Laura Vega walked into a small butcher shop in Bogotá, Colombia, and stopped short. The man behind the counter was Jorge, her coworker from the engineering firm.
She waited for him to say hello. He didn't. He looked at her as if he had never seen her before.
Laura couldn't make sense of it. Maybe Jorge had taken a weekend job, she thought, or he was short of money.
The friend who had come with her told her not to be silly. That man, the friend said, was her boyfriend's cousin. The two women went back and forth until the man behind the counter settled it himself.
His name was William, he said. He didn't know anyone called Jorge.
The next week, Laura told Jorge about his double, and they both had a good laugh. Jorge had a twin brother of his own, named Carlos. For years, people had teased the family that the two boys didn't look like twins at all.
Everyone took them for fraternal twins, the kind who don't have to look alike.