Wood Sprites

“Embryo bank” turned out to be the keywords. Apparently, when couples went through in vitro fertilization, multiple embryos were created but not used. It came from the fact that they were working at the cellular level with human reproductive systems already not operating properly. More eggs than needed were released, and then flooded with sperm. Because the failure rate was high, it made sense to invite everyone to the party and hope for the best.

While the information answered one question — that of their blood type — it raised dozens of others. They took a carton of chicken eggs out of the refrigerator and set it on the counter. There were eight eggs in the package, as their mother had made four soft-boiled eggs yesterday morning.

“We’re the leftovers.” Jillian poked at the remaining eggs.

So far they hadn’t been able to determine how many eggs were fertilized at once, only that normally up to four were recommended per each implantation.

Louise took out a marker and put eyes and mouth on one egg and then the letter L underneath. “L for Louise. J for Jillian.” She went to draw on a second egg, but Jillian snatched the pen out of her hand.

“I want to do mine.” Jillian cradled the egg in her hand and carefully wrote out her name and not only did a face but hair.

“According to Wikipedia, they do four embryos per implantation because they expect a high failure rate.” Louise found another marker and put Xs for eyes and a squiggle mouth on two of the eggs to indicate that they were failed embryos. “That means there’s another four embryos.”

“Do you really think they made twelve just like a carton of chicken eggs?”

“Well. . they keep them in freezers just like chicken eggs.”

Jillian put the Jillian-egg back into the carton beside the Louise-egg. “That proves nothing.” She tapped the remaining eggs. “These eggs might have never existed. These ones, though. .” She pointed at the empty cups. “Those eggs existed and were used and were successful — otherwise we wouldn’t be leftovers.”

Louise rolled the idea around in her head. Their “genetic parents” created a random number of fertilized eggs because they wanted babies. Once they had one or two babies, they didn’t want more, so they gave the rest to someone that did: their real parents. Jillian was right; for them to be leftovers, their genetic parents got the babies that they wanted.

“We have sisters,” Louise whispered. The possibilities were breathtaking. Two more Louise and Jillian? Did the other Jillian want to create epic movies? Did the other Louise love animals as much as she did? Did she have pets?

“Or brothers,” Jillian said. “They could be boys. It’s not like we’ve been cloned.”

That was true. Brothers wouldn’t be bad; just different. She and Jillian were often mistaken for identical twins because their hair was the same shade of brown and had been the same length prior to the explosion. The fire had singed Louise’s ponytail to a short brittle stump that their mother had trimmed even shorter to get rid of the burnt ends. She looked like a boy now.

Louise peered at her reflection in the mirrored side of the toaster. Would their brothers look like her? Were they nine years old, too? Or ten?

“How long to you think we sat in the fridge?” Jillian said. “We are leftovers, after all.”

“I don’t know.” There were reports of pregnancies of embryos that had been stored up to sixteen years. Their sisters could have been teenagers before she and Jillian were born. They could be really old by now — like twenty-one or twenty-two!

Louise decided she liked thinking that their siblings were two girls, exactly their age. What of the other leftovers? Louise took out an egg, pure white, perfectly formed, and considered the possibilities. The others would probably be younger. “I think I would want at least one brother. A baby brother, just learning to talk.”

“That would be boring.” Jillian picked up one of the unmarked eggs. “I’d rather have a baby sister but one that could talk and walk and act.”

Assuming that any other leftovers had actually been used. Louise eyed the egg with slight unease. She knew that she couldn’t remember that time between conception and implantation. Despite that, it seemed awful somehow to be stuck frozen at the brink of being alive.

“Do you think they’re still in the fridge?” Jillian marked closed eyes on the egg as if it were asleep. A chain of little Zs came from a tiny slack mouth. “Still-unused leftovers?”

“Maybe.” How many people wanted other people’s Easter eggs, left in the grass after the hunt? Would they stay lost in the darkness, forgotten, until they spoiled?

Louise cradled the egg in her hands. Every Wednesday night their mother would sift through the contents of their refrigerator, sniffing at the suspicious packages, throwing out anything that looked too old. How much time did the unused eggs have left?