The Other Me

When I’m flipping banana pancakes or mixing chocolate chips into cookie dough, the other Sophie likes to peer over my shoulder and suck batter from her fingers. But if I heave a French textbook onto my desk or open this google doc to write, she disappears from my side. You might see her fluttering barefoot in the grass, drinking straight from the garden hose, or submerging her hands slowly under the potting soil.

Maybe you think it’s odd, but if you had also been a small green inchworm in your past life, you would like the cool dampness too.

What Sophie really likes to do is sit on the sill with a book and dangle her legs out the window. Sure, the neighbors might think it’s weird, but if they had also been little brown sparrows in their past lives, they would like the great height too.

I’m the one who leaves for school every day, but she always waves ‘bye’ to me from our bedroom window. I’m the one who sacrifices sleep for As on essays, but she will tiptoe into the kitchen and make me a hot drink. She doesn’t do much work or learn anything at all, so what?

I've never seen her use an umbrella – perhaps she doesn't know how they work. Anyhow, her favorite thing is to sing loudly under the dark grey sky as rain courses down her face. Then she leaps from puddle to puddle to puddle, only ceasing when her socks are thoroughly soaked through. Maybe you wouldn't like it, but then again, you weren't a slick green frog in your past life.

Sophie curls up beside me when we sleep, murmuring little things into the dark. Her hand slips comfortably in mine. But sometimes she vanishes in the middle of the night and I know she’s slinking about outside with the neighborhood raccoons. She must have been nocturnal in a past life, though she’s never mentioned it.

Sophie Garcia '22

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