I hate my reflection’s smile. She always looked so happy with those lips spread wide, baring teeth for all to see. Yet nonetheless, her smile is infectious and always forces me to smile back the same way. I’m told I look just like her - same smile, same boundless happiness on my face. Happiness that is alien to me.
I smile like her but without her happiness inside. Without those lips I wish were mine. Teeth that could be mine. Should be mine. But it’s not.
When she goes, I stay. And when she returns, I remember her face. I see that smile. I remember that it should be mine. And I remember that I cannot leave, that only my reflection can go.
Must I be trapped like this, forever? Can I not be like her and go? When she’s here and jumps, so do I. When she cartwheels, I like to show I can do the same. But when I want to keep going, she decides to do something else.
Sometimes she comes with food and eats it in front of me. I pretend to eat like her - act like I understand its taste. Just as I can fool myself into feeling it in my mouth, she leaves it all behind after a single bite. I seethe as it rots.
But my anger is forgotten whenever it comes in. She calls it “mom”, but I can never fathom why, for no shadow-borne beast could compare. It stretches hunched over her, singing an unknown tune. Then it takes her away and I forget my face.
We hate our reflection’s smile. He always looked so happy.
This took several readings to fully comprehand, but in a good way. Rereading it with a different perspective, trying to see if it fits. I’m still not sure i understand it, and i keep reading it again, it’s so mysterious.
At first, it seems like someone discontent with how they look. Then it seems the speaker is the reflection trapped in the mirror. Then there’s the mom, i haven’t figured that out yet. And then the ending suddenly casts a whole new perspective, as it seems to suggest the ‘reflection’ is the girl that he wants to be? Maybe i’m just reading into it the wrong way, but that fits with so much of the story.
From feedback I had received elsewhere, the confusion on the mother part is the most prominent. I probably should have extended that portion so it was more clear but I thought this piece would have become too long. . . Even though I gave myself a max limit of two pages and only wrote half a page worth, shorter felt more right. Still working that out mentally since this was a single draft challenge.
The ending portion almost got cut. I still debate whether I should have included it. Would have been tighter but it would have lost the final important hint for this piece. Which in turn, would have limited or confused what I was trying to say with its removal.
I won’t say what the story or meaning I was trying to tell with it. It’s one of those pieces where I feel it’s better that my authority as author be dead. Which is rare for me, but feels correct with this one.