12 and 21

Harmattan was in full swing as she shivered her way to her dresser. She picked up her shear butter to oil her skin before the harsh weather cracked it. She dropped the lid and bent to pick it. When she stood she saw a completely different reflection in the mirror. It was older, prettier and had breasts. She didn’t have breasts.

She should have panicked but she didn’t. She watched as the reflection came out and stood in front of her.

“Am I dead?” she asked.

“No” it replied.

“Am I dreaming?” she asked.

“Does it matter?” it replied.

She saw the scar on the chin that they got when they were 5. They got it when they fell down the stairs while playing with their brother. It was different in a subtle way. It seemed to have grown into the face as if it was an ear or a nose. It didn’t seem out of place.

They both sat on the bed for what felt like 30 minutes. She looked at their shadows and saw that they were sitting in the same way. Right leg crossed over the left leg with the right hand leaning on the bed and the left over the right leg. The only difference was that one’s leg reached the ground while the other’s didn’t. She quickly changed her position because it made her uneasy.

She looked over at the reflection. It was definitely her. Older and probably wiser. She looked at all the features. She saw a new scar on the leg and another one on the elbow. She wondered where she got it. It was as though it sensed her looking so it turned to look at her. Its eyes were soft and gentle. It looked lovingly, almost longingly.

“How old are you?” she asked.

“I’m 21.”

“Oh, so you’re me but flipped over” 12 laughed.

“We’ve always been funny” 21 said.

12 looked with admiration. She looked good. 21 noticed it. She could see that 12 was proud.

“12, I came to talk to you. Do you have any questions?.”

12 swung her legs eagerly. 21 noticed this too. She felt a pang of jealousy. Oh, to be young again. To be like 12.

“How did we get pretty? Do people love us now? Did we make many friends? Did all our health conditions go away? Did we find love? Who is our boyfriend? Are we famous now? Are we one of the cool girls?”

21 laughed.

“I still have your face, 12. Somewhere down the road, we learned to love it. 16 accepted who we were and chose to pretend to be confident. When people see confidence, they see beauty. They started calling us beautiful and we heard it so many times we began to believe it. I don’t know if people love us, but we love us, or at least we’ve accepted us. It feels good.

We haven’t found love, 12. We haven’t found love because even now you don’t believe we deserve love and we never broke the cycle. So, here we are now, wanting love but too scared to open up because we think it won’t want us back. It’s lonely and its scary. We are too good at being alone that I worry we’ll never be able to let go.

We aren’t famous and I think that’s a good thing. I don’t think we ever wanted to be. We wanted to be loved and accepted and we thought we had to be famous to be loved and accepted but 12, you’ll find that a lot of things we think are good for us are not. Famous people feel the loneliest. A small circle is worth more than the world.

I can’t tell if we ever became one of the cool girls but I can say we stopped caring. It doesn’t really matter anymore.”

12 was quiet.

“You seem sad. Why?”

Silence.

“Daddy dies” 21 said abruptly. "Cherish the moments you get with him. You’ll go on walks together. Capture the moment for us. Take in the sky and the cold breeze. Memorize the untarred roads and the feel of his hands. Look at his face and remember how he scrunched his lips as he walked. He gives long talks, enjoy it. Hug him. Hug him, please. Hug him as many times as possible and do it for no reason. Stay there, in his arms and feel his heartbeat. Listen to it and take in how it felt laying there.”

“How did you survive it? I don’t think I can” 12 said.

“You’re me. You will. I know you pray every night to die. It gets better, sometimes. It’s not easy, 12, but we make some good memories along the way. I don’t think you want to die. I think you want to be happy.”

“I guess you came to tell me to hold on and to fight. I will. We’ll have the surgery and it’ll fix everything.”

“It won’t. it’ll make us feel better for a time but it’s a different kind of hard from the one we’re used to now. It still hurts. There’s the scar that’ll never go away. The things we can do diminishes and even worse, the things we want to do dwindles. We can’t play with the others. We’ll still be ostracized. We’ll still be separated from the others and treated differently. People will hate us for it. They’ll say we’re faking it and we’re pretending. They’ll treat us like trash because they think the different treatment we receive is better treatment. But I still want you to fight. I still want you to do it because that kind of hard is better than the one you’re in right now. Feeling like we fixed something and getting answers makes it better but it’ll never be an absolute fix.”

“Can I ask you something, 12?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you keep dreaming? Why did you keep pushing?”

“Because it makes me feel better. It’s what keeps my death wish as a prayer. I push because tomorrow will be better than today and I was right. Look at you! I didn’t think it was possible.”

“I’m not what you wanted. You wanted to be rich and famous. I’m not.”

“You’re alive and you aren’t broken.”

“We hide emotions and suppress memories. We forget a lot of things. I struggle to remember sometimes. It only comes as a flash and doesn’t feel real. I remember the children making fun of us and the teachers being mean. I don’t think it’s healthy to bury things.

We do act on our death prayer. 16 tries to but she fails. I’m glad she did. Losing someone hurts too much and I’m glad we didn’t do that to our parents and siblings. Even though life is hard there are some good memories to be made.”

"You're so hard on yourself."

21 fell silent.

“Are you really here just to tell me this?”

21 stared at the wall.

“I’m sorry 12” she said bursting into tears, “I’m sorry that it never goes the way we dreamed. I tried. We tried so hard. I cry for you all the time. I cry because I failed. I tried but it wasn’t enough. I wasn’t strong enough. I’m not as strong as you are. I’m just here looking at the broken pieces of our dreams.”

21 stared at 12 and 12 stared back. They both looked at the dreams they had – the dreams they still wanted. But it ate at 21 that she might not be strong enough to get them there.

“I’m sorry that I’m not strong. I’m sorry that we couldn’t mend things fast enough. I’m sorry that I’m afraid and that I’m stuck. I don’t know how to fix this. We did everything. We did. We are not bad people. Everything is broken and I don’t know how to fix it. It’s not that I don’t want to; it’s that I’m too tired. I can’t run anymore. I want to give up so bad, 12, and then I remember you. I remember how you fought. Then I think of 16 and 19, how they fought and I thought I would be able to do it again. I thought I could save us again like you all have done in the past, but I can’t. I can’t do it anymore. This time it’s too hard.”

12 looked at 21. It seemed strange to be hearing this. 21 seemed stronger and wiser. How could she be here saying this?

“So you want to die?”

“No, but I don’t want to be alive either. It takes so much to get out of bed in the morning. I fake a smile till I believe it’s real and I manage to drag myself through the day. It’s so hard to do anything. Then at night, when there’s no one to pretend for, it eats me. All the things we ignored come back to visit me. The dreams you had eat me up at night because I don’t think I can do it.”

“21, I’m 12. I don’t know the world like you do. You can’t shackle yourself by the dreams I had. Those dreams kept me going. I never thought we’d make it to 21 but here you are. That’s all that matters to me. None of the ages have had to carry your burden. It’s been easy for me, 16 and 19 to be strong because we were never 20. We were never you. It’s easy to hold a half glass of water in the first minute but by the 60th, it starts to weigh more than anything. I’m proud of you.

If you can’t fight, that’s okay. Don’t. Waking up every day is enough. The world never wanted us to get to where you are but you made it. We made it and that’s enough.”

“But if I don’t fight, how do I make it to 22.”

“Every night I ask God to kill me. Every morning I wake up and find a reason to laugh. Every night you can cry but every morning you must wake up and find a reason to laugh. That’s fighting enough and 22 will thank you for it.”

12 stood to wipe 21’s tears. 21 grabbed her hand and let it linger on her cheek. She felt the smaller fingers and closed her eyes.

“Thank you, 12”

21 stood and headed for the mirror. She turned back and looked at 12. They embraced. She felt a sense of healing holding on to the little girl she thought she had betrayed. 12 held her, memorizing what she was fighting for.

21 turned to go. “21, wait!” 12 cried, “why did you choose me? Why didn’t you go to the future, 18 or someone else? Why me?”

“Because you know how I feel more than any of them. But you’re young and the pain of the world hasn’t killed your hope yet. I needed to borrow some of that hope.”

“I’m proud of you.” 12 said.

21 turned and went through the mirror. 12 looked at her reflection. It was her again, but then again it was her all along. She placed her hand over her flat chest and felt the beat of her heart.