Deadly Design (9780698173613) by Debra Dockter

rattling cough and know immediately that our neighbor, an aircraft worker forced to retire early because of emphysema, is in the audience. A few days before Connor died, Connor came up to me while I was taking the garbage out, and we’d had a conversation about him. Connor asked me if I’d seen Dick Barber lately. I did what I always do when I hear our neighbor’s name: I laughed. Then he asked me if Dick had wished me good luck at the state meet because he thought I was Connor.
    â€œHe did,” I answered, causing Connor to grimace even though he already knew what I’d done. He had to, or he wouldn’t be asking me.
    â€œSo that’s why he called Dad and asked if I was okay.” He shook his head. “You know you don’t have to flip off every person who accidentally calls you by my name.”
    I told him I did. I absolutely did. But I didn’t tell him that while gesturing “fuck you” was my standard response, there was a part of me that meant it as a thank-you because it felt like a compliment. If somebody wished me good luck at the meet or told me what a good job I’d done at the forensic tournament, or if someone simply waved and smiled because they thought I was Connor, it made me feel good. Made me feel like shit too, because I’m not Connor, but just knowing that somebody thought I could be . . . it felt good. But I didn’t tell him that. I wish I had.
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    There is silence, real silence. There are hundreds of people surrounding me. Hundreds of people breathing and fidgeting and thinking. And staring. The principal has said something. She’s introduced me, and the gymnasium has filled with the silence of waiting.
    I stand, then walk, taking a second to look at my parents. They’re sitting in the first row behind the graduating students, and while I know they want to give me encouraging smiles, smiles to settle my nerves, they can’t. I reach the podium, look down, and start reading. It’s typical stuff, at least what filters through the haze in my brain. Motivational, fortune-cookie shit. “Work hard and you can accomplish anything. Don’t let the difficulties of life dissuade you from your dreams, blah, blah, blah.” And then there’s a space between paragraphs and a handwritten note. It reads Find Kyle in the audience. Look at him. Don’t say another word until he sees you.
    I glance back at the principal. She nods her head knowingly at me and smiles with trembling lips. I look up at the crowd of faces staring down at me. I’m searching through them, but for a second, I’m not sure if I’m looking for Connor or looking for me. I go back to the words.
    â€œKyle,” I read, “I don’t believe in regrets, at least most of the time I don’t. I don’t regret that we were born separately, because the truth is, if Mom had tried to carry us both at the same time, we might both be dead now.”
    Everyone is quiet, breath-held kind of quiet. No one fidgets against the hard chairs; no one fans themselves with their programs or turns through the pages to see how much longer this will take. Even the quivering cries of a discontented infant stop. All anyone can hear are the electric fans moving back and forth to aid the school’s ancient air-conditioning system.
    â€œI guess I do regret a few things. I regret that I didn’t wait for you. I arrived on the path first, and I ran ahead, so far ahead that you couldn’t catch up. I shouldn’t have done that. To make it worse, being twins, I should have figured that people would always be comparing us. It was up to me to set the bar, and I set it too high—for both of us. There’s always been this thing inside me, pushing me to be perfect. And once it started, it was like running down a hill, and you can’t stop, because if you try, you’ll fall, and the hill is so steep you know you