to consider her a stranger. I also knew about the moves that she made after losing me and that only let me know that I was never important to her and she never cared about me. That woman was never my mother.
(Shin)
I was a bit surprised with the way that we left. I didn’t expect to stay long, but other than that, I didn’t know what to expect. I know I didn’t expect “that woman” to look like Trin. I had always thought that the harpy looked like her mother, my Aunt; they had the same shaped face and almost the same eyes. I guess that helped the shock when I found out that Trin was adopted.
I wanted to say something to “that woman.” But, I just didn’t know where to start and I doubted that I would end if I did get started. I wanted to brag, but that didn’t seem to be the reason that Trin was there. So, I just left with her because I couldn’t get my head together enough to curse “that woman” out or something that I should’ve done.
Trin must’ve known that I was curious about almost everything that went down and that was discussed because once we were in the car, she started talking without me saying a word. She might not have been in the right emotional state to drive, I thought, but that didn’t stop her.
She talked about when she used to live with “that woman.” She was obviously very traumatized by a great deal of it because she could remember a lot of things from back when she was like three years old. I couldn’t remember that far back, except for a couple of things that mentally scarred me, like going through a carwash; I thought it was going to eat us, all right. I was only three.
Trin talked about not being able to sleep a great deal of the time back then because she afraid of being eaten by the rats that were in the apartment. She wasn’t even scared of the rats, but she said that one time she woke up on the mattress that she had to sleep on and found them gnawing on her; there was nothing else to it in the place it seemed and she tried to make a joke about the rats getting to her before she got the idea to get to them. I couldn’t imagine waking up one morning to find I was breakfast for such disgusting rodents.
I also couldn’t imagine my parents allowing me to live such appalling conditions. We never had bugs or things in our house, so I couldn’t imagine having rats. I couldn’t see how she could sleep under such conditions.
She then talked about when “that woman” used to leave her places, like corners or benches or just about anywhere she could. She said that if she was near a trashcan, she’d actually go through it for something decent to eat because there was hardly ever any food in the apartment. She had learned to go for a few days without food as a toddler because if she complained of hunger, pain followed the compliant.
Apparently, “that woman” used to be a drug addict. I wasn’t really surprised by that after hearing about all the other stuff. But, Trin said that she had just gotten clean; I didn’t ask how Trin knew that.
Trin always was a research nut, so she more than likely dug up everything she could about “that woman” before going to see her. Trin found that she mattered so much to that woman that it took her years to report that Trin was missing. She had just gone on, like it was nothing that she lost Trin, like it was nothing that she had lost her own daughter. I could barely fathom such a thing.
I was stunned that my evil twin didn’t plot some sort of revenge for that woman, but I think she just wanted to close that part of her life. I know I would. I wouldn’t even want to think about any of that ever again.
(Trin)
I spilled it all to Shin because that would be the reason that I keep him around; well, it would be one of the reasons. He was a trashcan for my grief. Sometimes, I feared that I might kill him just from telling me all of my burdens. He might die at a young age, not from his insanity, but because hearing and bearing of my problems.
I knew that Shin liked to be included in my life as much as possible, as I liked to be with him. Perhaps, one day, we’d just kill each other from all of our stress and insanity, I considered. Other than my past though, nothing seemed quite as heavy and we should always be able to carry that.
I never did see that woman again and I didn’t want to. I wasn’t her daughter and I never would be. I was and would always be a Possible. I would always be thankful for that too. Though they say that you can’t pick your family, mine picked me and I would always and forever appreciate that, even if I act out.
Next time: they pay a visit to Trin’s father.