VANISHING TWINS

"It's like we're the same person. We finish each other's sentences. This is what we've been taught to desire and expect of love. But there's a question underneath that's never addressed: Once you find someone to finish your sentences, do you stop finishing them for yourself?"

As long as she can remember, Leah has had the mysterious feeling that she's searching for a twin?that she belongs as one of an intimate pair. It begins with friends, dance partners, and her own reflection in the mirror as she studies ballet growing up; continues with physical and emotional attractions to girlfriends in college; and leads her, finally, to Eric, whom she moves across the country for and marries. But her steadfast, monogamous relationship leaves her with questions she can't answer about her sexuality and her identity, so she and her husband decide to try an open marriage.

How does a young couple make room for their individual desires, their evolving selfhoods, and their artistic ambitions while building a life together? Can they pursue other sexual partners, even live in separate cities, and keep their passionate original bond alive? Vanishing Twins looks for answers in psychology, science, pop culture, art, architecture, Greek mythology, dance, and language, to create a lucid, suspenseful portrait of a woman testing the limits and fluidities of love.

Leah Dieterich's essays and short fiction have been published by Buzzfeed, Bomb magazine, The Nervous Breakdown, and The Offing. She is the author of a book of thank-you notes, thxthxthx: thank goodness for everything.