Re-Vamped! (2 page)

“I
have a twin,” Ivy whispered.

“That
can’t be.” Her father shook his head.

“Sure
it can,” Ivy said, trying to smile. “Her name’s Olivia. She moved here at the
beginning of the school year.”

“And
how,” her father asked, “do you know this girl is your twin?”

“Because
we look exactly alike,” Ivy answered.

“Many
people look alike,” her father countered.

Ivy
peered down at the emerald ring hanging from a chain around her neck. “But not
many people who look like me also have a ring like mine,” she pointed out.

Her
father breathed in sharply through his nose. “This is . . . quite a surprise,”
he said slowly. Ivy winced.

“There’s
more,” she said. He turned a shade paler, which is no easy feat for a vampire.

Ivy
steeled herself. “She’s a human.” Her father gasped, and the miniature coffin slipped
from his hand. He grabbed at it frantically, but it bounced off his fingers.
Reaching for it, the back of his hand accidentally struck the model, and one
wing’s cardboard walls collapsed, crushing a pair of gargoyle easy chairs.

He
stared down at the model in disbelief. “Sorry,” squeaked Ivy.

“It is
not your fault,” her father said absently, going to sit behind his desk. He put
his head in his hands. “Does she know of your true nature?” he asked, looking
up after a moment.

Of all
the questions Ivy expected from her dad, this was the one she’d been dreading
most. She nodded, and her father closed his eyes in disappointment.

I
am going to be grounded for eternity,
thought Ivy. “She would have found out sooner or later,” Ivy blurted. “And
Olivia won’t tell anyone. She knows how serious it—”

Her
father held up his hand to stop the stream of words coming from her mouth. “I  understand,”
he said simply. He looked at her sternly, but Ivy didn’t think he looked angry.
He took a deep breath. “How do you feel about this sister you have found?”

“I
love her,” Ivy said matter-of-factly. “I couldn’t imagine my life without her.
I feel like meeting her was meant to be.” Ivy stood there, waiting for her dad
to respond, but he just stared into space. Finally she said, “Is it okay if I
go to Olivia’s house for dinner tonight?”

“Have
you finished your homework?” her father asked expressionlessly.

“Mostly,”
Ivy answered.

“Then
you may go,” he allowed, forcing a small smile. He stood and came to give her a
quick hug before looking down at his model. “It seems I have my work cut out
for me here,” he said, but his mind seemed to be elsewhere. Ivy nearly skipped
back down to her room in the basement.
Considering I was half expecting him
to burst into flames,
she thought,
I think he took that pretty well!

Olivia
had just finished setting the table for dinner when the doorbell rang.

“I’ll
get it!” her mom shouted.

Olivia
immediately bolted for the front of the house and rounded the corner just in
time to catch her mom swinging open the door and singing, “Hell—” her mom’s
voice broke midword “—o,” she finished, mouth agape.

Olivia
looked past her staring mother to see Ivy on the doorstep. Her sister had
clearly dressed up for the occasion. She was wearing a warm black jacket over a
turtleneck sweater, a black miniskirt with fishnets, and her long black boots.
She’d even put on her dark purple lipstick. Olivia thought she looked fabulous.

“Hi,
Olivia.” Ivy smiled with a worried twitch of the eyebrows toward Olivia’s
speechless, staring mom.

“Mom,”
Olivia said, elbowing her mother in the side. “This is Ivy.”

“It is
so . . .
interesting
to meet you, Ivy,” her mom said. She glanced over
Ivy’s shoulder into the street. “Did your father drop you off?”

“He
has to work tonight,” Ivy replied. “He’s really sorry he couldn’t stay.”

“I
hope we get to meet him soon,” Olivia’s mom said as Olivia pushed past and gave
her sister a hug.

After
taking Ivy’s jacket, Olivia led her into the living room, where her father did
a double take. Olivia caught her mom staring at her sister’s outfit again as
Ivy sat down on the couch.

“Can I
get you something to drab, Ivy?” Olivia’s mom asked.

“You
mean ‘to drink,’ Mom,” Olivia said, completely embarrassed. Her mom was
normally like America’s Best Hostess, but apparently her hospitality mechanism
malfunctioned when it came to guests wearing black nail polish.

Olivia
stepped between Ivy and her mother and mouthed the word “sorry” to her sister.
Ivy responded with a little don’t-worry-about-it smile.

“Want
anything?” Olivia asked aloud. “Do you have cranberry juice?” responded Ivy.
Olivia nodded and headed for the kitchen. “I’ll help you find a glass,
sweetheart.” Her mom gulped, hurrying after her.

Olivia
groaned inwardly as she overheard her dad saying, “So, Ivy, did you know you
had a double aura?”

Olivia
got the bottle of cranberry juice from the fridge as her mom took down a glass.
“Is she getting over some sort of illness?” her mom whispered.

“No,”
Olivia said.

“I
knew it!” Her mother gasped, putting her hand to her mouth. “Poor girl.
Somebody died, right?”

My
parents have got to get out more,
Olivia thought. “No, Mom, nobody died. And Ivy’s not training to be a mime,
either. She’s a Goth.”

“Didn’t
Serena Star do a show about those people?” Mrs. Abbott asked.

“It’s
just a style choice,” Olivia explained.

Her
mom nodded slowly, taking this in. “Do Goths eat zucchini?” she asked.

“Yes,
Mother,” Olivia replied. Then she headed out of the kitchen with Ivy’s drink.

A few
minutes later, Mr. Abbott was staring at Olivia and her sister across the
dinner table. “I wouldn’t have noticed at first, but you two really do look
exactly alike!” he said in amazement. “Like yin and yang.”

“Like
Superman and Clark Kent,” Ivy agreed.

Olivia’s
mom set down the last casserole dish and pulled off her oven mitts. As she sat,
she looked from Ivy to Olivia and smiled warmly. “Like . . . peanut butter and
jelly?” she tried.

Everybody
laughed. All at once, the room thawed, and Olivia’s parents started showering
Ivy with questions. Did she have any extracurriculars? (School newspaper.) What
did her dad do for a living? (Interior designer.) What was her favorite color?
(Black. Duh!)

Then
Olivia’s mom asked, “So, Ivy, do you have a
boyfriend
?” in that weird
way mastered by moms everywhere.

Ivy
squirmed in her seat as Olivia answered for her excitedly. “Yes! Brendan
Daniels! He’s awesome!”
Wow !
she thought as Ivy shot her a look of
playful annoyance.
It’s sort of nice not to be the one in the hot seat.

“All
right! Enough about me!” Ivy put her hands in the air. “I have some questions,
too.”

“Ask
us anything,” Olivia’s mom challenged.

“What
about Olivia’s adoption?” Ivy asked eagerly.

Maybe
Ivy will find out something I haven’t been able to!
Olivia thought.

“It
was the happiest day of our lives,” Olivia’s dad said proudly.

“Did
the agency tell you anything about our biological parents?” Ivy probed.

“No.”
Olivia’s mom shrugged. “All they knew was what was written on the note that
accompanied the baby: Olivia’s name and her date of birth.” A strange
expression flickered briefly across Ivy’s eyes.

“Must
be just like the note in your own file,” Olivia’s mom guessed.

Ivy
shook her head. “I don’t have a note. I don’t even have a file!”

Mrs.
Abbott’s face flushed with sympathy, and before Olivia knew it, her mom was
rushing around the table to give Ivy a hug. To Olivia’s surprise, Ivy didn’t
stiffen. In fact, she actually seemed comforted by it. Of course, Olivia’s mom
was a master of the art of hugging.

“I
feel like I have a whole new daughter,” Olivia’s mom declared proudly as she
began clearing the table a little while later. She beamed at Ivy. “I can’t wait
to see more of Olivia’s other half.”

Olivia
watched for Ivy’s reaction, half expecting her sister to look like a deer
caught in headlights. Olivia loved her parents, but they could be super
overbearing sometimes.

Ivy
looked genuinely touched though. “That sounds killer.” She grinned.

The
next thing Olivia knew, her father had a mountain of photo albums in his arms.

“Please,
no,” Olivia whined. “Ivy doesn’t want to see pictures. Do you, Ivy?”

“Wait
until you see Olivia dressed as a green kangaroo in her kindergarten play. She
was so
cute
!” her mom squealed.

“As a
matter of fact,” said Ivy, shooting Olivia a devilish grin as she followed Mr.
Abbott into the living room, “I
would
like to see that.”

Three
photo albums and hundreds of embarrassing photos later, Olivia was pretty much
at the end of her rope. To her relief, a car horn sounded outside.

Olivia
leaped to her feet and looked out the living room window. “Ivy’s dad’s here,”
she said. “Time to go!”

“Aw,”
Ivy teased from where she was sandwiched between Olivia’s parents on the couch.
“But we’re just getting started.”

“Here’s
Olivia with spaghetti in her hair,” her mom said.

“Sorry,”
Olivia said firmly, pulling her sister to her feet. “Show’s over.”

Ivy
grinned. “Thank you so much for dinner, Mr. and Mrs. Abbott,” she said.

“Call
me Steve,” Olivia’s father said.

“And
I’m Audrey,” said Olivia’s mother. “Why don’t you invite your father in for a
cup of coffee, Ivy?”

“I
can’t tonight,” Ivy said apologetically. “I still have some homework to
finish.”

“Well,”
Olivia’s mom said, “tell him we can’t wait to meet him.”

Olivia
walked Ivy to the door.

“That
wasn’t bad at all,” Ivy said in a low voice as she slipped into her jacket.

“You
don’t think so?” Olivia demanded. “Okay, next time we’ll look at pictures of
you
drooling and wearing embarrassing clothes!”

Ivy
laughed. “I’ll see you in the morning at school,” she said, giving Olivia a
hug. “I bet nobody even reads the piece about us in the school paper.”

“Probably
not.” Olivia shrugged. “But I’m still glad we told our parents.”

“Me,
too,” Ivy agreed.

After
Olivia had closed the door, her mom appeared and peered out through one of the
glass panes.

“It
must be hard,” Audrey Abbott said thoughtfully as Ivy climbed into her father’s
car, “with only one parent.”

Olivia
had never really thought about that. She gave her mom a hug. “I’m glad Ivy
finally got to meet you,” she whispered.

Over
her mom’s shoulder, Olivia saw her dad emerge from the living room.

“Nice
girl, Ivy,” he said matter-of-factly, “but who died?”

Olivia
rolled her eyes and started to explain,
again
.

Standing
on the front steps of Franklin Grove Middle School, Ivy flipped open her fuzzy
black spider watch and tapped it with a black fingernail. If it was really 8:10
on Wednesday morning, where were all the people? The steps should have been
packed.
What if my watch is wrong and I’m late for class?
she thought.

As Ivy
rushed toward the huge oak doors, she could hear a commotion inside. Stepping
out of the cold December sunshine, she found herself engulfed in a chattering
crowd of people.

Looking
around, Ivy realized she was at the end of a huge, disorganized line that led
to the tables where the school newspaper was distributed. A pimply
sixth-grader, who was coming the other way, walked right into her, his eyes
glued to the front page of the paper in his hands. “Sorry,” he mumbled. Then,
glancing up, his mouth dropped open. “It’s you!” he cried. “Or is it her?” he
added suspiciously.

Ivy
looked down at the paper he was holding and saw the towering headline,
LONG-LOST TWINS FIND EACH OTHER! over huge, side-by-side photographs of Ivy and
Olivia’s faces.
So much for no one reading the article,
she thought with
a grimace.

She
put her head down, letting a curtain of dark hair conceal her face, and started
elbowing her way through the crowd. Being the center of attention was hazardous
to Ivy’s health; it was like lying out in a bikini without any sunblock.

Luckily
Ivy succeeded in plunging through the fray without anybody else recognizing
her. Emerging at the edge of the crowd, she noticed another throng of people
squeezing into a classroom up ahead. She skulked over and, balancing on the
tips of her steel-toed boots, peered over everyone’s heads.