All my life I've been a half. Half of the Cooper twins, only one sister. Allie and I are not so much sisters, more like best friends. I know, cliche, right? Only it's a truth that's become fact in our bedroom.

Allie and I are identical twin sisters, and more than our features jive. Our personalities are parallel, mirroring the other's. Great, sure... but not all the time. I was never only "Laura". I always was "Laura, you know, the twin?"

Identity is paramount, especially in the seventh grade, which I ever so conveniently have been attending for three and a half months. And not having an identity all my own makes me feel like a balloon. I'm tied down, and everybody looks at the two tied together like a pair. But I want the party host to come along and untangle my string from that of my sister's, setting my free. A red tomato against the vast blue sky. In such a dream, Allie floats upward the other way.
___

"No, Laura, what are you doing?!" Allie shrieks. I glare at her, "Uh, watching a movie. What does it look like?"

She snatches the remote from my hands and clicks the OFF button. "You're supposed to come with me to the library tonight. Remember, big English test tomorrow?" I groan and lean back on the olive green couch in our living room. "Allie, that's easy. Come on, I've already studied." I make a grab for the remote, but she's faster and pulls it out of my grasp. "Oh yeah? What does plagiarism mean?!"

I sigh and recite the definition: "the practice of taking one's work and passing it off as one's own." She still seams unsatisfied. "Spell it." She demands in a doubtful tone. "P-L-A-G-I-A-R-I-S-M." Allie just lost the battle.

"Wouldn't you rather do something fun than watch whatever this is?" She tosses the remote on a nearby couch cushion. I pick it up instantly. "Not really. Can you move?" I switch the television back on and continue watching my movie.

Allie throws her head back dramatically and grunts before plopping down beside me on the couch. "What movie is this anyway?"

I explain her it's actually a documentary, not a movie, and tell her it's about climbing Mt. Everest. "The tallest mountain in the world?" She says for clarification. I shake my head wildly. "People always think that! Actually it's just the highest mountain above water. Mt. Mauna Kea is way taller, only under water."

Allie rolls her eyes. "Nerd."

She watches the entire rest of the documentary, though. Absorbed in the struggle of a mountain Sherpa and a climber. Once the credits start rolling she flicks her reality switch back on and stands up. "We should have watched, like, a love story or something."

My sister and I have different movie tastes, clearly. But that's barely a difference, yet one of our biggest. Nobody knows me as "Laura, the documentary-watcher" or Allie as a "romance fanatic".

Allie stretches quick. "Gosh-" she says through a yawn, "what time is it." My eyes wander to the bluish glow on the screen of our oven, which can be seen perfectly through the doorway between the living room and kitchen. "After ten," I tell her. "Late enough for mom to yell at us." She and I scurry down the narrow hallway to our bedroom.

Our house has three bedrooms; ours, our parents, and a guest bedroom. Allie and I have always shared a room. When we were babies, it was for convenience reasons. Now that we're older, and our parents don't constantly need to care for us; we just never broke the habit.