Living for both of us
Jessica Eikenberry reflects on losing her twin sister to a tragic car accident
*Written by Lauren Prater, as told by Jessica Eikenberry
STORY AND PHOTOS BY LAUREN PRATER
(Above) Jessica has kept a journal dedicated to writing letters to her sister. She writes about what’s going on in her life, how much she misses her and what her goals are for the future. Jessica got the inspiration for the journal from Josie who used to journal on a daily basis. Photo by Lauren Prater
03–15–16
I open my eyes, slowly blinking sleep away. Just as the blur in my vision fades, my chest tightens, as if someone is squeezing my heart with all of his or her strength. The hair on the back of my neck stands on end and my stomach drops.
I haven’t heard from Josie.
I shoot up in bed. She was visiting her boyfriend in eastern Washington for the weekend but she should be back by now. If anything, she should have called or at least texted.
I begin calling everyone I can think of and frantically driving circles around her house. I am sitting alone in my car with my seat belt still fastened across my lap when my grandfather calls. He mutters the words “a 20-year-old woman passed away in a car accident on Stevens Pass early this morning.” Everything he continues to say becomes lost in a mess of tears.
I know it is Josie — I just don’t want it to be true.
I pound my fists into the dashboard and I scream into the silence. This couldn’t happen to her, or to us. I keep shouting “NO! NO! NO!” until I can’t scream anymore.
They said she got into some slush; that she swerved into the other lane and was hit directly on the passenger side. They believe she died on impact and that it was fast and never painful.
Our Beginning
We were identical twins born on Jan. 14, 1996.
Although we were identical, my hair was naturally lighter than hers. My jaw line was more prominent and she has always had a baby face and a lazy eye. We had the same birthmark — a little dot on our butt cheeks, only they were on opposite sides.
Josie liked to say that we could have been switched at birth and that she could be Jessica and I could be Josie. I was born a minute earlier than her, making her the little sister. I think that’s why she didn’t like answering that question. I didn’t mind it though, probably because I’m older. Being older naturally made me the caretaker, or sort of like the mother hen to Josie and to our little siblings.
I have a hard time putting my childhood memories in chronological order. It’s almost as if someone took the timeline of my life and scrambled the first six-or-so years, leaving me with only haunting snapshots of our past.
Josie and I were dropped into the foster care system at an early age, along with our three younger siblings. After spending months going from house to house, Josie and I were adopted at the age of nine. We lived with our adoptive family until we were old enough to live on our own.
After sticking together though foster homes and adoption, you would assume that Josie and I were inseparable, but to say we were always best friends would be a lie.
Very early on we were forced into a repetitive cycle of being the same. Our biological mother and eventually our adoptive family enjoyed illuminating the fact that we were identical twins rather than individual people. For a while we had a continuous struggle of fighting for our independence and not being grouped together as one. Our dad didn’t even call us by our names; he called us “Josica.” I hated that.
I dreaded our birthday.
It was easy for everyone else; they could just buy two of everything and call it good. We would plop down on the carpet and push our backs up against one another, facing in opposite directions. Without turning around, we would carefully peel back the colorful wrapping paper. I always had to keep my mouth shut because if I said anything before Josie opened hers I would ruin the surprise.
If we were lucky, they were at least opposite colors.
Josie and I hated being constantly compared to one another. Throughout elementary and middle school we were close, but not as close as you would expect from identical twin sisters.
Our Connection
Freshman year of high school we began to distance ourselves from our adoptive family, allowing us the opportunity to grow into separate people without the pressure of being the same. It was then that we started to realize how we had been trying so hard to be unique when in reality it was unique to be exactly the same.
The summer following our freshman year we were stuck together and I mean literally, stuck. We had no car, no jobs and no family to occupy our attention. One day, I was being funny and started dancing around, stuffing as many Hot Cheetos in my mouth as I could, leaving several flying through the air, dodging my flailing arms and legs. Of course, Josie clicked record on her phone and captured a moment that would later be used to embarrass me in front of cute boys. She always found ways to embarrass me until I was red in the face.
We both showed up to our first soccer tryout that year, brand new to the school, not knowing anybody. We were both nervous to meet new people but for some reason I think Josie was a little more nervous than me. She just started saying “meatballs” in a bunch of different voices over and over again, each time a little bit weirder. It ended in us laughing until we cried.
She was always so awkward that it was funny.
At that point in our life, we were inseparable. In high school we got awards like “best duo,” and “partners in crime.” We even started crushing on the same boys and when we did, we tried to see who could talk to him more times and that would determine which of us he liked most. Maybe that’s why we were both awarded “biggest flirt” our senior year.
We started to realize that we did really need each other and we are the only ones to really truly understand. Josie was the one person that I could fully connect with and that I could tell absolutely anything to.
Following high school, we continued to be inseparable until the day she passed away. When my long-term boyfriend broke up with me and Josie was with me through it all. She listened to me, spent time with me, she knew exactly what to say. She was the only one that was really there for me.
I can’t thank her enough for that.
Her Legacy
Josie always dreamed of being a doctor.
In high school, we took sports med together and we both loved it, but Josie really latched onto the idea of the medical field. She got a thrill from helping other people and she was the happiest when she had the opportunity to do so.
Among many other things, she was an organ donor. After she passed away her body was able to give life to over 50 people. Someone else gets to live because of Josie, with her heart, her liver and even her eyes. That was a hard thing for me to hear, because I didn’t want to picture them taking things away from my sister, but when I think about it from her point of view, I realize that she was able to reach a goal that she had always strived for — to save lives.
She was able to follow her dream, even after she passed away.
She posted this on social media a few days before she passed and I honestly feel like she left it for me:
“When tomorrow starts without me and I’m not here to see if the sun should rise and find your eyes filled with tears for me, I wish so much you wouldn’t cry the way you did today, while thinking of the many things we didn’t get to say. I know how much you love me and how much that I love you and each time you think of me, I know you’ll miss me too. When tomorrow starts without me don’t think we’re far apart, for every time to think of me, I’m right there in your heart.”
Usually when people lose someone, they don’t have to look in the mirror and be reminded of them every single day. At first it made things harder to see so much of her in myself, but now I can look in the mirror and be reminded everything I am, because of her.
For me, each day is different. Since she had passed, I make a conscious effort to make every day count even more. I talk to her all the time or I write to her as if she is really here, I tell her about my day, or what I’m doing in that moment or when I’m upset. I most often tell her how much I miss her and how I don’t know how to do it without her here.
Losing an identical twin sister is like losing a piece of yourself. A piece of you that has been by your side since before birth, seen you in all of your forms, picked you up and held you and is the closest person to you on this planet. It’s unimaginable. The hardest part is the beginning and the end of each day because another day has started and ended without her here.
Now that she’s gone, all I can do is to try to make her proud in everything I do and promise her that I will live life for the both of us.
4–25–16
Dear Jo,
I don’t understand why you had to leave; you always made me stronger than I was. I wish there was some way I could bring you back, whatever it takes, I would do it because it sucks without you. I still need you so much; you were the only one who knew everything about me! There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you! I want to succeed even more now, for you, but I wish so badly that you could succeed with me.
Love always,
Jess