UNLIKE SOME CHILDREN when falling in love, Pierrot and Rose never fought. Their temperaments were suited to each other’s. When they were onstage, there was something of this sympathy that people were able to sense. It was like watching a tiny little married couple when they performed. They were able to intuit each other’s movements.
Indeed, wherever they were, they were always able to act in an oddly harmonious way. It was almost as if they were a monster with four child hands. The Mother Superior watched them setting the tables while conversing with each other. They did it quickly and at no point did either of them reach for the same utensil or the same dish. And they set the tables without once bumping into each other, a feat that had not been accomplished in many years.
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THE PATRONS would ask Pierrot and Rose questions. They would try anything to get them to talk. Because wasn’t it amazing that even though they were orphans, they sometimes had things to say, and clever things at that.
Sometimes the patrons would even ask them really sad things. It wasn’t, of course, particularly kind to ask them such sad questions—and they wouldn’t ever ask an ordinary child about something that would no doubt upset them. But Rose and Pierrot were orphans. There was something magical about hearing them talk about their tragic circumstances in such high-pitched voices. They were metaphors for sadness. It was like someone playing a requiem on a xylophone. It wasn’t something you heard every day. They especially liked to ask about the children’s origins.
“My mother was very sick,” Pierrot said. “She coughed all the time. I would put my hand on her back, hoping that it made her feel better, but I’m afraid that it didn’t make her feel better at all. Une nuit, elle toussait à mort.”
“My parents both worked in a hotel, and it caught on fire,” Rose explained. “They panicked and shoved me down the garbage chute. I ended up outside in the trash. They would have got into the garbage chute too, but they were too big.”
“My papa went to war and he died,” Pierrot sadly admitted. “A grenade landed near him and it blew him into a million bits. And my mother was so upset that she jumped out the window.”
They made their beginnings up. They had no intention of wearing their hearts on their sleeves. They kept their hearts neatly tucked away in their chests.
“My father was hanged for murdering my mother.”
Everyone in the room gasped. Rose looked over at Pierrot to indicate that he had gone too far.
“I wanted to kill them both off in one sentence,” Pierrot said when they were outside.
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BECAUSE THEY TRAVELED TOGETHER, they developed intimacy. This was something other orphans didn’t have. Intimacy makes you feel unique. Intimacy makes you feel as though you have been singled out, that someone in the world believes you have special qualities that nobody else has.
“I bet there are all these people just like us on other planets,” Rose said whimsically one evening. “I bet people are alive up on the moon.”
They both looked up at the moon. It was like a child’s face that needed to be wiped clean with a rag.
“What do you think it’s like up there?” Pierrot asked.
“It’s probably just like this planet except everything is lit up. Like if you have a glass of milk, it lights up. And when you drink it, you look down at your belly and you can see it shining through.”
“And the apples look like they’re made out of silver, but you can bite into them.”
“And the white cats glow so much, you can use them as lamps for your room.”
“And everybody has white hair just like old people—even the babies.”
They found out just how funny they were by hanging out with each other. They began to develop a new language. They had a different dictionary and every word had a slightly different meaning for them than it had for anyone else. No one else could understand what they were saying to each other. Every word they spoke was a metaphor.
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SINCE THEY WERE BOTH very good with sleights of hand and magic tricks, it was easy for them to steal. One day Rose slipped a load of sugar cubes into her sleeves and then shook them out into her pocket. When she got back to the orphanage, she held out her palm, which now gripped a stack of sugar cubes, shaped like an igloo. The children opened their mouths like baby birds and she dropped a sugar cube into each one. This way the other children were not jealous of her and Pierrot’s escapades. They began performing as a duo for the children as well.