Split.

When I was eleven, I fell into a flowerbed.

I remember banging my chin off the dirt and smelling the roses, feeling pricks from the thorns I didn’t know they had. Little me laughed. She didn’t mind the pain; if anything, that made the situation more “awesome” to her.

My dad tried to scold me for going so close to another’s property, but I saw his trembling hands as he bandaged my cuts and bruises. Little me thought he was shaking from anger. Bigger me knows better now.

When I was twelve, my first boyfriend got me flowers. I hid them from my parents, thinking they’d scold me for having a partner. My friend’s mom ratted me out and got me in trouble. I used to hold the flowers every day, feeling their soft stems in my soft hands.

Little me thought the world revolved around them. Around flowers. They were beautiful beings and extensions of the prettiest parts of nature. Bigger me knows better now, even if she doesn’t want to.

When I was thirteen, I went to a softball tournament for the first time and collapsed into the flowers, laughing as the gentle breeze cooled me after a strenuous day. They were dandelions. I wished for the moment to last forever. It didn’t.

Though, maybe it did, in my mind. Maybe it stuck around for longer than needed. Bigger me remembers it, but she doesn’t remember what being little me felt like.

When I was fourteen, the boy in my class who sat behind me in band made a joke about my breast size—the undeveloped ones, like the ones most of the girls in school had. I started stuffing my bra and demanding my mom buy me all new, larger ones. Little me didn’t know what she’d do if another boy commented on them. It made her hide away from the rest of the world. Bigger me doesn’t know how to feel about that.

Little me ran to my neighbor’s flowerbed, and she let her fingers wander too close to the thorns. On purpose that time. What surprised her most was that it didn’t hurt, and it felt like revenge against those who wronged her. It showed them that nothing could harm her. Bigger me knows better now.

When I was fifteen, my favorite flower became a white rose. It reminded me of the thorns I fell in when I was littler me. Fifteen was still little me, but she didn’t think so. She pretended to pay taxes and used curse words as if she were in college. Bigger me wishes I had the luxury of make believe.

I continued stuffing my bra and ignoring the boys in my grade, though deep down, I wished one of them would get me flowers again.

When I was sixteen, I got my first job. My first paycheck went to Spotify, where I listened to Guns N’ Roses because I liked their name. Their music, not so much. I thought it was blasphemy that they were allowed to have such a cool name with such lame music. But little me had an itch at the back of her brain. The itch of money. Not greed, but money. Little me didn’t know how important it’d become, though she shivered at the thought of losing it, thinking her life would be over if she did.

Bigger me feels the same. It’s the last piece of little me that bigger me agrees with.

When I was seventeen, I stopped going to the beach. I hated the way the sand felt between my toes, but what hurt me most was the water. I stopped swimming, even in pools. Every time I put my body in water, images of drowning flooded my mind. Images of tsunamis. Mega tsunamis. I thought the earth would crack and mangle me until all that remained was a broken rose stem. A stem that had lost its thorns.

I stayed back in the grass and watched my friends prance around, their feet tossing tan dirt in the air as smiles infected their youthful faces. I wanted to at least talk to them, to whisper about the shudders the water brought me, but the idea of talking to them brought more shudders than the water did, so I kept my mouth shut. As always.

When I was eighteen, I had my first thoughts about the meaning of life. Late bloomer, I know, but better late than never. I made up for lost time by staring at my wall for hours upon hours a day. It was to the point where I had hours blocked off on my schedule to sit and stare, thinking about nothing, but also everything.

My mood lamp used to shine on the ceiling, and I thought I could find roses in the calming red lights. But as soon as I remembered the thorns, I’d turn it off only to tremble in the dark and turn it back on again. It was the only thing that got my mind to shut up. Despite eighteen-year-old me being the rift between little and bigger me, bigger me didn’t know what was worse: the rampant thoughts, or the cruel silence.

When I was nineteen, I realized how much I couldn’t handle being outside. It was like the trees spoke to me, telling me to flee before they came for me. Before everything came for me. My mind hadn’t moved on from the life thoughts eighteen-year-old me had, and that led to images filling my mind. Blood. Death. Tripping and falling, but no longer into flowerbeds.

Bigger me always listened to the trees and ran for shelter. I’d cower under my blankets, and then yelp at the darkness and return to the light. But the light was no better. It never was. Little me never so much as considered running, but bigger me knows better now.

When I was twenty, I found out why I never stopped looking for flowers. I discovered a chasm of unaddressed feelings eighteen-year-old me didn’t include in her thoughts about life. At twenty-one, bigger me doesn’t know why, but she keeps reaching out. Her hand extends and brushes by the rose petals, yet it never works. They fizzle away as if they never existed at all. I wish I could be them. I wish I could be her. I can’t. It doesn’t matter anymore.

Every time I touch the flowers, all they do is wilt.