Separated
by Stephanie Denise BrownDo you remember your last trip to Earth? I remember your fear of dragonflies. You thought they would sting like bees, pierce the membrane with their rigid arrowed bodies, and burrow deep beneath the surface to create a patch of wrinkles in your skin, where the iridescent wings struggled to fly inside of you.
Remember the grapes? You stared in panic with your wandering eyes as the nurse plunged the cluster into her hungry mouth on an afternoon break. The bright viridian fruit resembled the cellulose prints taken after our delivery.
The doctors said our birth is what mutilated mama. She pushed and pushed down on us, and together we forced ourselves out of her tight birth squeeze. The separation stripped the lining of her internal walls, the way hands tear tomatoes from fruit vines. As conjoined twins, they knew we shared one central nervous system; but no one perceived the powers secreted within our life fluids.
Time passed. I mutated and ripened into humanness. My appendages morphed out of our shared green skin, distancing myself from you as if I were a stranger. You rebirthed me: shoulder to arm, hip to thigh, knee, ankle, and foot. I emerged an individual, an angular, monstrous, human thing. I stood outside of you, quivering on anemic legs, our link severed.
I watched the green gash in your bleeding flesh meld. Your skin rippled and sprouted a patch of worms to compliment your eyes. The writhing hive moved like a trembling, screaming mouth as your immune system adapted to the transformation. A faint scar lines the left side of my body where you split from me. I've never fully recovered from the separation.
Neither has mama. She and I talk in between her sleeping and sweating. I keep close to her like a baby in need of a cry. I feed her ice chips while she tells me stories. All the talking drains her energy and I beg her not to speak. She said she feels her cells rejecting the part of daddy she passed on to you and I.
Have you ever heard the story of how they met? Mama told me she studied the geology on Anaya-3 with a team of earth scientists when they encountered daddy and the rest of (y)our ancestors. She talked about how excited both worlds were to make contact with a new species. Those were peaceful years when everyone explored the unknown, shared resources, and exchanged knowledge. Things changed after the births and unexplained deaths on both sides. Some say we were never meant to partner in such ways...
Mama misses lying on the grass and listening to the rivers on Anaya-3 rush like emerald earth oceans, but I miss you. I miss daddy, too. Does he think of me? Is that a silly question? I guess I didn't come out the way he expected. You two have a special bond, one forged by a biological receptor. That is why they fear you and forced all the space-strangers to leave. I grew immune to that connection the day I developed a tongue. I asked mama when I would see you again and she said, "When both governments settle their differences."
Mama said she wants me to remember that I will always be a part of you, no matter how different I look from (y)our people. Somewhere deep within, humanity stirs in you. I saw a picture of our mother's birth home in Africa; she made me promise to go there one day. I hope you'll go with me when you return. Earth is your home, too.
You've been gone for years but your presence still lingers. The television in the corner ceiling reports rumors everyday. Do you feel the gravity begging you back, my distant twin? I can't get your verdant scent out of my skin. My scar itches often.
When I look at the sky from the hospital window, I pretend you and I are in open conversation. I close my eyes; my skin drinks the ultraviolet rays of the sun and in that moment...you love me.
What I'm about to write might frighten you. Do you promise not to get scared? I'm losing my skin. The layers peel in long, thin strands like mama's waist-length hair. I'm trying to keep the shreds hidden beneath my clothes but I fear I can't keep the secret much longer. My fingernails are already turning green.
Mama is dead now. When will you and daddy return for me? You've been gone too long. They say I'm an orphan, a property of Earth. The doctors make me do things I don't want to do. They make me change into different things. Dangerous things. When I don't do it right or fast enough, they get mad and call me a threat. Sometimes I can control it. Other times, it's like a sneeze. I sense a new sensation tickling to the surface and I uncontrollably explode into a fresh form. I get sick when I shape-shift too much.
Sometimes they give me a taste of what they call freedom. I gaze at the night sky, clouded by a charged force field. The stars blanket the horizon and I get dizzy trying to find my way through heaven from the dirt ground. Then I get tired and they make me come back inside. There are times when I can't find myself back to myself and I feel as if I'm caged in every new shape I take. There are times when I want to destroy this world, evaporate and rise from the ashes, drift into space, descend into (y)our home's horizon, and breathe the remains of my life into you. I wonder. Are you changing, too?
I worry. When will your human-secrets come out, my alien sister? When will you come home? I fear you won't know me then.
© Stephanie Denise Brown
Stephanie Denise Brown earned her Master of Fine Arts degree from Mills College and works full time at a library. Stephanie is both shy and outspoken; she's forever chasing the impossible and doesn't know if that makes her an optimist for believing in the impossible or a pessimist for saying "impossible." She lives in the City of Angels.