two. två. deux. dos. dúo.......dua

he hugged dua close, shoulders sagging from relief despite the shaking of his fingers. ‘i’m so glad i found you. i thought-’ he closed his eyes, not even wanting to finish the thought. ‘i don’t know what’s happened. one moment i was looking at art and then- this.’ primo ran his fingers through his sister’s hair, still hugging her close . ‘i’m alright now, i’ve been looking everywhere for- wait.’ primo pulled away, starting down at his sister and around them, until he comes to a realization ‘you’re not- you’re not with triu?’ his voice came out quiet but laced with so much panic, you could practically see him wound up tight again. ‘where’d- where’d you last see her?’

she let out a shaky breath and clung onto her brother feeling the unfamiliar feeling of fear. dua normally went though life without fear but what had happened had struck a chord in her. “i’m so glad you’re okay. i- i didn’t know...” feeling his fingers in her hair felt soothing, it felt safe. it reminded her of when they were younger and how primo would make sure she was okay if she got hurt or had a nightmare. dua looked back at him and shook her head. “n-no, i don’t know where she is.” she could feel the tension radiating off him “last time i saw her was near where the music was playing but we got split up when we were going for food. i hoped she was with you” oh god, triú wasn’t with him. their baby sister wasn’t accounted for. “where is she primo?” she asked in a whisper that fear creeping in again before she could try and compose herself “it’s triú we’re talking about, she’s smart. she’s the smart twin. she’ll have gotten out safe, right?” 

of course she found her twin stuffing her face with chocolate right now, but in that moment she couldn’t have been happier to see her sister being her usual dumb ass self. satisfied that she was convinced dua wasn’t an illusion, triú released the other “oh sorry. i was just so worried about you. have you heard from primo? i haven’t seen him yet” she asked, looking around to see if he was near.

dua took a step back and let the air go back into her lungs after her twin had hugged it all out of her. “i’m so happy you’re okay. primo found me at the festival after everything happened. he’s alive and he’ll be around here somewhere. where did you go? we were looking all over the place, you had us worried sick triú” it was one of the few times that she would pull rank of the older one out of the two of them. when dua’s confusion had settled her first thought was her siblings and thankfully primo had found her pretty quickly by her timeframe. “are you okay? did you get hurt?”

@dua-calia : DUA CALIA

the festival was chaotic, screams and scrambling going off on either side of him. he knew he should’ve gone looking for his sisters the moment he lost them, but how could he know something like this was going to happen? primo was frantic, eyes darting around and trying to pick out- ‘dua!’ he hollered, finally seeing one of the twins. ‘dua! thank merlin!’ he has hands on her shoulders and giving her a proper assessment. ‘are you okay?’

she didn’t know what had happened. one minute she was enjoying a plethora of snacks at the stalls and the next she was buried under a pile of fallen people and rubble from the surrounding stalls. clawing her way out of the crowd and collapsed stalls, dua looked around at everything unfolding in front of her in confusion. hearing her name being called, she turned to see her big brother “primo?” she asked, squinting her eyes to make out if it really was him or if her head was playing tricks on her “primo, what happened?” she asked pulling him closer to cling to him in a hug. “are you okay?” dua checked over her brother and then looked down at herself, she was fine other than some cuts and bruises. “i think i’m fine, just some cuts and bruises. nothing that would be considered an injury. where’s triú? is she okay? i lost you both.” 

Dominique beamed at her old friend. With the joyful memories came not so subtle reminders of why it had been so long since she had last seen her. She wonder if Dua knew any more than see did about what happened. To her, Primo had just stopped writing. And his last letter, finally addressing what they simply weren’t talking about for three years, made it all the more confusing. Seeing her again made her wonder, for the first time in a moment, how he was doing. Whatever she knew or didn’t, Dua didn’t seem upset to see her. “You live here now. Wow… Dua, that is wonderful. It is so lovely to see you. How are you finding our branches, then?” Dom felt transported to a version of herself that she hadn’t met in a long time, and it felt nice to, just for a moment, feel okay again to just be. “I’m writing about the festival, actually. I do some journalism along with writing personal works for publishing.”

in duas head, dua knew what dua needed to know. specifically when it came to her brother and dominique. she knew that she probably wasn’t as filled in as triú considering she was the less -lets call it- consistent one of the twins. all that aside, dua was happy to see dom again, in fact she was thrilled. she missed dom. “yeah i’m a big time fancy bartender. bartender and photographer to be specific” she beamed “they’ve been very sturdy branches, i have high hopes for them.” she said enthusiastically. dua and those dumb branches. it was how she and dom met those years ago after she barged in on dom and her brother. “you’re writing? that’s great. how are you finding it? is the festival full of as much action as you hoped?”

The scene that unfolded before her nearly gave her whiplash. She hadn’t seen the food fall until the cat had stolen it, and she realized that this was all because of her lack of awareness of her own limbs. She was about to speak, to insist on buying the girl a new meal, when she realized just who she was talking to. “Dua?” Dom never expected to see any of the Calia trio again. Maybe someday, far down the line, but those imaginary scenarios were always set in France. Not in England, at a music festival, and it certainly didn’t involve her tripping one of them. Memories flooded back, and an abundant joy arose inside of her. Dua always had a way of doing that to her. “Oh my days. No, I don’t know that cat and I’m so sorry. Let me buy you a new burger. Holy shit, Dua Calia. What are you doing here?!”

she was glaring daggers at the cat that had decided to take up residence not far from the crime scene to rub it in dua’s face. if that cat thought she wouldn’t rob him back it was mistaken and in all honesty she would have got into some showdown with the cat if it hadn’t happened so quickly. “don’t you mean victim?!” she said dramatically, putting the back of her hand to her forehead for effect. then again who really knew her and that peaked her curiosity. dua turned to see a familiar face from the past “dom? holy shit” it had been a while since she last saw dom, at least three years if dua was remembering correctly. “you don’t need to know the cat to be in cahoots.” she said pointing over at the cat who looks smug with itself “being the family disappointment. i’m working my way round different countries now.” she joked “i live in london now. i heard there were bigger branches here” three years didn’t feel like a lot of time but when dua thought about it she could consider it was. “what are you doing here?”

Of all events Dom could be asked to cover, music festivals were far from the worst. She actually quite liked being able to see so many artists within a few days, and being paid to write about them was an obvious plus. But today she was tasked with writing about the people. Dominique wrote about the beauty and the ugly in the chaos she observed. She refused, though, to write much about her family. Dom knew they wanted it, her bosses, but they knew she was stubborn. As she sat outside a stall, jotting down thoughts and observations, her eyes kept leaving her book and returning to those around her. But she wasn’t quite being careful, her foot a bit too far into the walking paths, almost tripping someone. She swore under her breath, focus snapping away from her writing. “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t paying nearly enough attention. Are you alright?”

was dua working later? yes. was that going to stop her from attending the festival and running all over the place to try and fit everything in before she had to go to work? no. dua had been working her way around the festival and stopped at one of the stalls to grab something to eat. something that she was very much looking forward to eating before someone had caught her foot. stumbling forward, the burger fell from her hands and dua stared at the burger on the ground, giving it a moment silence in mourning. she did consider picking it up with the five second rule but she could hear the scolding she would get from her twin in her head as a voice of reason and she couldn’t risk ending up with a trip to the hospital, mainly because she’d never hear the end of it from triú. that moment passed when a cat ran in swiped the food from the ground and ran off. robber. she was mugged by a cat. 

“were you and the cat in cahoots?” 

[ DUA CALIA ] has arrived in Ardere! Under the bonfire light, this [ TWENTY FOUR ] year old [ FEMALE ] is sometimes mistaken for [ MARGARET QUALLEY ]. Since graduating from [ BEAUXBATONS ], they have been working as a [ BARTENDER AT OOPSIE & PHOTOGRAPHER ]. Right now, they are currently residing in [ LONDON ].