Just Little Ones (Twin Eriks Oh My!)
[1931 -- Düsseldorf, Germany]
He discovers early on that there is more than one of him, and the information isn't really very shocking. Probably because children are less prone to surprise, or perhaps because neither of them has had the time to accrue that carefully suspicious guardedness that so prominently marks them when they grow older.
Instead there is sheer fascination, a child's delight at finding something different--new--it's not tinged with narcissism; it's just pure wonder, unadulterated by anything so petty and adult. And, as children are wont to do, they jump to the simplest, most obvious conclusion.
Are you me? One of them asks, brow furrowing, face unabashedly searching.
Are you Max Eisenhardt? The other replies, and there's only a beat of silence before they break into identical grins, toothy despite their age--or lack thereof. There was a time when Erik smiled fully like that, all teeth and slightly open-mouthed as though he might bite.
They're five. Unworried about anything that might be going on outside of the fact that they've each found a little boy who looks just as they do.
What do you think Mama would do if I brought you inside? says one of them, and the other produces a giggle that his older self would be ashamed of and replies:
Probably the same thing she would do if I brought you inside.
Pass out. Scream, maybe? To a little boy it's all very funny.
To two little boys, it's twice as amusing.
