There were three of us once.
Me, Leila, and Nora.
I know that sounds like the beginning of a story told by someone who has finally made peace with the ending. But I never truly made peace with ours.
Not really.
I simply learned how to talk around it without falling apart in public.
After Nora died, people started calling Leila and me twins because it was easier for them. Easier than saying “the surviving two.” Easier than watching our mother’s face crumble whenever someone asked where the third girl was.
But Leila and I never felt like twins.
We felt like two broken pieces of something that had once been whole.
Nora was older than us by seven minutes, and somehow she carried herself as if those seven minutes made her responsible for the entire world.
She reminded us constantly.
“I’m older,” she would say, lifting her chin like she had been crowned queen of the nursery. “That means I decide.”
Leila hated hearing that.
“Seven minutes doesn’t count,” she would snap.
“It does if you were late,” Nora would reply, grinning.
I usually laughed first.
Leila usually threw a pillow.
That was the soundtrack of our childhood before everything changed—laughter, arguments, running footsteps echoing down the hallway.
Mom shouting that if one more crayon ended up on the wall she was going to lose her mind.
Dad, back when he was home more often than not, pretending to be stern while secretly smiling into his coffee.
Whenever Leila and I fought over toys, clothes, the window seat, or any of the countless things children fight about before they understand how much they will one day miss the noise, Nora stepped between us.
“She had it yesterday,” Leila would protest.
“And you’ll have it tomorrow,” Nora would say, handing me the doll or sweater or whatever tiny treasure had started the battle. “Gia gets it today.”
“You always take her side.”
“I take the side of peace,” Nora would declare.
Then she would pull some ridiculous face, and somehow even Leila would laugh.
Nora was sunshine in human form.
She softened every room she entered.
She tied our shoelaces before school, saved the red candies for Leila because they were her favorite, and always slept in the middle during storms because she believed leaders protected both sides.
I still remember one thunderstorm when a crack of thunder shook the windows.
Leila climbed into bed first, dragging her stuffed rabbit behind her.
I followed a few minutes later, pretending not to be scared.
Without even opening her eyes, Nora lifted the blanket.
“Both of you are terrible at being brave,” she mumbled.
Leila curled against her left side.
I pressed against her right.
“You’re scared too,” I whispered.
“No,” Nora said. “I’m responsible.”
She should have been worrying about homework, messy hair, and whether Mom would let us stay up late on Fridays.
Instead, even then, she acted as though love meant standing guard.
When Everything Changed
Then Nora got sick.
At first, the adults whispered around us as if quiet voices could keep the truth from reaching us.
But Nora knew.
Of course she knew.
Nora always knew when someone was lying, especially when they were trying to do it kindly.
I remember her first hospital stay.
The smell of sanitizer.
The harsh lights.
The cartoon stickers on the walls that failed to make the room feel less frightening.
Leila couldn’t sit still. She kept picking at her sweater sleeve until Mom gently stopped her.
“Stop that, sweetheart.”
“What’s wrong with Nora?” Leila asked.
Mom looked toward the door as though an answer might walk through it and save her.
“She’s just very tired.”
Nora rolled her eyes from the hospital bed.
“I’m not a baby, Mom.”
Mom’s lips trembled.
Then Nora turned to us and smiled.
The smile was smaller than usual, but it was still hers.
“Don’t look like that,” she told us. “You both look weird when you’re worried.”
Leila burst into tears.
I didn’t.
Not then.
I stood frozen at the foot of the bed, gripping the metal rail so tightly that my hands hurt.
I thought that if I held on hard enough, nothing could move.
Not time.
Not sickness.
Not Nora.
She was only eleven years old.
Tiny beneath hospital blankets.
Her wrists were so thin that Mom cried whenever she thought we weren’t looking.
Yet somehow Nora understood more about leaving than any child ever should.
