HER LITTLE SISTER

UNEDITED SAMPLE LITERARY ARTICLE
By Karenina Isabel Apilado Lampa
IV - Michael Faraday


“Hi Krizia! Is she your little sister?”

“Yes.”

“You look like each other! Are you twins?”

We both looked at each other and inwardly rolled our eyes, before replying in unison.

“No.”

Have you ever felt like living the life of someone else? Or travelling the walks of life not through the own path that you should have made, but through the trails someone had left behind?

Have you ever had the feeling of living up to someone’s standards too much, that in the process, you totally forget the fact that you have a life of your own?

No? Well then, I have.


If people were asked to describe my sister, it would be the same old thing. She has a face which could launch a thousand ships, a brain that overpowers the lot in her class, a sense of responsibility, and an organized and systematic manner of living. Whatever they say, that’s what I always think. But for me, all of their answers would only amount to one conclusion: My darling sister is a nearly perfect human being.

You absolutely cannot imagine what I had to go through; living with her starting from the day I was born. It was absolute hell for me.

People never knew me for who I was. All of them saw me as ‘her little sister’. What they saw from her, they expected to see from me. Be it teachers, or older schoolmates, or even my relatives and parents, they all thought the same thing. I must somehow be like my darling sister.

Even then, I had already come to the conclusion that people must be blind and foolish. Where in hell did they get the idea that I would end up like my sister?

Here’s the truth of the matter. A lot-no, everyone says that I look like my sister. They say we could pass off as twins and no one would notice the difference. But up until now, I still don’t believe a single word of it, and I have learned to live through all their assumptions.

Their analogy is quite simple. Since my sister and I ‘look’ like each other, then we must be like each other. If only they knew how wrong they were.

After spending my whole life with her, I know that I can never be wrong to say that my sister and I are like black and white, hot and cold, deep and shallow, or whatever antonyms you could come up with. We were the total opposite of each other. She liked Science, I hated it. I love English, she abhors it.

I like to read. She’d rather not. She’s all creative and artsy – get this, I don’t have one creative bone in me. She dreamt of becoming a doctor. I knew I wanted to be a lawyer.

In other words, she wasn’t like me. I wasn’t- and am not, like her.

But all my life, I’ve been trying to follow her footsteps, not knowing that it did me no good. I wanted to be just like her, all lovable and perfect, that I didn’t notice how much it had cost me.

For a period in my life, I did not live as I am. I lived as ‘my sister’s shadow’, and I didn’t mind. All I thought was that, if it made my parents proud of me, then it was definitely a good thing.

I was like a puppy following its owner, ready to do anything it’s told like fetching the paper, or performing a trick. I was blinded partially by the expectations of the people surrounding me, but mostly by my desire for a life like my sister’s.

I never knew myself. I never knew what I could become. I never knew who I really was, until the day I decided to stop following her footprints and leave my own trail instead.

It was only when I became a little more mature that I realized how non-existent I have made myself to become, trying to be like her. I was cheating life, and it had to stop. No one can live my life for me. Only I have the right and the ability to do just that.

The first time I said ‘no’ to her was the day I pulled my leash from her grip and ran free. It was the day I stepped out of her shadow and experienced having a shadow of my own.


“Hi Kina! She’s your older sister, right?”

“Yes-

“You look like each other!”

-and no, we’re not twins.”

“No. I know.”