“Ana…” 

I was going to say Anael or Iris, which were both names of the first female character I had ever written but… Well, Ana is simpler. If I was going to write it out, it would be Anael Iris Healy. Technically, she was usually an Irish ginger in my stories. Still, if I had hesitated, my mother probably would have become even more suspicious.

“Her name is Ana Healy. Anyway, don’t worry about her okay? She’s a lot like me.” I snickered, “I know this is weird, but I’m weird. So what do you expect? At least she doesn’t smoke, drink or do any drugs.”

“Ugh, just go take a shower.” She seemed pretty pissed at me. Though the problems would probably come later, if my parents started asking questions about where Ana came from. 

Honestly, I always hate stories where the main character constantly lies about stuff and keeps secrets. Yet I also wouldn’t want to tell my parents: “Oh by the way~, my girlfriend is actually just some kind of weird female alien clone of myself. Or maybe she’s a demon? Who knows?”

Once I closed the door behind me, I opened my eyes in the basement. ‘Ana’ was thirsty as hell. It’s really annoying, but unless I start talking about my bodies in the third person occasionally, things will become extremely complicated.

Anyway, while ‘Michael’ was busy trimming his beard, pubes and then taking a shower, Ana walked upstairs. The door was wide open already, since the cat was no longer in the kitchen.

When I reached the top of the stairs, my father was sitting on the chair at the far side of the table and drinking coffee out of a thirty-four ounce, tall and black plastic mug. He was looking straight at me, but without his glasses, he just asked “Holy shit, did you finally shave your beard?!”

“No, not exactly.” I snickered as I walked over to the side of the table. Then smiled and said, “Umm hi, I’m Michael’s girlfriend… Ana.”

“No way…” He didn’t freak out like I expected, instead he squinted at me and grumbled, “How blind do you think I am?” Apparently he didn’t even notice that my voice was significantly higher than usual. To be fair though, I didn’t have any feminine inflections or tone? I wasn’t about to try and come up with a fucking accent or some shit.

“Okay, you got me. Hehe~, I’m actually Michael’s identical twin sister, who was separated at birth or some such bullshit? Don’t worry though, I won’t get pregnant with an incest baby if we only do anal and oral.”

By that point, my father finally put his glasses on and gasped. After a few seconds, he said “I’m really sorry about that, uh, Ana. I really am blind as a bat without my glasses… It’s just, you two must have matching haircuts and you’re wearing his clothes too… I’m sorry, my name is Michael Cinagra Senior. It’s nice to meet you.”

My father was surprisingly polite to strangers. Anyway, it seemed like he completely ignored what I said to him. Well, there was a talk-show on the radio next to him that was scrambling my brain a bit. While the washing machine and dryer were also running.

“Michael’s in the bathroom upstairs. Um, I’m really thirsty… I already know where the cups and stuff are though.” Even though said that, I knew my father would start rattling on about every goddamn type of beverage we had in the house.

He even offered, “If you want, I can head out and pick you up some soda or whatever you need. It’s a little early, but if it’s an emergency, I can head over to the pharmacy too…”

“It’s not an emergency, heheh~…” I reached up and opened a wooden cabinet, then grabbed a huge red mug. It was about sixty-four ounces or so, and particularly thick because it was insulated. I walked over to the sink and placed down the mug, “I don’t have any tampons, but I probably won’t need them any time soon. So just get them when you have time.”

I had a girlfriend once upon a time, so I did know a thing or two about tampons and pads. Of course, I never actually used one on her before. Hell, I didn’t even know if I’d have periods or if I would start giving birth to demonic tentacle monsters every month. When you suddenly grow an entirely new human being out of nowhere, your perception of what is ‘possible’ changes.

“I’ll get em when I go out later. Any special brand?” My father asked, before continuing to sip his coffee. It was honestly kind of amazing how good of a person he was. He used to drive me hundreds of miles a week so I could see my first and only girlfriend back when I was a teenager.

“No, just get whatever’s the cheapest.” I snickered, then pulled off my mug lid. Even though my hands were different, they didn’t feel strange at all. I swiftly removed the movable piece from the lid, then washed them both off thoroughly under the cold sink water. Then held them with my left hand, as I washed the inside and outside of the mug.

“Make sure to wash all the glasses and dishes off before you use them. Never know if there’s soap still stuck to em.” 

My father gave me some unnecessary advice, but I still smiled at him and said “Thanks.” After that, I walked over to the refrigerator-freezer. It was all white and about two meters tall. Split into the freezer half on the left side and the refrigerator on the right. When I placed the mug against the ice-machine trigger, my father told me “I just filled that thing, so it should have plenty uh ice.”

Without much suspense, after a loud grinding noise, a bunch of cubes fell out and filled a quarter of the mug. Then I stopped and held the mug with the lid still open with my left hand, as I opened the refrigerator with the right. Inside was some instant lemonade, orangeade and slightly sweetened tea. Three separate gallon pitchers on the top shelf, on the right side. To the left was a row of milk cartons: three regular and one 2%.

You might be wondering, “Why the fuck are you explaining stupid shit that nobody cares about?” The answer is pretty simple… Word Count. Just kidding, it’s mostly just obsessive compulsive disorder mixed with the laziness of not wanting to have to write about things in great detail in the future.

So yeah, I carefully poured the yellow liquid up to about half-way. Then I put the pitcher back and grabbed the tea, filling the mug the rest of the way. After placing it back in the refrigerator, then closing it carefully with my right foot, I walked over to the sink.

Once I rinsed my dirty right hand off, while still holding the heavy mug in my left, I then proceeded to place it down on the counter and snap shut the lid. I left it there and walked over to the cabinet closest to my door. I opened the left side and pulled out a box of straws with the top ripped off, using only my left hand. Then I walked over to the sink, pulled out a simple white straw with my right index and middle fingers. Placed the fucking box back where I got it. Walked back over to the sink and carefully washed off my hands, while also rinsing the straw clean with freezing cold water.

“You sure you ain’t Michael?” My father shook his head as he watched my usual OCD bullshit. Maybe he just figured that I finally found someone as crazy as ‘me’?

Once I placed the straw in the hole of the mug, I headed downstairs. When I was at the bottom of the stairs, I took my first slurp and let out a sigh of relief. It tasted good, and about the same as I remembered. I would still need to test out various types of food, but at least I was still a hardcore tea-drinker.

The increase in food, water and other costs would be difficult for my parents. And I most definitely didn’t make enough money to support a single body, so my first order of business was obviously to try and figure out something that I could do now, that I couldn’t before.

Took me about five seconds to think of making porn or doing live cam-shows. Of course, as a decently attractive woman, I could have also started playing video games and gotten relatively popular through making those kinds of videos. Unfortunately, there was an underlying danger whenever it came to revealing my non-existent identity. No matter what you do, as long as you become popular to a certain degree, someone will start snooping into your past.

What was more dangerous than ‘Ana’ being essentially a person without a legal identity, is if she was already a person. I didn’t know anything about her and I definitely didn’t recognize her face, aside from the fact that we could have been cousins or siblings. If I never showed my face, I wouldn’t be as popular no matter what I did. Plus it might cause people to become even more curious.

Ultimately, there was only one thing I really knew how to do well, while also making money. And that was writing. With two bodies, I could write, edit and post twice as much as before. At least for the short-term, that was my plan.