The Legend of the Ditto Twins (27 page)

"Duh!
Of course. We've made our first movie."

"First?"
He sat up on his knees.

"Well,
it's so short. Like a coming attractions trailer."

"So?"
My brother became suddenly pensive. "Oh. Huh. I'll bet we could make a
full-length one."

I
grinned. "A whole hour of us sucking and fucking."

"You
really want to?" He seemed intrigued by the idea.

"Don't
you?"

He
hesitated. "I dunno."

"I
dare you."

He grinned.
"I wonder if Clay still has the tripod..."

“...that
he and Jay used. I hope so."

We spent
the next day rummaging through the cellar, and eventually found a cubby-hole
that had once been used as a dark room. And sure enough, amid the film
canisters, lighting equipment, and developing trays, we found a dusty old
tripod leaning against one wall. Upon closer inspection, we noted Jay’s
nameplate on one of its chromium legs.

That
night's film festival began with a screening of the Clay-Jay tape. It still cast
its spell. Next, we undressed each other while our own short subject filled the
screen. It was so brief that we watched it three times. By then, of course, we
were raring to go, more than ready to make our feature film debut.

The
tripod was already in place. Atop it was the videocam loaded with a
sixty-minute tape. We pushed the Record button, and I took Clark into my arms.
Our first loving kiss was, if I do say so myself, a dynamite beginning.

The
entire experience felt very schizophrenic. On the one hand, we were totally
aware of the camera and performed for it, but it was this very calculated
aspect of our sex-play that made the spontaneous action beneath even hotter
than usual. I guess the best way to explain it is that we were having two
different kinds of sex at the same time, and each enhanced the other. Or there
may have been a simpler explanation: Perhaps, that was the night we began to
realize we were really closet exhibitionists. Have you ever had a camera watch
you fuck? Or get fucked? All I know is, everything I did was as much for the
camera's lens as it was for Clark or myself.

Clark
understood of course. Only, he made a joke of it. "Our first
threeway
—and it's with a camera."

The next
day about noon, Clay, Clark, and I were in the kitchen when Lily hurried in, a
manila envelope in hand.

"Any
problems?" asked Clay. She started to answer but he cut her off. "Sorry
I asked. Did you get 'em?"

She
nodded, pantomimed zipping her lips, and handed him the envelope. Quickly he
tore it open, pulled several legal-looking sheets of paper out of it, and
scanned them before looking up.

"Labor
Day's creeping up on us," he said, "nibbling at our collective ass,
so to speak, and..."

Unable to
wait, I interrupted him. "What's that?"

"Applications
for your passports. Lily picked them up, and I've made some phone calls. Seems it's
possible to get emergency passports almost fuckin' overnight."

"Passports?"
I repeated. "Clay, we've never been..."

"...out
of this state..."

“...in
our whole lives."

"Then
it's fuckin high time you saw Europe, however briefly. Okay? We'll just hop over
for a few days, see how the other half lives."

"Oh,
my God!" we gasped. "Berlin?"

"Clark,
why did you buy an attaché case?"

"Duh.
Where are your brains? Now that we know we're officially illegal, Worldwide
Criminal Perverts, we can't leave our goddamned memoirs lying around."
Clark began to pack the spiral notebooks into the slim leather case he'd picked
up at a yard sale. "Shit, if these ever got into the wrong hands... "

"That's
not gonna happen."

"You
never know. Suppose the plane crashes on the way to Berlin, and the police come
in here to investigate?"

"Clark,
that's not gonna happen. Besides, if it does crash, what are they gonna do?
Take our corpses and put em in jail for the rest of our lives?"

"Humor
me, Mark" He closed the lid and locked it. "Here's the key."

"What
should I do with it?"

"I
know! We'll give it to Lily for safekeeping while we're gone. She's the only
one we can trust. Do you think we should shave?"

Mark ran
his hand over his brothers cheek. "Nah. We just shaved last week."

Once we realized
we'd need our birth certificates in order to get our passports, we knew we'd
have to face Mom again right away. No fun. Her defeat in The Battle of Labor
Day was only days old, so we could hardly expect her to cooperate willingly,
but we had no choice.

She was
standing behind the screen door when we got out of the Mazda. But so was Dad.

"What
are you doing here?" she demanded.

"We
need our birth certificates," we explained.

"What
for?"

"Something
to do with Clay's business. We..."

“...have
to prove we're not..."

“...illegal
immigrants. Can we come in?"

She made
no move to unlatch the screen door. "Well, I don't have the slightest idea
where they are."

It was
the driver's licenses all over again, but for the second time in days, Dad
unwittingly came to our rescue.

"Of
course you do, honey. They're in the lock box on the top shelf of the outdoor
wrap closet." He reached around her and unlatched the screen door.
"Come on in."

She
turned on him. "You're going to let them march right in as if they owned
the place, after they've blatantly disobeyed us?"

"Now,
honey, calm down. Labor
Day'll
be here before you
know it." He opened the closet. "Here it is."

He handed
her the metal box, reached in his pocket for his keys, and unlocked it. But she
kept tight hold of it and retreated into the kitchen.

"I'll
do this," she said, sitting and beginning to riffle through the various
deeds, stock certificates, and other documents. "But I know they're
not..."

"There
they are." Dad reached over her shoulder and lifted out the two forms
before she could stop him.

"Oh."
She swallowed her fury. "How did I miss them?"

He handed
them to us. Quickly, we began to examine them.

"12:01.
Just like you always said, Mom." I turned to my brother. "What about
yours?"

"12:01,
just like... Hey, wait a minute. Look!"

He
pointed to the line listing year of birth. "Mom, you always said we were
born the year Reagan was elected President. That was 1980. This says we were
born in '79."

"Well..."
She gulped in several mouthfuls of air before managing to speak. "You know
how I am with dates."

"But
that means..."

“...we're
not sixteen..."

“...we're
seventeen. What's going on?"

No answer
from either of them.

I turned
to Dad. "You had to be in on this, too."

He
nodded. Uneasily, as if he'd unintentionally committed a mortal sin. But he did
nod. "I guess we always knew we'd have to tell you someday, only..."

"Only
not so soon," added Mom. Desperately, she tried to find Scarlett O'Hara.
"Besides, it's so unimportant. What's one year?"

"But
you've been lying to us..."

“...all
our lives? Why?"

Mom
brushed her hair back. "It was not a lie... not exactly... I just
wanted..." The sobs began to gurgle up. "Kids grow up too fast...
being a child is so much nicer than being a grown-up... that's when things
change..." She pushed herself up from the table and stumbled out of the
room.

Still
reeling, we turned to Dad. "Why did you let her?"

He
shrugged. "What was the harm? Besides, your Mom's a very persuasive woman.
I won't fight with her."

"She's
crazy. You should have." In unison.

He shook
his head. "Can't. I love her."

Four days
later, Clay, Clark, and I flew to New York, where we boarded a Lufthansa 747 to
Frankfurt. Lily had summer school finals and couldn't go. She was not happy.

Our
connecting flight from the Midwest was late, and we had to race halfway across
the airport to catch our plane to Germany. Clearly, Clay was a man on a
mission, and he set the pace. I was terrified he might have another heart
attack right there in the terminal, but he didn't, thank God. At the check-in
counter on the ground floor of the International Flights Building, the clerk
examined our tickets and passports, issued our boarding passes, and pointed us
toward an escalator. With an eye on the clock, we rushed forward, took the
ascending stairs two at a time, and stepped off just as our flight was called.
We fell in line and followed Clay up the jetway into the plane.

At the
door stood a blond steward in the blue Lufthansa uniform, directing passengers
to their seats in Coach or First Class. When he spotted us, he quickly gave us
the once-over, his eyes hastily bouncing from our boarding passes to our faces
to our crotches. He smiled.