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Sometimes both of them died. And all of it unbearable for the parents. But now I might actually be one of those parents. And Joe? said her mind uneasily. How is Joe going to react to this?
    Martin Brannan said, ‘We can’t see as far ahead as an operation, yet. Don’t let’s jump any guns. I expect you know that identical twins develop from a single fertilized egg, don’t you? And they’re always same-sex children for that reason. One theory for conjoined twins is simply that the developing embryo starts to split but stops before the split is quite complete.’
    Mel supposed she did know this, in a general sense.
    â€˜We don’t know why that happens yet—although one day we will. Your GP had a suspicion that something wasn’t quite as it should be, which is why he sent you to me. It’s why we’ve done the scan a bit earlier than normal, as well. So, now, the scan indicates that your twins are joined at the chest, fairly high up. That’s what we call thoracopagus twins.’
    â€˜They’re face to face?’ Mel had a swift mental image of the twins curled tightly into a silent embrace.
    â€˜No, not exactly,’ he said. ‘The join is at the side. Fairly high up—around the ribcage.’
    â€˜Side by side.’
    â€˜Yes. The images show that the limbs are all separate and free, though. Does that make you feel any better? It should do, because it makes me feel a whole lot better, I promise. And there seem to be two heart shadows, so they aren’t sharing a single heart—that’s always a massive concern with thoracopagus twins.’
    â€˜How good a chance that there are separate hearts?’
    â€˜A lot better than good.’
    â€˜And the bad side of things?’ I’m doing quite well, thought Mel. I’m being calm and logical, and I’m not embarrassing him with hysterics or faints or anything. But she was aware of a churning panic, and she thought that panic, after today, would smell of the lavender air-freshener somebody had sprayed around this office and the geranium plants that somebody had put on the window-sill to catch the sun.
    Brannan took a minute to reply. ‘There’s some fusion of the scapula,’ he said. ‘Around the clavicle—about here.’ He indicated the area just inside his shoulder. It’s not a large area though, and we ought to be able to deal with it. They’ll both have a massive scar afterwards, of course, but we might do a skin graft when they’re older.’ He studied her thoughtfully, and Mel was deeply grateful to him for talking as if it was a foregone conclusion that the twins were going to survive the birth and have the operation, and that they were going to grow up to reach ages where skin grafts could be done.
    â€˜It could be so much worse, you know.’
    â€˜It could?’
    â€˜Oh yes,’ he said, and there was such conviction in his voice that Mel believed him, and did not want to know all the so-much-worse things that she might have had to cope with.
    â€˜Will you—you will be able to separate them all right, won’t you?’
    â€˜It’ll be a difficult and dangerous procedure,’ said Brannan. ‘Because there’s some bone involved—possibly tendons and muscle as well—the separation might leave some damage to one of them. Not necessarily, but possibly.’ He leaned forward. ‘Listen, though, you’re going to hear all kinds of conflicting statistics and stories over the next few months—try to ignore most of them, or ask me for the real information. And remember that thoracopagus twins are by far the easiest to deal with, and that as a rule of thumb more than seventy-five per cent do survive separation.’
    â€˜Both twins?’
    â€˜You’re jumping guns again,’ he said, and then, before Mel could deal with this one, said, ‘D’you want to know the sex of the twins, at