It takes a village to raise a child? Try two children. Twins. It takes a whole city.

We called the older Mad Tom, and the younger was Troy. Tom was always the older, even if a mere fifteen minutes seemed to stretch to fifteen years depending on the question asked. But Tom had a touch of the fey about him, and while Troy could never be said to be the sensible one, Tom was the one with the big dreams, and Troy kept his small so he could get what he wanted. Tom wanted to fly, Troy wanted to drive. Tom wanted to see a unicorn, Troy wanted to have a puppy.

I don't know when the ritual started, but I remember their father had the words down from the beginning. It went something like:

It would repeat two or three times, once when he got home, and then before bed, even though I said it was instigating pre-sleep excitement, and he said that no one should go to bed without laughter?, and that that was a guaranteed giggle. Since he always made me laugh, in bed and out of it, I didn't argue the point.

Squirm and Struggle. Maybe those were better names for the two. Mad Tom squirmed into trouble, and Troy struggled his way out of it.

I don't know why it surprised me that their adventures ran wide. After all, every time I walked with them to the store they would be greeted by name by people who were complete strangers to me. I would be given a friendly nod, but it was like being the girlfriend of a celebrity. You know the one who came before the stardom and the celebrity is totally faithful to, but doesn't understand all the fuss? And who has to buy the name brand designer dresses because otherwise the tabloids use words like "frumpy" and "dowdy" even if on an average day she would have been whistled at, but she's not Hollywood, so it's like she's nameless? Just like that. At first I wanted to talk to all of them, at least transmute the nod to a real word, but I didn't exist to them. Only Tom & Troy, mad boy and trouble magnet. Of course, asking Tom and Troy what the names of the people were who they met was a foolish endeavour. "That's the guy who lives down the street. That's Jerome, he plays chess in the park. That's the crazy lady with all the cats and the masks on her wall."

I imagined a map drawn of these descriptions. It would be a treasure map of course, described in the patois of my troublesome twosome. Every apartment would be superimposed with the things children notice. Our neighbors on the right had a piano that fascinated Troy. They had him come over on holidays when they and their own grown children would gather around and sing. The crazy lady with all the cats and the mask would have a black feline all arrayed for a masquerade on her corner. Toy shops would be larger than life, with a ever changing display of whatever was the most desired toy of the week. Parks would go on forever, mown grass, trees, frisbees, and chess tables and benches. Pigeons would dot the map erratically. Dogs and cats would be occasional punctuation marks crossing the passes represented by the busy crosswalks. I thought of a particular dog, in fact, one both shaggy and that off-colour white that dogs get after a few days away from a scented bubble wash.

As if the memory summoned him, I saw him rooting through the alley. The boys ran ahead, scattering pigeons and shouting random sounds of greeting and mischief both, and I followed slowly. Troy gave the overlarge puppy a huge hug, receiving a sloppy wash of dog saliva in return. I looked through my purse for some antiseptic wipes, although I knew it was a lost battle. For one, we're talking about my purse, which is one of the places I let the chaos of my life accumulate, rather than compartmentalize. For another, as soon as this set of germs was wiped off it would just be replaced by something else, probably something worse. Words like "entropy" and "perversity" floated through my head and I gave the cause up. It'd strengthen his immune system and I'd insist on a bath. I held firm to my justification. I mean, conviction.

"He squirms! He struggles!" Tom shouted, picking up some kind of metal stick from a pile of discarded apartment furniture. My mind fuzzed for a moment. I knew that shape. Part of a musician's stand, you know, that holds music? I can't remember the name of it. He held it out like a sword...no, more like a magic wand. The swordsman stance was more of a Troy thing. It's those little differences that give them away, when they otherwise look identical. Even identical scars; it was enough to make you believe in some of those paranormal things between twins. The scraped knee Tom got from the tree adventure? Matches the one Troy got skidding along the school playground.

The wooly mammoth of the canine world looked straight at Tom. He barked once. Tom waved the stick. "Squirmanstruggle, Squirmansquiggle!" he said, entoning the magic words.

"Now, Tom, that wasn't necessary," the dog said.

I blinked and dropped my purse.

"Sorry, Sam," the dog nodded in my direction. He barked again and ran up the alley. Tom shouted something back at him, but I was busy picking up my mini-flashlight, my lipstick (just for touch-ups), and the forty-seven cents in change that had made the escape for it while I was hallucinating.

Somewhere on the map, a big arrow with "Talking Dog" was just written. I mentally highlighted it, underlined, and set an interbang next to it. "Boys?" I asked. If my voice sounded kind of funny, I guess I could have been excused.

I think Mad Tom said, "Phooey." Maybe insanity is catching. I guess I did read a bumpersticker that said it was hereditary: you get it from your children. I laughed involuntarily, remembering.

"Mom?" Troy asked. "You all right?" He found a quarter that had liberated itself farther down the sidewalk. He pocketed it.

"Whose dog was that?" I managed.

"Oh, that was Davis. He's always worried Tommy will hurt himself," Troy said, unconcernedly. "Come on, let's go to the store. I've got a quarter. Can I get a gumball?"

It was then I realized I had fallen off my own map, and I didn't know the way home. No matter how I squirmed or squiggled, things were no longer going to be the same.

Tom watched me carefully. He pointed with his metal wand. "That's the way. Let's go," he said, ready for another adventure.

I just wondered what their father would think.

• bed without laughter?

referencing a number of other stories