Free Thorn in My Side by Karin Slaughter Page B

stares and looks of horror. We had a mirror at home. I knew what a strange sight we made walking down the street. Two heads. One set of legs. One set of arms. We grew out of each other’s torsos like spliced branches on an apple tree. Kirk had two shoulders while I had one and a half. We shared one stomach, one heart, one set of intestines, one spleen, liver, pancreas. Our arms moved independently for the most part. We both controlled the legs, but neither of us could explain how we walked in tandem—nor could modern medicine, which we’d given up on years ago. As far as I could tell, it was a matter of wills and whose was the strongest. Which usually meant Kirk got his way. He itched, and I scratched. He farted, and I said, “Excuse me.” He drank, and I started singing hymns at the top of my lung.
    It was inevitable that our predicament raised questions. But this one in particular was maddening in its stupidity. How long have we been conjoined?
    How long has breath filled my body? How long has wax stopped up my bad ear? How long has the earth turned or clouds waltzed across the sky?
    I said, “We were born this way,” before Kirk could give his usual “accident at the nuclear power plant” remark, which I was half afraid this girl would believe.
    “Freaky,” she said, her fingers pulling blindly at the zipper on her dress.
    “Keep those out of his face,” Kirk warned, an edge to his tone. “You’re with me, not him. Remember that at all times.”
    She finally gave up on the zipper and pulled the dress off over her head. I tried not to, but I couldn’t help but glance at her firm breasts, the gentle curve of her stomach sloping into her darker lady regions.
    Kirk’s head snapped around, and I pretended to be interested in working out the kinks in the headphone wire. Still, I felt my cheeks flush. I was in the wrong here. We alternated our days—always had. It was the best way to keep the peace, and it made sure no one, namely Kirk, could screw things up too badly. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays were mine. Kirk got Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Sundays we split down the middle so that I got to go to church and Kirk got to do exactly what he was doing right now. Being honest, I think he did it on purpose. Saturday was all his. He could’ve debauched himself silly and given me time to recover. But no, as soon as I got home from church, he was spraying on cologne, greasing back his hair, and ironing our tight, low-rider jeans for his big night out.
    “All right!” Kirk clapped our hands together, making me drop the headphones. “Let’s get this party started.”
    With no preamble, she mounted Kirk, her leg wrapping around mine by necessity. I felt a quiver in my ball, the tightening of my asshole. I tried to ignore both as I put on my headphones and started the movie. Little Women . Not the remake with Winona Ryder, but the original with Katharine Hepburn. Classy lady. Angular, athletic. More my type than the needle freak currently bouncing in my half of our lap like an elasticized jackhammer.
    “Yeah,” Kirk groaned, lifting his hips up and down so fast that I got a kink in my neck from trying to keep my head from slamming into the window. “Ride it, baby. Ride it.”
    Not for the first time, I wished I’d had the forethought to take some Dramamine. Motion sickness took over as I tried to concentrate on the movie. I would never admit this to Kirk, but his head lined up more squarely with the rest of our body. Mine angled out a bit, which was hell on my neck and made me look more like a thorn growing out of his side. Which was often how Kirk referred to me, and I will tell you right now, if you think that’s funny, then try being attached to a sex-crazed egomaniac whose idea of a joke is to power-slam bran at every meal so that his asshole—an asshole he doesn’t have to deal with, by the way—rages as wild as the Colorado.
    “Come on,” Kirk coaxed. “Work it hard, baby. Work it