Candy Halliday - Are Men From Mars?

It was like looking in a mirror, Maddie always thought. They were identical twins, with Mary Beth being all of two minutes older. Yet, Maddie had always thought of them as the opposite sides of a coin.

Even as children, Mary Beth had loved the frilly dresses, the white tights and the patent leather shoes their mother had dressed them in. Maddie, on the other hand, had usually soiled her dress, torn the knees of her tights, and scuffed the toes of her shoes crawling around on her hands and knees observing insects of every size and description.

As they grew older, Mary Beth had been the social one, while Maddie kept her nose buried in the encyclopedia learning everything possible about the winged invertebrate population. Mary Beth had been the cheerleader and homecoming queen in high school, Maddie the valedictorian of their senior class. And while Maddie had plunged into college for a Ph.D. in entomology, Mary Beth had chosen an acting career.

We’re identical, all right. Identical opposites, Maddie thought, but offering a truce to the sister she dearly loved, she said, “I’ll make you a deal. I won’t say anything else about your short-shorts, if you’ll stop making fun of my pith helmet.”

“It’s a deal. But I wasn’t kidding about heading back to the hotel within the hour,” Mary Beth threw in as she gave their immediate surroundings another nervous scan. “This place totally creeps me out and you know it.”

“Do-do-do-do—do-do-do-do.” Maddie chanted the Twilight Zone theme in fun.

“Very funny,” Mary Beth grumbled. “But more than one eyewitness claimed a space ship landed in Roswell in l947. Some people even claim to have seen the bodies of those poor space creatures our government dissected for its own amusement.”

“And after fifty years of extensive investigation, the government concluded all those people saw was a weather balloon,” Maddie insisted.

Mary Beth sent her a shocked look. “You mean you really don’t believe other intelligent life is out there somewhere?”

Maddie grinned mischievously. “Maybe the surest sign other intelligent life does exist, is the fact they’ve never tried to contact us.”

Both sisters shared a good laugh before Maddie reached out and patted her twin’s shoulder. “You know, I really am glad you came with me on this trip. We never get to see each other now that you’re out in L.A.”

“If you want to be in pictures, you’ve gotta go where the action is,” Mary Beth answered with her standard reply.

“I know,” Maddie said with a sigh. “But we really do miss you, me and Mom and Pop. Though I have to admit they haven’t seen much of me, either, these days. I’ve been so caught up trying to map out the migration of the Deva Skipper, I’ve barely had time to eat and sleep.”

“And what happens if we do find this bug?”

“Butterfly,” Maddie corrected again. “It’s a rare species. There have been reported sightings in the southeastern part of New Mexico, but none have been confirmed. If I could find one, it could help pave the way to preserving future colonies.”

“And also advance your career a little, maybe?” Mary Beth accused with a grin. “Like that research team you’re so eager to be chosen for?”

Maddie didn’t deny it. “I’d be lying if I said I wouldn’t kill to make my boss’s research team on…”

“On why an old bore like him can’t find a date?”

For the first time, Maddie sent her sister a stern look.

“Okay. Don’t get all huffy,” Mary Beth said as she downshifted and picked up speed. “We’ll look a little longer, but I mean it, Maddie. There’s no way we’re staying out here in UFO utopia after dark.”

“Afraid we might get probed?” Maddie chided.

“No,” Mary Beth said with a laugh. “I’m more afraid you’ll never get probed if this is your idea of how to spend your summer vacation.”

Maddie’s eyes cut to the left. “That wasn’t an invitation for another lecture about my love life.”

“What love life? Or have you finally determined celibacy is too grim a fate even for a workaholic like you?”

Maddie took up her binoculars again and refused to answer.

“I hope you know you’re fooling yourself. You think you’re safely hidden behind those saintly college walls playing professor, but one day some guy is going to come along and knock your feet right out from under you.”

“I’ll be sure to let you know the second anything like that happens.”

“But he won’t be some mental wizard like those stuffy professors you hang around with now,” Mary Beth predicted. “He’ll be all man. Total brawn from head to toe. And you’ll be so hot for this guy, even you would be willing to dance naked on CNN just to get his attention.”

Maddie laughed in spite of herself.

“Besides,” Mary Beth added with a sigh, “we aren’t getting any younger, you know. The big Three-O is just around the corner, and…”

“Age isn’t a subject I care to discuss, either.”

“Nor do I,” Mary Beth agreed. “I just hate seeing you waste your life away like your revered Dr. Fielding has done. And what has being devoted to his career really gotten your boss? When he’s ready to retire I doubt there’ll be any life left in his old caterpillar, if you know what I mean.”

“Mary Beth!” Maddie scolded.

“Well, I’m sorry, but that man gives me the creeps. Any man who would devote his entire life studying the sex life of the tsetse fly has to have a major mental problem. And what scares me most,” Mary Beth added, “is that your only goal in life seems to be to follow in the old coot’s footsteps. Don’t you want a family some day, Maddie? Don’t you want…”

“Stop!” Maddie grabbed Mary Beth’s arm and pointed up ahead. “Ease the Jeep up that hill. Near those thistles. I saw something. Get closer.”

As instructed, Mary Beth eased the Jeep forward and up a small rise that took them even farther away from the main road and deeper into the desert.

“Don’t get too close,” Maddie warned, still using her binoculars to search a patch of brush growing by a chain-link fence that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

“Is that a fence?” Mary Beth whispered, reaching for the binoculars when Maddie took the strap from around her neck.

Maddie ignored the question and substituted the strap of her faithful Nikon camera around her neck. Grabbing a small net from the knapsack sitting on the floorboard, she started to ease herself out of the Jeep when Mary Beth grabbed her hand and pointed to a sign fastened to the fence. Forcing Maddie to take back her binoculars, Mary Beth said, “Take another look. I told you we never should have left the main road. This is government property. I think we should get the hell out of here. Fast.”

Maddie looked through the binoculars again at the weather-worn sign that was faded, yet still official looking enough to cause some concern. Government Property—Absolutely No Trespassing—Violators Will Be Prosecuted—didn’t leave much room for any misunderstanding about the warning. However, Maddie made her decision when she checked the bush again and saw another flutter of movement.

“I’m not going over the fence,” she argued, prying Mary Beth’s fingers from around her wrist. “It’ll only take me a minute to get a specimen.”

“A specimen?” Mary Beth cried out. “I thought you said these butterflies were rare? And now you’re going to capture one? Cut its tiny life short? Isn’t that defeating the whole cause?”

Maddie drew her fingers to her lips in a quick sush. “The Deva Skipper only has a life span of a few weeks,” she whispered. “That’s why finding one is almost impossible. I have no intention of harming it, but how can I possibly save other colonies if I can’t prove the Deva was here to begin with?”