Caroline knew the mirror was lying to her and she didn’t know to prove it. She’d tried telling people about it, this changing face of hers.
They all thought she was crazy; some had even told her so.
Nonsense, they said. Everybody has a face, and everybody knows what their face looks like.
You know who you are, they’d say.
She was different, she was them all. She used to think on it more, the horrors of having no self, no I, no face. She used to worry how it might affect her, like, emotionally. Spiritually, even. This sort of stuff used to really weigh on her. That was when she was younger though, when she was afraid of the mirror.
She wasn’t afraid anymore.
Like anything else, not knowing who you are becomes routine. Caroline had wrestled with it, and it kind of made sense. Maybe it’s not as simple as knowing who we are. Maybe some of us aren’t lucky enough to get something stable, a real identity (if there is such a thing). Maybe some of us are stitched together with what’s over from everyone else. And maybe that’s ok…I mean, it has to be, right? Caroline often thinks about all this in the first few moments after she’s woken, when the world feels too quiet and too loud all at once. It’s raining outside, and she wonders if raindrops worry about who they are inside while they hurtle, unsuspecting, towards the ground. She grimaces at the lack of subtlety in her metaphor, but it makes her feel better. It’s alright, little raindrop. It’s alright that you can’t look into the wild infinity of a mirror and be sure it’s you looking back
word by Josh Elyea
colour by Shalak Attack
wordandcolour 