Facing Myself

My mother looks at me like I have two heads. But considering there are two of me standing in the room right now, I suppose that’s technically true. 

“Honey?” Mom says, pursing her lips and putting a shaking hand, heavy with silver rings, to her chest. Her face flicks over me, then the mirror image beside me, then me again.  “I… um, darling? June?” 

I look over at the Other June, who informed me upon our first meeting that she prefers her (my? our?) full name,  Juniper. I always thought that name was a little too flower-power for my personality, but she thinks it suits her just fine. 

Juniper doesn’t seem to care, or even notice, that she’s crashed Thanksgiving dinner. In her bulky black combat gear, she looks completely at ease– hands set loosely on her hips, a soft smile on her lips, hair falling down in soft, loose waves with a silkiness that implies the invention of some magic conditioner that only exists in her world. Even though we are quite literally the same person, she still stands a couple inches taller than me, thanks to the platform soles of her heavy black boots. 

Naturally, Juniper is the only one who’s nonplussed. My entire extended family stares at us, their faces a range of horror, madness, and confusion. My mom's mouth still opens and closes like a fish gasping for air. My grandpa puts a hand on Mom’s shoulder and steadies her as she sinks into her chair.

“Mom, I can explain,” I say, very much unable to explain. Hey, Mom, you know how in that one Spider-Man movie, Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield show up? Well, imagine that I’m Tom Holland. 

Juniper puts a loose arm around my shoulder. “Mom– or, Ms. Johnston, I guess– I’m just going to borrow June for a second. Matter of multidimensional security. I promise she’ll be back in one flap of a butterfly’s wing.” 

The table continues its slack-jawed silence.

“Get it?” Juniper says to me, her eyebrows scrunched together like the most shocking thing at this dinner table is that no one laughed at her joke. “Like, the butterfly effect. Cause we’re messing with time and space and all that.” 

“Um, Juniper,” I hiss, whispering even though the entire table is watching us. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

Before she has time to respond, I grab her by the arm and pull her into the kitchen. 

Juniper’s eyebrows shoot up as she eyes the pumpkin pie sitting on the kitchen counter, prepped for dessert. 

“Don’t even think about it,” I say. 

Juniper huffs, then puts out a hand and begins examining her cuticles. “Do you think I should paint my nails? I like this red on you. I didn’t realize we could pull it off.”

“Sure. Follow-up question: what the hell are you doing here?”

“Well, I didn’t get the invite for Thanksgiving dinner from you, so I figured it got lost in the mail.”

“Seriously, dude,” I say. The name “Juniper” still feels strange and sticky in my mouth. 

“Matter of multidimensional security,” she says. “I told you.”

“Riiiiiiight. And this has to do with me how?” 

Juniper just stares at me like she can’t believe we share the same DNA. “I don’t know, might have something to do with me being involved in it, and you being another version of me.” 

“There’ve got to be other versions of us who can help you with whatever you’re working on a hell of a lot better than I can. Also, I really think that you are another version of me.” 

Juniper rolls her eyes, grabs a knife out of the drawer, which she locates with perfect ease, and begins cutting into the pan of pumpkin pie. 

“Hey!” I protest, but she continues to section off a slice and heap it onto one of the plates we reserve for guests. I stare at her in silence. She’s cut a triangle right out of the middle of the pie– no crust– like a psychopath. 

I don’t know how we’re the same person. 

“What was that?” 

Guess that thought had bubbled to the surface. “Nothing.” 

Juniper shrugs, takes a bite, and hums approvingly. “So, you were asking why I don’t just ask another one of us. Maybe one of us who doesn’t dress like a librarian.” I open my mouth to protest, but she continues. “You, in particular, are involved in this. Or, at least, other people in this universe, who’re close to you. So, it’s you, Junie. Sorry ‘bout it. I’m not giddy over it, either.” 

“And when you say people in my universe are involved in this… what do you mean? What… what am I supposed to do about this?” 

Juniper scrapes the last bits of pie off her plate, and sets it on the counter with a loud, careless clatter. I can only assume the reason no one has come into the kitchen to check on us yet, between the noise and the situation of Juniper being a very… er, strange visitor, is that my family’s brains are still buffering. 

Juniper shrugs. “Hell if I know. Luke says it’s imperative, though.” 

A shudder travels down my spine. Luke’s name is confirmation of the feeling creeping in at the periphery of my body since Juniper arrived. 

Luke, who didn’t belong in this dimension, no matter my protestations. Luke, who belongs in Juniper’s. 

Her lips turn up at the corners and her eyes flash. “So I’ve finally got your attention.” 

I glance over my shoulder. My family is beginning to stir in the dining room. Uncle Ewan pokes his head in the direction of the kitchen doorway, straining to get a glimpse of the two Junipers staring at each other over the kitchen island. My grandmother’s hands shake so badly I can see them from here. 

Can I blame her? They must all believe they’re going crazy, or that someone accidentally slipped a different kind of mushroom into Aunt Becky's gratin. Shit, shit, shit. Juniper has brought chaos into my house, which means, by extension, I’ve brought chaos into my house. 

The hopeful bit of me says I can try to stop this here, tell her to stop showing up beneath the bleachers at school to try to wrangle me into some scheme, to stop leaving notes for me to remind me that none of this is a dream, however much I want it to be. To stop nearly colliding with my family’s Thanksgiving dinner thanks to some ill-planned interdimensional travel. 

Juniper, though, is looking at me like she already knows what I’m thinking. Which, despite our differences, is probably true.

“Great,” Juniper says, not waiting for my response. “We should get going now. Luke–” she pumps her eyebrows suggestively– “Will be waiting for us.” 

I take a final glance through the doorway, at the table of stirring relatives, looking around the dining room with shock etched into every line on their faces. At my mom, whose glassy eyes still stare blankly at the plate of food gone cold before her. 

“Take my hand, Junie,” Juniper says, and for once, I see what I think is a flash of recognition in her eyes. “I’m turning this thing on, and then you can’t let go, or you’ll get sucked into the cosmic goo.” 

“Cosmic what?!” 

“Kidding,” Juniper says. “Hold on tight, though.” 

I cast one more glance in my mom’s direction, saying a silent goodbye and reciting a promise to be back soon. 

An elbow pushes softly into my side. Juniper doesn’t look over as she fidgets with the device strapped to her chest, an octopus of wires that will shortly take both of us away. 

But, so quiet she’s almost inaudible, she says, “They’ll be okay.” 

I heave out a shaky breath, and Juniper begins counting down. As the world begins to blur and a deafening roar rushes into my ears, the last thing I see is Juniper grabbing the entire pan of pumpkin pie, one piece already taken out of its middle.

God, I’ll have some explaining to do when I get back.