Forty-Eight

Daniel Addas





Clara and I are playing Fortnite on Twitch. Clara has the most views between us. As I once said, people love her. She doesn't even have to speak. Just walks into the room and people become enchanted. I think the reason why people love her so much is because she presents a mystery. Nothing fascinates people more than an aloof individual.
We switch to Trivia Crack Kingdoms. She gets bored of it three minutes in. Well because I'm better at it. Now it's Galaga where the high score reads: CKA CKA CKA CKA CKA (Clara) then BGA (Clara's missing goldfish) DGA (Me). I let Clara win. She really does think she wins ligitimately. That she's just brilliant at all things gaming. She should never know that I'm better.
We all know that unspoken rivalry between siblings. It's there. Hovering. As much as we want what's best for our siblings, we also want to be smarter, more successful. Clara wants to outshine me in everything. She wants to save the day. She wants to be rich. Independent. She wants us (the family) to depend on her. She wants to be praised. I think in her sick, twisted mind she's convinced herself she's a God. She never accepts failure. She always seeks perfection.
The doorbell shrieks.
"I'll get it." Clara.
She comes back herding a group of policemen. Four in total.
"Mind if we look around, twins?" Asks Jones. His search warrant dangles from his hairy fingers.
This is a set up, so Clara and I give the only answer we should give. "Not at all," we say simultaneously.
Clara and I are the sort of twins that think so much alike, we might as well be the same person. We even sound the same. But we aren't really twins. I was adopted.
Two of the policeman slip into the other rooms. Jones and Xavier stay. Jones sits in the sofa opposite me while Xavier parades the house. He looks at the family album hanging the north wall. He snickers his laughter. Fuck. He must be looking at the picture of me wearing a pink necklace. Clara made it for me when I was eight. I wore it with great disgust. The hideous thing even sparkled and had glitter raining down on my chest and shoulders. I had painted a picture of her as a birthday present which still hangs to her wall to this day. Whereas I got rid of her handmade necklace the second she was asleep.
"Daniel can we talk?" Another set up.
I nod.
Clara makes those lame TV show excuses about losing something somewhere and going to look for it. She bends over me, her beefy fingers curl around the IPad on the couch and she whispers, "I'll call Fred. You'll be fine."
I nod. Of course I'll be fine. I hope all this supreme confidence isn't misplaced.
My eyes follow Clara out of the room. She limps until I can't see her anymore.
"So she still self harms?" Jones asks. His voice is so casual you'd swear he was just saying: so it's going to be sunny again today.
"What?" I state at him. "My sister doesn't hurt herself."
He sighs. "Looks like you two like hiding things from each other."
I squirm. Talking about secrets makes me uncomfortable. But talking about secrets with a cop makes me more uneasy. A cop who wants to arrest me. Of course I knew Clara doesn't get cut hiking mountains and cutting through thick forest. She knifes herself. I just didn't know the police knew.
"Do you have siblings detective Jones?"
He nods.
I need to validate my point. "Do you know everything about them?"
He laughs. "Xavier. Everyone knows their siblings secrets. Don't you, X-man?"
Xavier nods.
I roll my eyes. "So you're telling me you know when and to who your sister lost her virginity? You know about Hopewel, William, Commodore, Lucas—"
He groans his distaste and fishes in his pockets and retrieves a thick stack of photos. He throws them on the glass coffee table between us. All pictures of Papa's badly mutilated body. "Pick one. Look at it. What do notice?"
I pick one. Look at it. Notice nothing. Except the obvious: "He's dead?"
"I know that," he says. Impatient. Pointing an index finger at the four corners on the picture closest to him on the table. "It has just come to my attention that you're extremely OCD and obsessively obsessed with the number four. Your father's body was chopped off in an interesting way. His head, along with both of his hands are missing. From the chest to the end of his abdomen he was cut into four pieces. Each leg his been cut two times which makes it another four pieces. His arms too. Notice that the pinkie fingers from each side are also gone which leaves him with four fingers in each foot."
I hate to admit it but he's right. I'd suspect me too if I were an officer.
"But what about his hair? He's clean shaven. Papa was never clean shaven? Ever."
"Oh ... You're absolutely right. He is clean shaven. But what's wrong with that? Men wax all the time." While he says this his eyebrows raise. So what? He's asking. It's like a game to him. Cat and mouse.
"Yes but then Clara has a fear of hair and—"
"That doesn't make sense, Daniel." He narrows his eyes as though I'm being intentionally dumb. "If Clara had Trichophobia then she wouldn't be able to shave your father's hairs. She wouldn't be able to touch it. But someone else, someone who wants to 'create' evidence against her would."
Does he have to say my name every time he speaks to me? It's unnerving.
"But—" my words die at my throat.
"But what, Daniel?" His voice is actually patronising.
"Clara suffers from Trichophobia...And that's why she is bald."
Jones gets up and strokes his chin. "Actually... The reason your sister is bald is because of the thallium."
"No. It's not. Don't you see what's happening here?"
"I see perfectly. Your sister outshines you in everything. She's daddy's favourite but you didn't like that, did you Daniel? So you decide to kill him and make her suffer or was the motive money?" He presses on, measuring my facial expression.
Rage lurches at me, but I keep my eyes on the floor. If I look at Jones, I'll lose it. "I actually couldn't care less about that—"
He interrupts me. "You should. I would if I were you." Pause. Exhale. "Your sister was poisoned. Your father murdered. You should care."
"That's not what I meant. Fuck. Where the hell is my lawyer? Clara? Fuck."
Jones chuckles darkly. "Don't worry. I'm done here."
When I speak, my voice is hollow. "So you aren't going to follow up with this hair thing?"
He hesitates before speaking but his voice is firm.. "Are you saying your sister should be a suspect. That she's the killer? That she poisoned herself?"
That's exactly what I'm saying. But then again, something is wrong. Something is off. Why did she poison herself but framed no one? Nothing adds up.
"That's not what I'm saying."
"What are you saying then, Daniel."
"My father was a fucking Muslim. A devoted fucking Muslim. The kind of Muslim that prays five times and shit. He would never shave and I don't know anyone who hates religion more than her."
"Hmm..."
"Hmm, that's all you're going to say?" I say, my voice strong and sharp. He practices patience, just staring at me. "She usually said she'd shave him. As a joke but maybe not."
"Do you have evidence of this? A voice recording, a video, anything?"
I don't.