Ben's father was set on Ben becoming a lawyer but when the time came for him to take the bar exam and he failed, worry set in for both Ben's father, Ben himself and his girlfriend Emily Harrington, who also took the bar exam and passed. That was a year ago and Emily and Ben were now living together and Emily had been hired by a prestigious law firm which surprised everyone because neither Ben nor Emily had any great connections. Emily did have a well-regarded professor at Harvard who was apparently a better reference than she had thought. Her path was seemingly paved while Ben's was a rocky slice of uprooted prickly weeds.
All this left Ben even more askew, and left on his own, he would have abandoned the law profession and gone into teaching, engineering or perhaps watch repair. Ben had been taking watches apart and putting them back together ever since he'd received his first watch for his fifth birthday from his grandfather. Over the years, he rebuilt them, redesigned them and eventually assembled his own line that he gave away as gifts. They were quirky like Ben and kept perfect time. The small precise nature of this task was what Ben needed to calm his mind and still his body. He was prone to nervousness and moods. Sometimes he’d buy a fake Rolex on the street and rebuild it to conform to the real thing. Mostly he saved the parts for future use. When his aunt Gwendolyn called him an artistic type at a family dinner when he was twelve, his father's only comment was, "Let's hope he grows out of it."
There are some families who consider law or medicine the only real professions to go into. Everything else is beneath them. Ben was a member of such a family; his older sister was a doctor and his brother was an attorney as was his father. His uncle owned a canning factory and made a lot of money but even he was suspect. If you happen to come from one of these families, you are not encouraged to be anything like a pilot, a mechanic, an industrial designer or an athlete even if you have an aptitude in these areas. Even if the field is less competitive and you can make a decent living doing something you are good at. No, it's lawyer or doctor and that is the narrow path you must follow if you want to please your family. This is old-fashioned thinking in the modern age with so many ways to make not only a living but a fortune but Ben's parents were old when he was born and so he lived with ancient dictates that no longer had any meaning except to those of a certain mindset. Ben excelled at a number of things; he had mechanical aptitude, was good with his hands, thoughtful and kind. He could draw, play the banjo and build grass huts. At summer camp he built his own canoe.
All this was of no concern to his father and once he failed the bar, Ben carried around with him a shame that left him distant and uncommunicative. That Emily was already launched on her career and looked upon him with pity did not go unnoticed by Ben. Nevertheless, she was tutoring him so that when he took it again he would certainly pass it.
Emily was a straightforward kind of girl. Attractive but without any real glamor or style. She wore her medium brown hair straight and long pulled back with a barrette or a headband. Sometimes she wore it up which Ben thought sexy but she didn't seem to care what he thought on these matters. She wore no makeup, small pearl earrings and flat shoes. She did not have a fashionable bone in her body but luckily she had good bones so it didn't matter. She looked like what she was; a brainy, down-to-earth, outdoorsy type. She loved hiking, rafting, cross-country skiing and boats of all types. This is where she and Ben most meshed. He also loved the outdoors. They both liked to fish. They both played tennis but not stringently. Emily knew the names of all wildflowers, trees and shrubs in New England. She grew up in rural Vermont. Ben grew up in a townhouse on the upper West Side in Manhattan and knew all the landmarks in the city. They both attended Harvard Law School. Neither one was from a rich family and earned scholarships to supplement their tuition. Sometimes they both felt like misfits in a school with so many upper-class over-achievers. Thanks to affirmative action, there were students with less posh backgrounds but both Emily and Ben were loners. Emily felt driven to succeed, Ben less so. Sometimes he questioned what it was all for.
Ben and Emily were living in a small one-bedroom apartment in Boston waiting for Ben to pass the bar and get a job so they could get married and begin planning their life. They wanted to live outside the city and have two or three children and several dogs. They wanted what everyone else wanted; they were not particularly original in their desires, were somewhat of a cliché Ben thought when he was in a mood. Money was tight but they did not have extravagant tastes or expectations. Emily would go to work on the bus, and three days a week Ben worked in a book store and the other four he was presumed to be studying for his second try at the bar exam which would take place in three weeks. In the evening they sat on the couch and Emily would go over everything he had studied that day. At times she was cross with him:
"I don't think you're taking this seriously enough," she'd say.
He would just glaze over. She did not want to harp on it; it would only make him moody. "I'm just not sure I'm cut out for the law," he'd reply then go into a dream-like state that made her nervous. As if on cue, she would question him;
"What are you cut out for, do you think?"
He'd think this over for a bit but never really answer. He'd occasionally have an idea but never spoke of it, it would not impress anyone and she would give him that look--that look his mother used to give him when he said something incomprehensible. He'd reopen the tome in his lap and they would continue and eventually go to bed in silence. Ben wished he could take her in his arms and confess all his longings and fears but knew she would not find this endearing. It would not break the ice or get her to respond to his body the way he truly wished she would. She held back and Ben resented this. She was making him pay for her insecurity. He didn't like this but did not say anything; this too embarrassed him. He wondered if she loved him and if not, what were they doing? He wondered if he just missed all the signals and if he would soon get it right, like the bar exam.
Ben might seem like a rebellious spirit. Literature is filled with this type but Ben knew he did not have the bravado to be a true rebel. He was a coward, he knew this and hoped know one else noticed. As a teenager he'd had fantasies about joining the military. When the ROTC came to his high school he'd listened to the recruiter's pitch and read the brochures. For three days he dreamt of the places he would see. He wondered if it would make him a man--less fearful, less unsure--but in the end, he would need his father's signature and he was afraid to approach him. He would say Jews are not soldiers. He'd heard his father say that at the dinner table once and he wondered if it were true and why not. Israel certainly trained their men to fight, in fact it was compulsory. Another anachronism, Ben thought. In the end, he forgot about the military, it evaporated like all of his dreams. Somehow he knew he had to join the real world. And then the real world brought him a new conundrum.
One day while Emily was at work and Ben was ostensibly studying for the bar, the doorbell rang. Ben assumed it was the landlord, Curly, who was doing some work in the bathroom per Emily's request. The one thing about Emily, she could bully recalcitrant landlords, taxi drivers, repair men of all types and waiters. It wasn't that she was a bitch or a ball-buster per se, but she had a way of looking at men with a steely eye that they couldn't deny. She never charmed or flirted with men; that would not be her style but she nevertheless got them to see things her way. She was verbally gifted Ben admitted. She could make a person do something they'd never thought of and make them think it was something they'd been going to do all along. Including me, thought Ben a little wearily. "She is going to be one hell of a lawyer," his father had said after meeting her. "Too bad she's not Jewish," was his mother's only reply.
Ben often felt a little deflated after an argument with Emily, not that they often argued. She was his first real girlfriend in college, the only one he'd brought home to meet his parents. After that he felt he was obliged to continue the relationship even though he was not sure he had the right sort of commitment to it. He was a loose thread in the institution called family. He knew it and wondered how a smart, shrewd girl like Emily missed it. He was nothing like his brother or sister who were as straight as the side of a building and about as interesting. Ben had a romantic side he felt compelled to hide. For instance, he wanted to fly a plane, build a Japanese garden and live in a foreign country. These were vague ideas, like the military, building the perfect timepiece and even more improbably, joining the CIA. Ben had a furtive side that longed for an outlet. Instead he would be a wily attorney--anything was possible, he thought.
Ben answered the bell with a Philips screwdriver in one hand and an instruction manual in the other, wearing his off-kilter magnifying glasses that he thought made him resemble a mad scientist but Emily thought a psychopath. He was fixing the rewind mechanism in the VCR that was jerky. He'd taken the thing apart and was reassembling it even though his instructions from Emily were to buy a DVD player and get rid of it but why do that when things were fixable? Ben never liked getting rid of things. He scorned the disposable society we've become. When the door opened he discovered Emily and a large suitcase but upon removing the glasses, saw it was not Emily at all but an exact look-a-like. For a moment he thought he'd lost his vision or entered a hallucinatory state so disconcerting was the image before him.
"Well, well a Mr. Fix-it. How convenient. You must be Ben, I'm Janey, obviously Emily's sister. Now don't look so startled, she must have mentioned me somewhere along the line. When one has a twin sister, it's not something you can hide. Oh, I see you’re shocked. Don't tell me she forgot to mention her evil twin. Well, here I am, an exact replica of your betrothed, well, pleased to meet you anyway, Ben. Is Emily home?" This was all said while she rolled in the suitcase, had a look around and inspected his repair project.
Ben shook her hand but could hardly manage a complete sentence. She was indeed an exact replica, but so exactly not. She was wearing an off-the-shoulder peasant blouse with bright embroidered flowers around the neckline and tight jeans rolled up to show her ankles and calves and some sort of handmade sandals. It was only March so this tropical dress was incongruent, not to mention a style never before seen on Emily who was a khaki, polo-shirt kind of girl. Ben gaped at her for longer than polite but it was too extraordinary. Where had she come from? "Nice to meet you too," was all he could mutter, unable to shape a more responsive greeting.
Okay, to be truthful, Emily did mention a sister in the Peace Corps but had implied that while Emily lived with her mother in Vermont after the divorce from Emily's father, a sister, vaguely defined, lived with their father who was a professor of art history at the University of California, Berkeley. “My God," Ben said," it's 'The Parent Trap' come to life.” That was the first coherent thing he'd been able to say. Why had Emily never uttered the word "twin?" Ben had thought she wasn't even a real sister, but a half-sister. It occurred to him that Emily was not very forthcoming about much in her past, but then neither was he. Both of them rarely talked about family as if to shake them off somehow. But not mentioning a twin was carrying things to an absurd extreme. An identical twin, at that. Ben was beside himself and for the first five minutes of Janey's presence unable to focus.
"Love the glasses. Cool. Do you always wear them?" She had a provocative laugh that was definitely not Emily's laugh. Everything from Janey's mouth was a flirtation. She had a wide easy smile that Emily lacked, a sort of sex-kitten appeal that Emily definitely lacked.
"Holy cow," he gasped.
"I guess you've had a cow," she teasingly said. "Is that law school-speak?"
"Sorry, I'm in shock," said Ben pulling off his glasses. "I didn't realize...it's too ridiculous...," he was fuming.
"My sister is a mystery, I believe. She likes to keep people in the dark about certain things. She get power from holding back and then watching the surprise. We all play games, and that's hers; don't tell anyone anything and then pretend she had all along told you but you are too indifferent to have heard. It's called passive-aggressive and she's a master at it if you haven't already learned. She's in the right profession in any case. What about you Ben? What's your game, Mr. Fix-it? Are you secretly hiding another persona no one knows about? I bet you are, and don't think I won't learn what it is before long. I'm was a psych major before I went off to save the world."
By now she was standing very close to Ben and talking close to his mouth or at least it seemed that way. In addition, her blouse kept falling forward and she was not wearing a bra. He stood there thinking that his Emily and been reborn as Sharon Stone and he was not entirely displeased about it. He noted that she had the exact same breasts as Emily but that so openly exposed they presented an entirely different arrangement. Emily's were always tightly encased in her Haines 32-C 100% cotton bras and although she took it off to sleep, she did not parade her assets quite so flagrantly, so without a care or a worry over rapists, sexual harassers, dirty old men or a horny boyfriend. How utterly free, he thought to himself while trying to direct his eyes elsewhere.
Elsewhere too was not without interest. Her hair had been highlighted with blond streaks, perhaps from the sun, she wore eye makeup and lip gloss. She had a small heart necklace at her throat and a pile of silver bracelets on her arm. Her toenails were painted coral and she wore a gold toe ring which was indescribably sexy to Ben. He'd had very little contact with this type of girl. He'd seen them at parties, in clubs and on the street but he would never have been able to chat casually with them. He was not cool enough, he was, in fact, a nerd even though Emily said he was growing out of it and was becoming attractive in his own way. Once a nerd, always a nerd, Ben thought. But this apparition here in his own domain, so early in the day was, he could only say to himself, delicious somehow, a word he had never had reason to use before, not even for fruit, which she smelled like. It was Emily in drag. It was Emily in a schizoid other-world.
"What brings you here? Where have you come from?" asked Ben.
"You, darling boy. I came to meet the guy who Em actually lets near her, actually inhabits the same abode, the same bed, if I may be so presumptuous. Does she take off her clothes? You're the first, you know," laughed Janey uproariously.
"Why do you find that so funny? Emily is a mature woman..." but once again he was gaping at her open neckline and noticed that her toenails matched the flowers on the blouse and wondered if it was a coincidence or planned. Women mystified him. His sister was so much older and his girlfriends had all been quiet types. He couldn't think of what he was trying to say to defend Emily who was not here to defend herself but he felt he should.
He remembered a girl he'd picked up in a bar in college who came home with him, shared his bed and then moved into his roommate Doug's bed where she woke up the next morning not sure where she was or how she'd gotten there. She walked around naked until she found her clothes in Ben's room. She figured in his fantasies long after that night but he never saw her again. Nor did Doug, though he looked. Ben had been both excited and annoyed: excited to watch her, annoyed that she ended up with Doug. It was too confusing and he went back to studious girls.
Anyway, Janey wasn't like that girl. She was vibrant and sophisticated. How had twins deviated from each other so fiercely? And why had Emily never said anything? This is not nothing. Ben thought he would be feeling pretty pissed off if Janey were not so diverting.
"You're really surprised," Janey said as if reading his mind. "I know, I know, we're the same but not the same. It's confusing. We get it all the time. Well you see, Ben darling, and you are darling you know, I was raised by wolves and she was raised by nuns, ha, ha, ha. No, I went to Berkeley with dear old Dad when I was ten and Emily stayed with Mother. It was not 'The Parent Trap' because we were given the choice, shared custody and all, and though we both stayed with Mother at first, I felt sorry for Dad and started to spend more time with him in California and then I decided I wanted to go to school there because I knew I could get away with murder with him and I liked the warm weather. So Emily and I decided I would go with Dad and she would stay with Mother. And we would spend summer's together in Vermont. Unlike the movie, our parents were not in love, they loathed each other and never got together for any reason if at all possible. And though Em and I were as close as twins are, she was more serious than I, our personalities weren't alike. But it was hard separating. They say twins feel the same things and it's true. I knew when Emily had a bicycle accident before I was told. I could feel it. But culture, they say, definitely figures in. And Dad's lifestyle was not Mother's. I became that happy specimen, the California girl, a stereotype to be sure but not completely. Em was still playing with her dolls when I was...well, Ben darling, that is a story for another time. I must take a bath. Can I?"
"Of course," said Ben. Then he remembered the landlord who happened to ring right at that moment and went through the same shock as Ben had over Janey and like Ben, had trouble diverting his eyes from her open blouse as she was bending over her suitcase on the floor. Ben had to make him leave and he insisted he would have to come back later that day; it could not wait. Ben was amused that it had been waiting for a month already but kept it to himself. He had enough to think about just then.
Janey had been with the Peace Corps in Central America for just over two years. Ben invited her to stay on their couch if she wanted to but wondered why she would not want to stay with her mother until she returned to California to do graduate work. But he figured Emily would straighten everything out and he went back to his VCR repair and Janey went into the bathroom. He could hear her splashing in the tub and he wondered if he should call Emily to report this news but decided he'd let her have a little jolt too. After all, she left him in the dark and this was his home. It then came as a jolt to himself when Janey called his name.
"Ben, honey, do you by any chance have a joint we could smoke? I'm so tensed up after the long flight and I really need to relax and get my head together to meet Mother later."
Ben had a moment of panic over that question. You see, he had told Emily he quit smoking dope when they moved in together. She said since it was not quite legal and both of them were about to be in the legal profession, they should not have pot on hand or be smoking it. He reluctantly agreed to this restriction although he did still smoke it at from time to time on the back porch while Emily was working. He justified it by saying he was not actually in the legal profession yet and it was his business what he did.
He deflected by asking, "Does Emily know you're here? She never said anything." He did vaguely remember her saying her mother would be in town and a possible surprise but it did not really register at the time. Her mother did not like him that much, he felt, and his mother was the same toward Emily. It was, he was sure, the Jewish thing again and neither Ben or Emily deigned to address it so it was left open and unanswered.
"Well not exactly, Ben. But we're sisters. Of course she'll be thrilled. I wanted to surprise her. I was supposed to stay at Aunt Jean's with Mother but I couldn't face them right off so I came here. I forgot she was working...why are you standing outside the door, come in here and talk to me? I'll tell you everything especially if you give me a joint. I know you have one. Emily told me you were a little pothead and she didn't approve. Now come on, light up with your future sister-in-law and let's talk it all out. I'm covered in bubbles, you have nothing to fear, you little prude."
Could any two sisters have a more different personality Ben thought? How can this be? How will Emily take this? His brain was spinning. Should he give her a joint? He did have one, only one, he was saving it, but he decided to offer it up and not be so uptight. Besides, it would be fun to watch her in the bathtub. Wrong, possibly, but not to be avoided. The one way these sisters were alike was the ability to get men to do what they wanted, of this Ben took careful note. They just used a very different strategy.
So they lit the joint, inhaled deeply and enjoyed a moment of silence. After a short time, she started giggling at a corny picture on the wall and then he giggled about the bathroom in general and the landlord's shock and then what Emily would say when she came in and on they went, laughing at this and that, and as the bubbles slowly disappeared they both pretended not to notice and Ben felt he had been completely seduced and then wondered if he even cared and for a brief moment wished he could get in the tub with her but thought not but enjoyed the view anyway. He was pretty high when she stood up and asked for a towel which he gave her even though he could not avert his eyes for very long. She wrapped the towel around her middle, leaving her top exposed and then walked to the living room, opened her suitcase, took out a bottle of wine and asked Ben to open it while she went into the bedroom to find something in Emily's closet to wear because she didn't have anything appropriate for Mother and Ben thought he had surely died and ended up in a French movie where women casually went topless and he felt warm all over.
That is until Emily walked through the door and saw Janey and Ben drinking wine, laughing and Janey wearing a dress that she had meant to give to Goodwill because it was too short for her workplace. She felt her stomach knot up and thought she might throw up but Ben came and put his arm around her and said,"Surprise!" Then he added, "And when were you going to tell me about a twin sister, at our wedding?" He felt guilty as sin so he put on the huff a little more than he normally might. He was breathing marijuana smoke and wine on her and she moved her head away.
"And what have you been up to all afternoon?" she asked in a snotty tone, Ben thought.
"Em, don't be mad at him...it's all my fault. I was so tense..." she had her arms around Emily now and the three of them stood there in a clutch and then Ben felt stupid and moved away and let the sisters reunite. They hugged and cried and were the picture of happiness in this slightly weird scenario that Ben could not quite fathom.
"But Jane, you were supposed to be at Aunt Jean's. Everyone was waiting for you. I took my lunch hour and went over there. Mother is there and she expected to have lunch with you. Why didn't you call? You will have to get a cell phone right away."
"I came here first because I wanted to see you. I forgot you were at work. Ben was here and we had such a good time talking. You should have seen the look on his face when he opened the door. Em, that was not nice to keep him in the dark about your sister. He was totally floored. I can't believe you never told him you have a twin. Jeez, Em, there's a limit to secrecy. I'm not the devil you know even if you think I'm bad. I'm not. I just spent two years taking care of people who have nothing, know nothing and well...you can't imagine how they live. You can't imagine what I've been through. But it was all good. I've gained a lot of insight and when I go back for my master's, I'll be a lot more in tune, if you will, I will have experienced things. I highly recommend the Peace Corps. I told Ben he should sign up instead of adding one more lawyer to the populace, as if we need any more. Sorry Em. But you know how I feel about that profession. Why you want to go into it, is beyond me. Is it just for money, or show or what...you have such a better conscious than that. And Ben does too. He's not a lawyer. It's all too ridiculous. Dad thinks so too."
Emily blanched at hearing this. She knew her sister and father's view; she just didn't agree with them. She found Ben's father's love of the profession a welcome relief from her own father's. But she was visibly offended at bringing Ben into the debate. He was going for the bar exam in three weeks and he didn't need this diatribe against the profession. She pulled away, stalked to the bedroom and when Ben followed her she told him to leave her alone to change and get ready for the dinner.
"Am I invited to this dinner?" asked Ben, "Or am I to be sidelined?"
"Of course you're invited. I was going to surprise you but that’s foiled. What do you think of her? Flaky, wouldn't you say?"
"She different from you, that's for sure but I wouldn't say flaky after two years in a third-world country trying to teach English and plumbing to indigents."
"Well, I just meant, she's a real hippie from Berkeley. She's got all sorts of dippy ideas that will take her exactly nowhere," said Emily with a little too much vehemence.
"Well, I think it's commendable what she's done. I wish I could do something worthwhile; something besides think of the bar exam," said Ben.
"Well, I think the law is a fine profession and I'm sorry you do not. I thought we were in agreement on it. You did go to law school you know. I didn't force you. It was your choice," said Emily.
"Yeah, I know. I'm just caught by surprise. You led me to believe she was something other than what she is."
"Which is?"
"A twin sister, for Christ's sake. Nobody has a twin and fails to mention it. What's with you, Emily?"
"I was waiting for you to meet her. She's been out of the country as you know. I was going to surprise you. I'm sorry. It was stupid. Childish. I'm sorry."
Ben left her to change and went back into the living room. Janey was channel surfing, laughing at something. “I haven’t watched TV for two years. How silly it all seems,” she said. “No wonder American culture is so hopeless. Is Em all right?"
"Yeah I guess. She's always peeved at something these days."
"What about you Ben? How are you these days?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, do you really care about the law profession? I mean, you don't exactly strike me as judicial material."
"You sound like my mother. Truthfully, I don't know. It's what my father is, my brother, I just try to please."
"Trying to please is not a good way to spend your life, Ben. Get a grip."
"Yeah, I know."
They had dinner in a expensive Italian restaurant with the twin's mother and aunt and then Emily, Janey and Ben went to a club. Janey wanted to party and seemed to have a gaggle of friends miraculously appear. Both Ben and Emily were quiet and watched Janey dance, cavort and end up doing a mock strip on a table. All Ben could think about was that she had no underwear on under that dress and several times it was high up on her thighs as she danced. Ben could hardly concentrate and had had too much to drink, too much excitement for one day and wished ...well, he wished many things but was too drunk to think clearly and just wanted to sleep. They eventually made it home, Janey passed out on the couch and Emily rejected his advances once again...what else was new? As Ben fell asleep, he thought that this was possibly the strangest, most amazing day in his life and wondered what tomorrow would bring.
Tomorrow brought a hung-over Emily trying to put her clothing on for work while moaning and groaning and speaking in tongues. Ben was also hung over but made an effort to help her; brewing coffee, offering to take her to work but she just ignored him and left, catching her jacket on the door handle and nearly ripping it off. She used a few words she did not usually use but sometimes did. Janey never budged and when Ben looked at her on the couch she seemed completely at peace. After Emily left, he went back to bed but couldn't sleep. He laid there wondering what Janey had scheduled for the day; he'd heard her making many plans with various friends in the club. He did not have to wonder too long, as she appeared in the bedroom, wrapped loosely in a sheet and crawled into bed with him and went back to sleep.
Well, this is new, thought Ben. In bed with his girlfriend but not his girlfriend. He decided to get up but she stirred a little and told him to rub her back. Ben stood at the side of the bed not sure what to do. Surely she was kidding?
"Come on Ben. You know you want to," said Janey.
"God, Janey, what do you think I am?" he replied a bit put out.
"You're a darling boy in need of love and affection like the rest of us and I can tell you don't get it, if I may say so," she said.
"How do you know what I get?" said Ben.
"I can see it in your eyes. They're hungry," she said.
"Hungry, you can fucking see hungry, give me a break, Janey," said Ben a touch too defensive.
"Just rub my back, then you can make me breakfast, the breakfast Em turned down after she turned down the back rub," she said.
Jumping jeez, thought Ben. How was he supposed to deal with this? But in the end, he did as he was told, never having enough nerve to not do what he was told. He chastised himself for his lack of grit but rub her back he did. They were both silent for some time and when she turned over abruptly, his hands touched her breasts, she sighed and just what you'd expect to happen, did happen and though Ben was not proud of the fact, he had never felt quite so alive in his short life. They spent the morning in bed doing things he'd only dreamed of...things he wouldn't have tried with Emily. He knew everything would never be the same again. In what way, he could not tell you but a shift had taken place in Ben and he shivered as he lay by Janey's side breathing the smell of body heat and mangoes.
When things began to waver, he got out of bed and immediately started to fret. Janey laughed, demanded pancakes, and walked around in his old t-shirt, digging through her suitcase once again for what, anyone could guess. She continually produced the odd and unexpected from that suitcase covered in stickers with various messages and foreign symbols on them. What a marvel of dissemination, Ben thought. He dutifully went to the kitchen and began mixing batter as instructed. Guilt covered him like a gossamer film he knew he would never shake it in this lifetime. He had never felt so off-balance and fear would have brought him to his knees but he was too happy to pay it any attention.
END PART I
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