Double the Happiness

By Martin Lochman

Hanna and the other Hanna are sitting on the floor by the play kitchen. Hanna appears to be momentarily fascinated by a wooden imitation of a banana that can be broken down into two pieces and then put back together, courtesy of a velcro strap in the middle—she keeps flipping it around in her hands and running her fingers across the strip with the tiny hooks—while her counterpart is fastidiously taking plastic cutlery out of the little cabinet beneath the sink and laying it on the floor between her legs, only to put it back again once finished. 

It’s a scene that would be thoroughly heartwarming—cute identical twins playing together in harmony—if not for the fact that Hanna is and always has been an only child.

I finally manage to break off my gaze and turn to Kasia, who is leaning against the real kitchen counter next to me, a cup of tea in her hands. 

“I got nothing,” she mutters. She lifts the cup to her lips but changes her mind at the last moment and sets it down on the counter.

“Hmm,” I respond, not exactly thoughtfully.

She looks at me sideways.

“You’re the writer,” she says, and it sounds a little like an accusation. “Don’t tell me you don’t have a theory.”

“I do,” I say hesitantly. The truth is I have a couple, neatly arranged in my brain from the most likely to what-the-hell-have-you-been-smoking one. 

“Well?” she nudges me impatiently.

“Shared hallucination,” I offer and lick my lips before continuing. “I don’t know how or if it’s even possible for two people to see the same thing—different brain chemistries and whatnot—but that’s the most reasonable explanation.”

Kasia frowns. 

“Let’s assume we are not crazy. What else do you have?”

If I am being honest, I don’t like the idea of my mind being compromised to a degree where I can’t even trust my senses either.

“She could be an identical twin,” I say, and at that moment Hanna looks up at me, her blue eyes finding mine, and utters “Daddy!”. 

I smile at her. Satisfied with my reaction, she resumes playing with the toy banana.

“Don’t you think I would know that there was more than one?” Kasia points at her stomach.  

I shrug.

“I don’t know, would you? You had a C-section. Granted, I was there with you, but I couldn’t really see what they were doing down there. Hypothetically speaking, they could have taken both out and shown us only one. The ob-gyn could have been feeding us false information, the ultrasounds could have belonged to someone else... When you think about it, up until the moment we had Hanna in our hands, everything we knew about her was given to us by the doctors.”

Kasia opens her mouth, closes it, then opens it again. 

“That’s... insane.”

“Hey, you asked for theories!” I say and pause, organizing my thoughts. “But okay, say she’s not a twin or a secret clone, and there are no conspiracies in the medical sector. She could be from a parallel universe.”

While it may not be at the top of the list, it is the explanation that intuitively makes the most sense to me, especially considering how uninvasively the other Hanna appeared in the first place. We simply woke up that morning to find her beside our Hanna in the crib.

“So somewhere out there—” Kasia makes an uncertain gesture with her hand. “—the other you and the other me are freaking out because their Hanna is here with us instead of with them?”

“Yes,” I nod, then shake my head. “I mean, probably. This is all hypothetical.”

“This isn’t,” she points at both Hannas. 

“Which is why we should decide what we are going to do about this... situation.”

I haven’t divulged all theories, but I somehow doubt Kasia is interested in hearing about alien imposters or robotic doppelgangers designed to replace their human analogs.

“Well,” she says with an expression I can’t quite identify. “You are always mentioning that it would be nice if Hanna had a sibling.”

“We can’t just keep her.”

As if she can understand exactly what we are talking about (and I am pretty sure that at slightly over eighteen months of age, most of what we are saying sounds like complete gibberish), the other Hanna drops the plastic cutlery and waddles up to me.

“Daddy,” she says, extending her arms up.

I bend down and scoop her into my arms. 

“Daddy,” she repeats and tugs at my beard, before burying her face in my shoulder. 

Intellectually, I know that she isn’t our daughter, at least not in the strict sense of the word, but emotionally and otherwise, I can’t see or feel any difference. Hell, the only way we could tell both Hannas apart earlier was because they were luckily wearing different pajamas. I have no idea what we would do if they were dressed the same.

Our Hanna follows her counterpart’s example and with outstretched hands comes up to Kasia. For a long moment, we stand there in silence, cradling both versions of the same toddler in our arms. 

“You were saying?” Kasia says, her voice both amused and dead serious.

I shake my head again.

“We have to tell someone—the police, the CPS, I don’t know—otherwise, how would it even work? Hanna goes to the childcare, we both work. Who would she stay with? Besides, you can’t raise an undocumented child nowadays.”

“I know that,” Kasia retorts a little testily. “But what if we adopted her after?”

I press my lips into a thin line. The other Hanna is quietly resting against my shoulder, her tiny back rising and falling against my hand.

“We still have no idea what she is,” I say quietly. “What effect she can have on us. Physically, psychologically, biologically...”

I let my voice trail off.

“Okay,” Kasia nods. “Let’s say she is a normal human being and she doesn’t carry incurable diseases. Let’s say the government won’t haul her off to a lab somewhere to run experiments on her, and she goes into the system instead. Would we consider taking her in?”

I don’t reply. During one of the decisive conversations before getting married, Kasia and I did talk about adoption in case we couldn’t have children naturally. And I did bring up that it would be great if Hanna had a little brother or sister on numerous occasions. Taking both into account, it should be a no-brainer—after all, we would be effectively adopting our flesh and blood—yet somehow, I cannot give a conclusive answer. 

Just as the silence becomes uncomfortable, there is a knock on the door. 

“I’ll get it,” Kasia says, a ghost of disappointment flashing across her face before she sets off toward the hallway. 

I follow her, intent on staying just out of sight.

By the time she reaches it, someone knocks twice more, each time louder than before. Kasia shoots me a suspicious look and hesitantly draws the door open.

“Thank God you’re home!”

From behind the corner, I recognize the voice of Monique, our downstairs neighbor. 

“I didn’t know who else to turn to,” Monique continues. She sounds agitated.

“What is—”

The stunned silence that cuts into Kasia’s question forces me to peek out.

Monique stands in the corridor, holding Alek and Erik, her one-year-old twin sons, in her arms. There is a double pushchair behind her; in it, their exact copies are looking out at the world with wide, curious eyes.

END