NATALYA AND VALENTINA

NATALYA AND VALENTINA

by Marianne Carlson

For as long as she could remember, Natalie had an imaginary twin. As a child her twin was her constant companion. Had it not been for Valentina, life in the small NJ suburban town outside New York City where she grew up would have been unbearable for it was Valentina who pushed her, kicking and screaming, to try out for the swim team, to sing a solo in Guys and Dolls in the local theatre production, to denigrate herself continually auditioning in front of bored clients looking for the perfect teenager. How ironic her life had become. Since the Ruth White Agency had signed her up, Natalie was  the perfect “girl next door” in magazines and on billboards. She sold shampoo, deodorant, jeans, her soul. As her fame grew, her ego, brittle to start with, diminished and was in danger of disappearing altogether. Natalie walked through the door,  charming agents and photographers alike, but it was Valentina who always sealed the deal. 

Tall and graceful, she moved like a giselle with the long, lean look of a ballerina. When she smiled, which was rare, she was captivating. When pensive, she appeared to be consumed with melancholy, her mind was clearly somewhere else,  not a good place for her to be. 

“Natalya, we have to be more careful, people are beginning to notice.” Valentina always called Natalie “Natalya.”

“Notice?”

“Yes, never talk to me in front of other people. They will think you are odd, that there is something wrong with you.”

Fear gripped her. As Valentina talked, a feeling  of  pure terror engulfed Natalie.  They were coming more frequently, the preliminary rush in her head leading up to a full-blown panic attack, leaving her weak, vulnerable and shaking.  She had learned early on to never let anyone know what she was thinking,  never tell anyone, never utter an opinion about anything. Valentina thought for her. The magnitude of losing her twin began to take hold from that moment on. Natalie’s reality, her fame depended on Valentina, without her she was nothing. 

“Look at it this way, Nat. I’m the alpha dog, you the beta.” 

“OK. Fine with me.”

But it was not fine. If you are always someone else, who are you? Natalie was a graceful swimmer, her free style times beat everyone else in her age group but while Natalie walked into the locker to change into her bathing suit, it was always Valentina who walked onto the deck of the pool.  And then there were those damn auditions. Natalie’s mother enrolled her in a spiffy advertising agency in Manhattan. The woman who interviewed her was everything Natalie hated - large, loud and brassy with lots of bracelets that clanked as she drummed her long red nails on her day planner while looking at Natalie through myopic, pale blue eyes too proud to wear glasses. One too many face lifts had frozen her thin lips into a smile that looked more like a perpetual grimace, and through that grimace she oozed hostility born from jealousy. Surrounded by young girls on the cusp of their   allure, hers had long since passed her by. As a result, anger bubbled below the surface, and  unacknowledged anger can be a very scary thing. There was no way Natalie could deal with the horror of this woman, but Valentina loved her.  She was a challenge, and Valentina loved nothing more than a challenge.  

“Dear, you are exactly what Ruth White looks for. How do you stay so slim?”  Both Natalie and Valentina hated it when anyone called them “dear,” it was the kiss of death as far as they were concerned.

“I swim.”

“Wonderful. Just keep on doing what you are doing and you will go far with us.” The Grimace said she would be in touch, and the next thing she knew Valentina was signing a contract. She signed “Natalie” on the dotted line.  

“Oh, my dear, you are lovely beyond belief,” Natalie muttered as she went down the elevator, talking to the mirrored walls surrounding her.

“You bet your sweet ass I am, and we are going to make some big bucks off of you, Grimace, ” answered Valentina.

And so it began: the “cattle calls,” looking for teenage girls for a fast foods commercial, a shoe line, a family scene advertising a mini van, rain gear. Natalie auditioned for all of them. The panic attacks reared their ugly heads on a regular basis. Every time she read or danced or smiled or cried or ate some God-awful processed cheese for yet another self-serving client, Natalie panicked,  but Valentina was always there to put the pieces together as quickly as she fell apart.

“Please swim to the edge of the pool, pause, and then climb slowly up the steps. Try it again, you almost have it.” The client for SwimGear was becoming exasperated.  It was hot on the deck and the lights from the crew and photographers were making it even hotter. Natalie began to shiver, she had been in the water for over an hour and she was cold.

“What am I doing wrong?”

“The timing is off, if you could swim a little slower, and then pause and wait before you climb the stairs.” The client, the ad people, The Grimace was pissed. 

“I can’t do this, I just can’t. Natalie’s world was beginning to cave in on her, the panic, the voices, they were in the pool, they were coming after her.  

“Over here, Natalya, over here.” Valentina waved from lane six, her white bathing cap and black goggles shrouded in a cloud of mist.  Natalie left lane one, and swam under water across the pool.

“What the fuck is she doing now?” The camera man shook his head while wiping the sweat off his red, pudgy face. 

Natalie’s lungs were caving in but she managed to reach Valentina.

“Valentina, I thought you had left me, I thought you were gone, this time for good,” Natalie sobbed.

“I told you, Natalya, I would never leave you. You need to believe me. 

The crew on the deck watched the white bathing cap go under water again, and waited for it to reappear. After ten minutes, The Grimace called 911.

It's All Temporary