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Ma never talks about the day my twin sister died—

Tara Isabel Zambrano

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      instead she puts on rainbow dresses on me she sewed for her, the quilt that’s embroidered with her name on my torso, instead she never trims my hair and all the boys in the neighborhood tease me, You’re a girl, instead I get accustomed to a ponytail or a braid and grow quiet as if well behaved, instead she scolds me of not taking any interest in housework, so I pull out the weeds from the yard, fold the laundry, instead she teaches me how to cook, instead I always mess up the sizes—diced instead of grated, thicker slices instead of finer, overcooked or raw, instead I start cutting small crescents on my arms that look like a perfect constellation, then going bigger and deeper, seeing how far I can push the blade into the cake of my skin to find the sister I have lost.

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Tara Isabel Zambrano is a South Asian writer and the author of an upcoming short-story collection, Ruined A Little When We Are Born, by DZANC books in Fall 2024. Her work has appeared in Wigleaf Top 50, Best MicroFiction, Best Small Fictions, Tin House Online, SmokeLong Quarterly and other venues.

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