Then and Now

Edna was a young girl again, running through a field made not of grass but of dreams. The air was warm, sweet with clover and sun, and her legs were strong beneath her, carrying her forward without effort. She laughed as she ran, the sound light and surprised, as if she had forgotten she still knew how to do that.

The field rolled on forever, soft and green, stitched together with wildflowers. Somewhere ahead, she saw herself.

Not a reflection—a vision.

An older woman, pale and still, framed by rain and glass.

Edna slowed. The girl-version of her felt a tug in her chest, a strange knowing she couldn’t name. She stepped closer, pushing through the tall grass, reaching out.

Through the rain, she could see it clearly now:
a window.
a room.
a wheelchair.

And in it—her.

Old. Folded inward. Hands resting uselessly in her lap. Eyes open but unfocused, staring through the glass as rain slid down like tears she could no longer feel.

“I’m here,” the girl tried to say.

She ran toward the image, heart pounding—not with fear, but urgency. If she could just reach that woman, touch her, wake her up, maybe she could pull her back into the field. Back into movement. Back into now.

But suddenly, her legs would not move.

The ground beneath her hardened, turning slick and cold. The green dissolved into gray. The warmth vanished.

Metal pressed against her thighs.

Edna gasped.

She was no longer running. She was seated. Heavy. Anchored. Her body refused her commands, stiff and foreign. She pushed forward anyway, mind screaming go, but the wheelchair did not move.

The window loomed inches away.

Rain hammered against it, louder now, relentless. The girl in the field pressed her palms against the other side of the glass, eyes wide with panic and recognition. The old woman did the same—but her hands lifted only slightly, trembling, stopping short.

They stared at each other.

Two versions of the same soul, separated by rain and time and failing memory.

The girl’s mouth moved.
The old woman could not hear the words.

Then the field began to fade.

The colors washed out first. The flowers lost their shape. The girl’s outline blurred, smearing into light and motion, until she was nothing more than a suggestion—a feeling of once.

“No,” Edna whispered, though she wasn’t sure who said it.

The window remained.
The wheelchair remained.
The rain remained.

And the field—so close she could almost smell it—slipped away.

Edna sagged forward slightly, her chin dipping toward her chest. Whatever bridge had formed between then and now collapsed quietly, without ceremony. The vision retreated, leaving only the ache of having almost touched something whole.

She was lost once again.

Outside, the rain kept falling.

Inside, Edna sat still, staring through the glass, haunted by the echo of running feet she could no longer feel.