I tell her, “I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“Then let’s talk about something else,” Emma says.
“What did you have in mind?” I ask.
“It doesn’t matter,” Emma says. “What do you want to talk about?”
“Right now,” I tell her, “I don’t know what there is to say. I mean, Danna’s sick and she’s not going to get any better in a permanent kind of way. There’s no reason to think she won’t live a happy and full life, but times like this make me just wonder how she can wake up in the morning and decide that life is still worth living.”
“She’s still got a smile on her face after everything, huh?” Emma asks.
“Oh no,” I tell her. “Danna’s one of the most cynical people I’ve ever known. She always has been in one way or another. That’s the comforting thing, really.”
“How so?” Emma asks.
“It hasn’t changed,” I tell her. “She was cynical before her diagnosis and she’s cynical now. I guess the things that make me feel more hopeful aren’t the occasional improvements or the long stretches when she’s symptomless, they’re the things that just haven’t changed.”
“She’s still your sister,” Emma says.
I haven’t shared too much about Emma with Danna, nor have I shared that much about Danna with Emma. In my life, there are two separate and distinct worlds. In one world, I am me, Damian Jones, actor, extraordinarily handsome gentleman, etc. In the other, though, I’m Danna’s twin, and in that world, nothing is more important.
“I know she’s still my sister,” I tell Emma. “I’m just sick of losing so many little pieces of her. This thing, it just chips away at a person, bit by bit, until even when symptoms aren’t relapsing, life and the drive to continue living it just starts to make a little less sense.”
“Have you ever wondered why this happened to her and not to you?” Emma asks.
I’m not entirely sure what to say to that.
“Listen,” I tell Emma, “I told you that I didn’t want to talk about any of this. Now that we have, is there any way we can just let the whole thing drop?”
“I guess so,” Emma says. “It’s a shame, though. It’s a real, real shame.”
I sigh and ask, “What’s that?”
“You almost sounded like you were on the verge of saying something that was going to make you feel better,” she says. “I haven’t the slightest idea what it might have been, but I saw that little gleam in your eye. Come on, out with it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I tell her.
“I think you do,” she says. “I don’t know if you were going to answer my question or if you were going to tell me the rules to seven card stud, but whatever came into your mind right then—that was important.”
“That’s the thing,” I tell her. “I wasn’t thinking anything that I wasn’t saying. I don’t know what you want to hear.”
“What happened to your parents?” she asks.
“You’ve seen the magazines and the talk shows,” I tell her. “You must have heard the story at some point, if nothing else, at least on the set.”
“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” she says.
“I really don’t want to,” I tell her.
“That’s all right,” she says. “So, why’d you break up with me?”
“Can we maybe do this another time?” I ask.
“Well, we’re here. We may as well talk about something,” she says. “We may as well work out any issues remaining between us before they overtake and kill the friendship I hope we still have.”
“We’re still friends,” I tell her. “The problem isn’t you. The problem isn’t even Danna or me,” I continue. “The problem is that I only have so much capacity for some things before I get filled up. The problem is that I feel guilty about starting a torrid love affair while my sister’s lying in a hospital bed, okay?”
“She wants you to be happy, doesn’t she?” Emma asks.