Part One"Dorothy, Dahling, your résumé it's weak. Flimsy, really. You need something to ah how can I say it well, we want people to take you seriously. Why don't you go over to that Stanislavski Strasberg Adler Meisner Hagen Institute you know the one, Dahling over there by the university. They'll help you. I know they will."Of course, I expressed some hesitancy."I don't know. I heard they're kind of expensive, and things are really tight right now.""This is your future, Dahling! You've got to invest in your future! Are you going to trust Korkie?""I guess I could give it a try.""There is no try only do. So, you'll call them tomorrow? Here's the number."And that's how I got talked into going to the ice-cream-melting, tree-blowing-in-the-wind acting class. So, I was sitting in acting class and the teacher, Mr. Stinkmuffin, was blabbing on and on about sense memory or something like that. It was completely boring. I was ready for a snooze. (Oh his name wasn't really Mr. Stinkmuffin at least, I don't think it was. But that's what everybody called him because he always smelled like he had just farted.) I wasn't really paying attention to what Stinkmuffin was chattering about; I was more interested in checking out Luke, the fine-looking aspiring actor who sat behind me. I was in the midst of this incredible daydream with Luke and me in a hot tub and Luke was just about to kiss me when my cell rang. It was my mother. "Hello Dorothy?" she yelled into the phone.Like who else would be answering my cell phone?"Yeah""This is your mother.""I know, Mom." As if I didn't recognize her voice after twenty-six years."Something absolutely tragic has happened; you have to come home right away."Normally, something tragic for my mother would be missing a big sale at JC Penny's. But this time it really was tragic."What's going on, Mom?""I can't really discuss it on the phone. When can you be here?""Well, I'm in acting class right now.""Can you leave?""I suppose so, but."I didn't really want to leave class early because a bunch of us were supposed to go clubbing in Y'bor City after class and I really wanted to get to know Luke better. What could be that important, anyway?"Dorothy, it's your father. Please come home now."Then she just hung up. I never heard my mom like that before. Her self-help induced cheerfulness had turned somber and dark somehow foreboding. I knew something was very wrong.So I told Mr. Stinkmuffin I had a family emergency I needed to attend to, made sure to smile at Luke on my way out, and drove to my parent's house. Now, the living room of my parent's house could have been called a movie memorabilia museum of sorts, since both of my parents loved old films. Most of their furnishings had some connection to an old movie. Even my twin brother and I were named after the main character in one of my mother's favorite movies. Growing up, we watched The Wizard of Oz five-hundred and seventeen times. Being named Dorothy Gales Robinson wouldn't be so bad if I didn't bare such a striking resemblance to Judy Garland herself. I often wonder whether this is sheer coincidence or one of those incredibly strange twists of fate. I guess I feel kind of sorry for my brother, even though I hate him. He got stuck with Jude Garland Robinson for a moniker. But at least he doesn't look like Judy Garland. He's actually more of the Charlie Sheen type. I could go on and on about the trials and tribulations of being a twin. It's bad enough having a twin brother I could only imagine the stress of being an identical twin. I'm the oldest, if there really is such a thing in twindom. I'm not convinced. I was born first, but my brother came only three minutes later. I often wonder whether the whole psychology-of-birth-order thing applies to twins. I've done a lot of reading on the subject. They say that fraternal twins are no more alike than other non-twin siblings. I'm happy to say that Jude and I are nothing alike. We have a love-hate relationship. We both love hating each other.It must have come as quite a shock to my parents when my mom went into labor and twins popped out. They were living in a hippie commune at the time and rejected the whole prenatal care thing. There wasn't a doctor present at our birth my parents preferred a midwife. I've never actually met a midwife, at least not since I was born. I imagine they look all earth-motherly with long, flowing dresses and long, super-straight hair. Probably a few crystal pendants dangling from their necks. And they smell of patchouli oil, no doubt. When I arrived at my parent's house on that ill-fated evening, my brother was sitting on my parent's Gone with the Wind couch. An authentic replica from the actual film, or so my dad always said. Jude was sitting there just staring into space. He didn't say a word when I entered the room. Now if you knew Jude, you'd understand that this was the only time in his entire life that he didn't have an overabundance of discourse spewing forth from his pie-hole. Jude is an attorney. It's a profession he was born to pursue. When I sat down next to my brother, he acted like I didn't even exist. This wasn't really any different than the way he usually treated me except he didn't make any rude or nasty comments about my hair, clothing, or lack of gainful employment. After a brief but seemingly eternal moment, my grandmother broke the silence. "Your mother should be out in a minute, Dorothy.""What's going on, Frannie?" I asked.Since I can remember, my grandmother has insisted that my brother and I call her by her first name. I didn't know this was so unusual until I realized that none of my friends ever called their grandmothers anything but "Grandma." Luckily, Frannie sounds enough like Grannie that my brother and I don't stand out in a crowd."I think we should let your mother talk to you about it," she said."Talk to me about what? What's going on? Why is Jude looking like somebody died?" I've always had this uncanny ability to say exactly the WRONG thing at the absolute worst possible moment.Finally, Jude spoke. "Maybe it's because somebody did just die, you moron."The realization hit me like a ton of bricks. No one had said anything about my dad. Frannie hadn't said, "Your mother and father are going to be talking to you." My mom didn't say, "Come home; your dad and I need to talk to you." Just where was he, anyway? That's when I screamed at the top of my lungs like some wild woman of the jungle, "Would somebody please tell me where my dad is?! "As soon as I exploded, my mom came running out of the kitchen. She was wearing the same somebody-just-died look that my brother was wearing. "Maybe you'd better sit down, Pumpkin," she said."I don't want to sit down," I said. "I want one of you to tell me what's going on.""Please sit down. Take the On Golden Pond rocker. It's your favorite chair.""I really don't feel like sitting right now. Would you please just say whatever it is you have to say?"I already knew what she was going to say. I just needed someone to say it out loud.My mother took a deep breath. "Your father is he's gone.""What do you mean he's gone?" I asked. "He's dead," Jude said.There it was. Out in the open. Now that the words were spoken, no one could take them back. But how could he be dead? My dad was only forty-eight; it didn't make any sense. "What happened?" I asked.It was another one of those brief eternal moments.Finally, Frannie said, "The police said there was in a terrible accident. Apparently the brakes gave out on a city sanitation truck and it sped out of control, crashing into the Buckstar's Coffee Shop where your dad was having a non-fat decaf mocha latte.""I always told him Buckstar's was evil," I said."You and Jude are going to have to be strong for your mother," said Frannie. "This is a very difficult time for her."That was the last thing I remember my grandmother saying before I passed out. I knew I should have listened to my mother and sat down. A few hours later, I woke up in my old bedroom. It had been about eight years since I'd moved out, but my mom hadn't changed a thing. It was like being lost in the 80's. All of my old posters still covered the walls: Howard Jones from his One World Tour, a really cute Julian Lennon head shot, Corey Hart (wearing his 'sunglasses at night'), and a full cast poster of the Kids from Fame (the television series, not the movie). To this day, I still don't know how I got back to my room. When I opened my eyes, Jude was standing over me holding a newspaper."Nice of you to rejoin the family in our time of need," he said."What happened?" I asked."You passed out."Then I remembered that my dad was dead and it wasn't just a bad dream. "Here's the evening edition of the Tampa Times," Jude said, tossing the newspaper at me. The headline on the front page read I tossed the newspaper back at Jude."So, what happens now?" I asked."What do you mean?" he said."I mean what do we do? I've never had a parent die before. I don't know the protocol." "Since Dad died at the scene of the accident, there's going to be a police investigation.We have to find out when they can release his body so we can make funeral arrangements. My law firm has a number of associates who deal with wrongful death claims, so we're covered there. I also have a few buddies who deal with wills and probate. Mom has to make a few calls to find out what kind of insurance coverage he had stuff like that.""What about us? What do we do?""I don't understand where you're coming from. We don't do anything."It just didn't seem right. Your dad dies and you don't do anything. "I don't feel so hot," I said. "I've got to get some rest." I threw the blanket back over my head and slept for three days.
