I tried to kill her before I was born. The knees of her long legs jabbed my ribs and her high cheekbones poked me in the eyes. At thirty-six weeks a foetus has no fingerprints so nothing could have linked me to the crime. But my tiny fingers could not fit around her throat, so I grabbed her umbilical cord with all my might. She thrashed around our mother’s sack deprived of oxygen and nutrients. My strength gave way and I collapsed into sleep. I had failed. The race to be exit the sack was breached and unfair. I awoke one morning to find her head already lodged in the tunnel. Electra came out first and I, second in the race, was named Echo.

My six-hundred-pounds-an-hour therapist says my story of our birth is rich in symbolism. However, he wants me to describe real memories of my childhood for next time. My memories, our past, is on the wall above my sister’s perfect head. French antique frames hold publicity photos, newspaper features and snaps of us with the stars – our Daddy always in the background. Anything I can’t recall from the past has been preserved in documentaries profiling the twin, child actresses with the Midas touch. From womb to acting classes, to stage, to TV, to silver screen: always us two together. Our memories and movements are public property.

Electra’s blond hair flows down the back of the chaise longue. All the furniture in our trailer was sent from France by mother. She missed our ninetieth birthday three months ago and decided to fit out our ‘home away from home’ as a gift. ‘If my babies are going to be sardined in that hideous trailer let them at least have finery around them.’ I didn’t resent her missing the event. The South of France affords her the ideal combination of sun, attentive young men and a doctor with a generous prescription pad.

Electra flicks through a magazine, stopping for a moment occasionally. She sighs, disappointed her cursory glance didn’t satisfy her curiosity and relieve her boredom. “Christ, how long is this going to be…” She throws the magazine on top of her script. She clearly wants me to be mummy. “Electra Darling, I know it’s a bore, but we’re due on set in just over an hour. Knowing your lines could be awfully useful. I won’t have you making yourself look silly.” She looks to her right, giving me a pouting, distant and vaguely troubled profile. “Don’t be concerned darling,” she retorts, “I’m sure the script’s the same as all the others.”

She stands. Her size six jeans perfectly filled, especially around her pert little ass. She looks between the wooden blinds. Outside the crew mill around the set and fifty meters back fans and paparazzi are held at bay. Only in here are we safe from the publicity that’s necessary to stay afloat. “You do this stuff day in, day out Echo. But I just don’t have that same ability – certainly not long term.” She gives me a smile that’s normally reserved for fans in wheelchairs. I watch her take three small steps and traverse the trailer. “Really Electra, you’ve always carried me – just ask Daddy. You’ll still be keeping the kids entertained for years yet.” She doesn’t take the bait. She starts playing with her nails, which have been painted to resemble miniature swan’s wings.

“Robert was talking to you quite a lot yesterday…” She says, probing.
“He’s actually quite witty, considering all the junk he’s on. He’s a good actor too.”
“Interested?”
“Him or me?” She shrugs, running a finger over her stomach, which is palates and starvation flat.
“I heard Robert’s on heroine.” Her tone contains no warning or concern. Her only real question is ‘did he speak about me?’ It’s my turn to thumb through the magazine.

I try a different tack, holding up the script: “If you want, we can read it through together?”
“I’ll look through it myself. Chad called. He said he’s got a part for me.” Chad has been on the verge of making it as an indie film director for years now.
“What does Daddy think?” She stomps up to her feet, recovers and pretends to stretch. Her fingers nearly touch both walls when she does crucifixion position. She finishes with her hands on taught waistline. “Daddy’s going to have to realise that his little girl has grown up and can’t keep doing cutesy twin sister movies forever.”
“I understand your frustrated but there are other people involved here…other interests. He’s chasing a horror movie for us. He’s been looking in the states…”
“Oh please Echo. He’s had his chance to break us into the America and hasn’t managed it. Besides, I need something more challenging. Chad understands that.” Chad understands the extent of her bank balance.
“It’s not like either of us have done so well outside of the twins thing.”
“That was managed by Daddy too. This is going to be different. This reliance you have on Daddy and I is interesting. Have you talked to your shrink about it?”
“I’m not blissfully fulfilled either, but doing this pays the bills darling. Daddy works hard for us. We’ve done a lot better than most. Mustn’t be too greedy. Remember the dog who saw the reflected bigger bone?”

The familiar three-tap knock precedes Carlos. He’s still saving up to get the small bags under his eyes done. He believes this will return him to twenties glory. My sister’s lackey minces over to the fridge, gets and open an Evian, hands it to her. “Smoke?” he drawls in thick Spanish accent. She shakes her head. “There’s a problem with the location, mi Diosa, your scenes are delayed.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake who’s …”
“I’ll go and see what’s happening. Does my Father know?”
“He’s on his way,” says Carlos without wasting eye contact on me.
“Oh, don’t go out darling, they’re bound to get a hideous photo of you for their shitty magazines.” I put on a baseball cap, sunglasses and a puffa jacket.

Carlos doesn’t bother to shield me from the camera flashes or screams of fans. I’m obliged to wave. We weave through technicians and runners who pretend not to look at me. The nieces and sons of executives badger me for autographs, which I give, and for photos, which I refuse. We find my father towering over a man with spiky hair and thick-rimmed glasses. “Your people have their specifications.” His middle-class London accent has imbibed a Californian twang recently. “You received them weeks ago. Now, either I get a call saying this is sorted inside a half an hour…Sweetness, what are you doing here?”
“I heard there was a problem Daddy.”
“That’s not for you to worry about”. He speaks loud enough for those standing around to hear. His dark tan makes him seem foreign amongst his pale countrymen. His ‘on-set’ cotton tracksuit is burgundy today. “How’s your sister?” I wonder if Electra gets asked the same question in my absence.
“Are we going to be delayed much?”
“Has she learned her lines?”
“She was going through them when I left.” His brow becomes furrowed up to where the hair used to grow. He looks around, making eye contact and smiling at the senior people on set. “You look drained Sweetness. Can’t have you looking drained in your scene. Have you eaten? I’ve ordered coffee and Danish from Belle Époque.” So I walk and hear about production schedules and market demographics. I eat half a pastry and skip the coffee. My father rarely eats when someone’s watching.

He leaves me for a moment to deal with something. Half and hour later he returns, “let me walk you back to the trailer.” Outside the door he pauses, points to something in the distance and makes no effort to link this gesture with his words: “the rushes from yesterday’s shoot look sexy, I’ve got a good feeling about this one.” When he’s sure the press have their shot we enter the caravan.

I realise the noise isn’t the T.V. Electra’s moaning. She’s naked, sitting astride Robert Levy who plays her non-supportive, former boyfriend in our film. She turns, seems not to see us at first. She doesn’t reach for the blanket to cover herself. She doesn’t jump of her mount. Electra slowly continues to fuck him in front of us. While my father and I watch, struck inarticulate and inanimate. She slides her hand up from her hip until she rolls and pulls her nipple between thumb and forefinger.

The sound of the door slamming makes me realise Daddy has left the trailer. And I’m still inside, standing and staring like a fool. Electra looks around again. She lifts herself until Robert’s glistening penis is removed and slaps down against his belly.
“Hey…”
“Get out. Get out now or I’ll call security.” She ignores him, open and drinks her Evian. Robert dresses and leaves with muffled expletives he dares not make audible.

"What the fuck are you doing? Cover yourself for Christ sake." I throw her a dressing gown, which she drapes over her shoulders. She lights a cigarette. "Really Electra…" I'm bending forward now, beating out syllables with my hand like mother used to. “…what are you doing?"
"Now…I'm smoking and listening to you. Before…I was fucking."
"You just did it to upset us - Daddy probably." She does a long blink, which means she's had enough and is ready to walk out of the room. She adjusts the wooden blind, peeps out. The world outside is still a treacherous ocean surrounding this island. There can be no dramatic exit with slammed door. She settles for pushing her arms through the sleeves of the robe and pulling it tight around her. "Oh, now you're coy? You'd no problem putting on that little show earlier."
"It's nothing that he hasn't seen before."

Her eyes dart to meet mine. For several moments I can only stare at her. I become conscious of my jaw hanging loose, creating an open mouth. I snap the gap closed. I exhale and draw breath to re-take the scene. My sister has just made a reference to my father and her naked body. The way she's looking right now makes it clear it was no chance wording.

"What is it? Are you intent on destroying everything? Is it possible for you to think of someone else for ..."
"Why should I?" She asks, and there it is. I shake my head, widen my eyes and bring my palm up to lay out my point. "I don't know how you can ask that question. Look at what we all have - not just us two, Daddy and Mother as well. He works so hard for you, for us."
She's up on her feet, I move in front of the door, a symbolic gesture because she can't go out now. I wait. The situation is currently impossible. This silence can't last and this argument can't end now. I know this because I’m the one who spoke last.

"Daddy may have worked hard but he's also very rich and powerful. That's something most men don't get from their daughters. But then, he always got more from his daughters then most men."
“You sound bitter,” I retort, “like you want you hurt people. I can’t…” I reach for tears but my fellow actress is unmoved. “You’ll destroy everything…for all of us.”
“Father’s too clever to give up everything now. He’ll negotiate his way out of it. Hey – maybe I could send you to broker the deal? Just like old times.”

“So, has the old deal been broken? He’s taken us where we asked him to. He hasn’t touched us, or me certainly, since then.”
“And we’ve kept our mouths shut.”
“Yes, we’ve kept our family together, our careers going. So what’s changed for you?”
“Yes Electra, what’s changed?” My father’s voice comes over my shoulder and makes me physically shudder. “Are you tired of the good life?”
“Tired, certainly.” She sits down on the bed but keeps her eyes trained on him. As always, I’m in the middle.
“I won’t stand for the disrespect I was shown earlier.”
“No?” She asks, accompanied by a cone-shaped exhale from her Marlborough.

Daddy smiles. He moves over to a small coffee table and touches a statue of Ganesh we received on a visit to India. “My sources tell me you’re interested in doing a controversial autobiography-expose. I was disappointed to hear you hadn’t cast me yet. You should know it’s impossible to keep a secret in this business.”
“I’m not the one with the secrets to keep.” She holds his gaze, put pulls her feet under the blankets for shelter. “So it’s one of two things,” he says, summarising, narrowing her options. “You either want to do something or you’re threatening it as a bargaining chip. The former means – POOF.” His hands raise and gesticulate the evaporation of all we have.
“You taught me to always be open to negotiation. But the ‘POOF’ option doesn’t sound too bad.”
“You couldn’t live without living the life.”
“Who says I’d have to?”

He slowly sits in the chaise longue. “Far from backing you, I’d block you at every turn.”
“Stop this!” I try helplessly, seeing them edging towards the abyss, about to destroy it all. “That’s assuming,” Electra stubs out her cigarette, “you have any influence left to block me with. Maybe I wouldn’t need you. As you say, Daddy, it’s all about what the market wants. Maybe the market is interested in what you did to us. About the deal you made and the people it made us into.”
“So you’re counting on this to launch you. The angry, sexually liberated woman strives forth from the ashes of the abused child,“ his arms stretch wide as if he was giving a pitch. “It’s good for an autobiography that will be serialised in a tabloid and laughed at in two years when the ghost-writer tells his story. It’s good for late night chat shows for a while. In four years time you’ll be twenty three and begging your agent to get you on ‘I’m a celebrity, get me out of here.’” He waits for this to sink in. “And where will your sister be?” I see it taking a toll on Electra. Her lip trembles and her hands join refugee feet under the blanket.

“And where will it leave you?” She throws back. I close my eyes momentarily. She’s clearly bent on the destruction of everything. “I’m standing here you know.” I say, strangely devoid of emotion, like I’ve always known this day was coming. “Yes Electra, Echo is standing here.” I’ve only heard him say my name to other people. “She’ll be left as the one who didn’t have the strength to come out. Maybe that’s because she knows the meaning of the words loyalty and gratitude. She won’t substantiate your story – you’ll look like a fool.”
”Echo – I know we haven’t always gotten along, but - the past can be healed.”
“Echo”, says Daddy, his eyes locked on Electra. “Your sister and I need some time together. I’ve obviously been too lenient about whom I’ve let her associate with.”
“Echo, don’t go.” She’s pulling the top of the robe closed now. “I love you.”
“And I love you…but it seems you two have some talking to do…and I have a scene to prepare for.”
“That’s my girl.” Says Daddy as I exit the caravan. I wonder what’s happening between them now. It reminds me of the jealous reveries I used to have. I’d imagine him still visiting her room after our agreement. I draw down the tears from behind my eyes - I’ll need them for the cameras. I walk towards the barrier and the fans enter frenzy. With the first camera flash the tears come. I wait until there’s enough silence to speak in. “There’s something I have to tell you about my family…”