Dude! I'm in Oakland, CA in this coffee place and there's this chick that could totally be Molly. Seriously. It kind of freaks me out. Like, can you check the files? Does she have a secret twin who lives in Berkeley, or something?

Rob OUT!

Sent from my iPhone

Dear Readers,

I received this e-missive from my sometime lab assistant, Rob, who evidently spent his brief Thanks-to-Giving Holiday in California. Evidently, Rob had taken it upon himself to participate in the Opt-Out Day observance of new security protocols, but "Turned out I sorta, like, was distressingly chilled out by getting rubbed up on by a hefty dude in blue gloves, and I sorta flaked after that and ended up boarding the flight I'd bought a ticket for, even though, like, the whole point was to make a stink about getting nuked-or-groped and then not do the flight. Anyway, so, as long as I was in San Jose, it sorta didn't make sense not to crash out with that Mojo editor guy that lives out there, right?"

[In an email, our dear editor Mojo confirmed "That's basically correct, except for he forgot to mention how he ruined Thanksgiving for me, my pregnant wife, our duplex-mates, all of our friends in attendance, and the guy down the street whose address is the same as our address, but backwards. Also, I'm pretty sure he stole my phone. Please dock his pay and punch him in his stupid face." When presented with this account, Rob rebutted "Ha HA! Joke's on him, 'cause I don't even draw a check for th—OOOAH! 'HUT THE 'UCK! 'EYE 'UCKING 'OUTH!!!]

In any event—and more germane to the matter at hand—this is not the first time that the West Coast Twinner phenomenon has been brought to my attention, especially with regard to its special strength in the Bay Area. As this is a matter San Franciscan, I chose to employ the counsel of my Special Adviser on Matters Homosexual (and garage manager), Devo.

"You know I never even lived in SF, right? Just because I'm gay, I don't have special access to the hivemind of the Bay Area, or whatever. I mean, I used to be on a listserv but it got all infighty and split into maybe two dozen rival factions."

"BUT YOU HAVE VISITED DOZENS OF TIMES IN THE LAST HALF-DECADE, WHERE-AS I HAVE NOT BEEN THERE SINCE BRIEFLY AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR TO END ALL WARS."

"And weren't you there for Halloween this year?" Molly called out as she entered the room, sipping from her presidentially crested coffee's mug.

Devo sighed, nodded at his basic predicament—that of being accurately described within his stereotype—and then brightened as he warmed to his topic.

"I've seen at least a dozen twins of Molly down by the Bay, for sure," Devo said, "I almost stopped one on the street last spring, thinking it was her. And I've seen a guy who looked like Fritz, the beardy-printshop editor guy in Michigan, too." Devo turned to Rob, now gingerly sipping from a bottle of Pepsi ONE, "Never seen a twin for you though, Rob-o."

"Yeah," Rob replied, replacing the freezer-treat that he had been applying to his swelling lip, "Well, when God made me It broke the mold, on account I punched It in the fucking Face."

I observed eyerolls of such vigor I feared they may foretell seizures grand mal.

Rob, distressed, re-iterated, "For reals. I am that rough. I roll 50 deep."

"It's hard to take a pugilist seriously," Molly opined, "when he ices his your lip with a SpongeBob push-pop."

"AS I RECALL," I interrupted, "THAT MOLD WAS BROKEN FOR LIABILITY REASONS."

All stared at me, and so I felt the need to sum up what was known by all, but left unstated. It is often my place, as the outsider, to see what is pervasive and yet invisible.

"MOLLY'S BEAUTY IS COSMIC AND ANCIENT. IT IS NATURAL THAT IT WOULD BE WIDELY DISTRIBUTED, AS IT STEMS FROM DEEPER AND MORE ANTIQUE YEARNINGS THAN HISTORY CAN MEASURE. IT IS A WONDER YOU GRUNT CHIMPS DO NOT ALL YET LOOK LIKE HER, AS APPROACHING HER IS THE CLOSEST ANY OF YOU WILL COME TO APPROACHING THE INFINITE. YOUR EARLIEST ANCESTORS RIGHTLY HELD HER UP AS A GODDESS, AND ALL OF HISTORY, ITS LONELY AND TERRIBLE ARC, BENDS TOWARD HER BEATIFIED FACE."

All were momentarily without speech, and Molly's face-cheeks expressed the healthy blush of dilated capillaries.

"Are you comparing Molly to the Old Gods?" Devo asked.

"I thought it was because I'm smart," Molly quipped, her face's flush yet till increasing, "and because I have a great personality; isn't that why our earliest ancestors held me up as a goddess?"

"YES. BECAUSE OF YOUR EXCELLENT PERSONALITY, UNFLAPPABLE UNDER STRESS AND NON-EUCLIDEAN."

"And your badunkadunk is mad-fine," Rob added, his words somewhat slurred by his loosened teeth and popsicle. Devo snickered, and Molly gently reached out, set her warm hand upon Rob's sore cheek, took hold of his swollen lip, and twisted until he wept and wept and wept.

All of which is to say, I am inclined to doubt in the veracity of the West Coast Twinner phenomenon, not because it is unfeasible, but simply because a single iteration of any one of us tends to be far more than sufficient.

I Remain Yours,
The Giant Squid
Editor-in-Chief
PMjA