MIRROR IMAGE
My entire world is a dark grey cloud, all because I wield a silver locket.
I lay on the grass and starred at the sky. There were a few cumulus clouds and a dove with brown wings which dimmed white flew over me. I kept my gaze on the sky. I could still see the peaceful blue. It made me feel hopeful and warm inside to know that I can see the bright light of day. I hope I can enjoy it while I can.
I was at the park. It was crowded. I saw young children with smiles and laughter as they ran around playing games. There was a couple with there fingers locked and their faces bright with glee taking a stroll along the lavender flowers. Families were enjoying themselves at picnics and seemed glad to be together.
I’ve always wanted that life, life without worry, without sorrow or without guilt. I knew it was impossible no matter what I tried. I would always dwell in darkness. I was alone, the only one like me. I was a danger to anyone who approached me. A tear ran down my face as I thought about my life, my endless life.
“Hello.” I heard from behind me.
I sat up and turned around. There in front of my eyes was a boy. He looked around sixteen, seventeen. He had dark brown hair and slightly darkish skin. What he wore was pretty average, a red T-shirt with a pair of dark jeans.
“Hello.” I said faintly.
“Are you here alone?” he asked.
“No.”
“Who did you come with?”
I took out my black LG K501 and pretended to read a text. Then I sent an empty text to an unknown number.
“I’m sorry, my mom just texted me. She said I have to go home and study for my big quiz. Sorry.” I said as I rapidly got up.
“Wait!” he said, “What’s your name?”
“Magnolia.” I said as I hurried away from him.
Magnolia? No. My name was Amita. I didn’t want a friend. I didn’t want him to get hurt.
I had gone back to my apartment. It was plain and simple. Dark brown couches were in the living room and they surrounded a small round glass table. The walls were a light peach colour which was always soothing to see.
My mother entered the living room and I instantly felt safe. Her warm smile glistened on her face and her blonde curly locks looked beautiful. Her turquoise eyes were warm and welcoming. I could’ve given her a hug, I could’ve complimented her, but I didn’t want trouble.
“Amita, are you hungry?” she asked.
My face had a flush of fear. A cold sensation ran down my spine. Him, that boy, I knew I would see him again, although I didn’t want to. It just happens…always.
“Honey you look scared are you alright?” she asked.
“I’m fine. I’m just…” my voice trailed off.
I reminded myself that she is not my real mother and that she was just helping me. I wanted to tell her, but she deserves to be happy and glad to have a normal daughter.
“Just what honey?”
“Nothing. I’m hungry.” I said.
“Come on. I made a cherry pie. I’ll cut you a slice and you can tell me all about how nice the park was.”
We entered the kitchen. It was fairly small. It had a black counter and white cupboards. It had a certain dull feeling in it, because it had such sad colours.
She cut me a slice of pie which was on the kitchen counter and put it on a plate for me. I ate it slowly enjoying every piece. Once I was finished, I washed my plate and put it away.
I went of to my room. The walls were also a cream peach colour. It was my favorite colour. I collapsed on my small bed and looked at the white curtains of the window. The sunlight still shone through as if an angel was announcing its presence.
I reached for my dark brown bedside table and opened the drawer. Inside it were few things. Some papers, some colour pencils and some text books. Inside the drawer was also a mirror and I reached for the mirror. It was round with a white frame around it.
I could see myself in the mirror. My long dark hair, my pale skin and my grey icy eyes all forming part of my face. I wasn’t proud of it. Seeing my face made me sick. I put the mirror on bedside table and buried my face in an orange pillow.
Why me? Why did I have to carry on this curse? Why was I put through this torture? I never asked for it. I never wanted to be like this. It just happened and I didn’t know why. I was stuck the way I was.
My eyelids got heavy and slowly as I thought about how corrupted my life is, I drifted of to sleep.
The next morning as I walked to school, I saw the sunrise. It was orange and glorious to watch. It had a magnificence which made me feel inferior.
“Magnolia!” a male voce yelled.
I didn’t wasn’t to look back. I wanted to keep walking forward to avoid him. I ignored his calls and started walking quicker. He tapped my shoulder and I had to turn around.
“Good morning.” he said.
“Good morning.” I responded not to excited to see him.
“So you live here? I just moved in with my older sister to one of these apartments. Are you going to Delta high?”
“Yeah.”
“Then let’s go.”
“I’ve never seen you at Delta high.”
“I’m starting today.”
“I’m sorry, I have to hurry and get to school early to...uhm…talk to the principal. He won’t let me talk any other time.”
I hurried off to school as quickly as I could. I felt horrible about having to leave him alone, but this way, no one has to get hurt.
I starred at the pasty grey building which had two stories. Its dullness seemed dead and uninviting. There was a red star on a golden circular sign. It was our school logo. The only thing in the school that wasn’t completely depressing. The logo hung over the clear glass double door.
I entered the school and hurried of to my locker. I avoided the noise of wooing girls and stomping boys. My locker is five down from the main entrance. The lockers are bright orange on a light yellow rough wall. I opened my locker to take out my overly thick math book. When I closed it I saw him. He seemed disappointed. I knew how this was going to end.
“You’re trying to avoid me.” he said in a low voice.
“No I…”
“Forget it. Sorry I bothered. It’s just hard making friends in a new town you know?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but he turned around and started towards his first class.
During lunch time I like to sit in the corner of the lunchroom. There are various sized old tables in the lunchroom and a dull green floor which is all over the school. I scanned the lunchroom and saw how divided the school was. Jocks sitting near the windows, cheerleaders right next to them, nerds at one end of the lunchroom snobs in the middle and so on. Like every school, everyone knew their place.
I started to the opposite end of the nerds and once again I found him. This time he didn’t bother looking up. I sat on the bench opposite him and started eating. After a while I looked up and noticed that he really didn’t care.
“This is my table.” I said.
That sounded mean. He turned his head up and faced me for a nanosecond before he lowered his head and concentrated on his food once more.
“Sorry. I’m just not used to newcomers.” I said.
“I should believe you why?” he asked.
“Okay, you shouldn’t believe anything I say. Let’s start with my name. It’s not Magnolia it’s Amita. “
“Thanks, do I feel stupid.”
“I’m used to newcomers and I love getting to know them and stuff.”
“You don’t act like it.”
“It’s just…this thing…And it…uhm…”
His face gradually turned into a smile as I stumbled across my words. Soon he was grinning.
“Is it because you don’t know how?”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“Okay your name is Amita and mine is Daren.”
“Okay Daren, now what?”
“Now you tell me what to steer clear of at this school.”
“The cheerleaders unless you want to be humiliated, the jocks unless you want to be pounded into nothing, the nerds unless you want to be bored to death, the weirdoes unless you are one and…”
“I’m a weirdo?”
“You tell me. Basically you stay away from everyone unless you’re one of them.”
“And you?”
“I’ve been here long enough to know I don’t fit in.”
“Because you’re normal or because you’re boring?
“I’m far from norm…Hey I’m not boring!”
“Oh, yeah? I can drive.”
“I can sing.”
“I can draw.”
“I can write.”
“I’ve been in the national gymnastics competition and came in second.”
“When was that?”
“Last year.”
“You win, I’m boring.”
We stayed there having our conversation and that’s how it pretty much went for the next three months. It became a routine. We walk to school together, we have most of our classes together, we sat together during lunch, we walked home together and sometimes we studied together. Daren was a pretty good friend. I remember the last time I’ve had that feeling before. The feeling of being accepted and accompanied, I’ve felt it all before. It felt so wonderful, that’s why it was dangerous.
That evening, I had a dream…a warning.
I was walking in a hall of mirrors, but it was endless. The floors, the ceiling and the walls, were made of mirrors. I was walking along the mirror floors when I looked to my right and saw a dark skinned girl with unruly curly hair. I remember her. Her name was Elizabeth. She wore rags and I saw the pained look in her eye.
“Elizabeth? Are you still there? I’m sorry…” I started.
“Mirror Image.” she said as if she was being forced by someone.
“No.” I whispered.
I kept walking with my head lowered and I kept seeing more people. Andrew, a blonde boy about seventeen, he looked like the old British. He wore a puffy white shirt and the old style black pants and boots. He had the same look in his eye as Elizabeth.
“Andrew I…”
“Mirror image.” he said expressionless.
As I went along the path, I saw all my old friends. I ran hoping I would find a way out. But straight ahead there was no way out. It was endless, nothing more then just mirrors wherever I looked. My eyes filled with tears and my hands closed into fists. I fell to the ground and began to whimper.
Suddenly I felt a slight breeze around me. It hadn’t come from one side only, but everywhere. I lifted my head up and there was a person in front of me. I stood there paralyzed, expecting him to say anything. I assumed he wasn’t as hypnotized as everyone in the mirrors.
“Mirror image.” said Daren.
“No, no! You’re not a mirror image, you aren’t! You have a life, a future. You have a family.” I said angry.
I reached out and grabbed his arm and in and in an instant, he vanished and reappeared inside the mirrors. I ran to the mirror and kept hitting it with my fists. It didn’t break, nothing happened. Daren stood there expressionless.
“No! You can’t! You can’t!” I yelled.
His image faded away and in that same instant, I woke up.
Cold sweat dripped from my face. My breathing was heavy. I didn’t want Daren to be next. I quickly got out of bed and got dressed in my usual T –shit and jeans. I wolfed down my breakfast and quickly took the elevator down. As I was going down, I held the locket inside my hands with rage. There was a mirror ajaacent the elevator doors. I looked at my own reflection and ripped the locket from my neck. When the dooropened for the ground floor I ran out and threw the locket about seventy meters away into some houses garden.
I felt a tap on my shoulder and yelped as I turned around to face Daren.
“Are you okay?” He asked with worry in his voice.
“I’m fine. Let’s just go to school.” I said short of breath.
When I felt my neck to see if the silver locket with the ancient looking engravings was gone, fear rah rough my face as I felt the oval with the ancient engravings. I wasn’t going to live another ten millenniums like this. I wasn’t going to let it all happen to Daren just because he was my friend. I failed the others, but I don’t want it to happen to Daren. I don’t want the locket; it brings misery to whoever is assigned to look after it.
Daren and I walked to school as usual and we arrived just as the bell rang. We went to our first class. History, how I despise this subject. It reminds me of the suffering that I have brought to everyone I have ever known.
“The French revolution made a huge impact in European…” started Mr. Simone.
I wasn’t paying attention. My entire body was trembling, fearing what will come next. For millenniums I have existed, I haven’t aged. For millenniums, I have seen people’s births their deaths. For millenniums I’ve taken opportunities from others just by developing any relationships with them.
I remember liberating Elizabeth from a concentration camp in the sixteenth century. I traveled with her and acted as her mother until the mirror took her away.
Andrew was a British boy in ancient London. He helped me escape from the dungeon in the twelfth century. Eventually he became my lover. I remember that tragic day, the moment before we kissed he was sucked into the mirror.
There were countless others. From china there was a princess 1000 BC whose maid I had become and we became friends.
In Egypt a man found me homeless and took me in. He treated me as if he was my father.
The only reason it hadn’t sucked in my dear mother wannabe is because I was careful enough to keep my distance from her. I love her immensely, but I didn’t want to put her in danger. We hardly ever talk or do anything together, because I always refuse.
I cried for the entire lesson which I didn’t think was enough. My pain felt heavy and I carried the burden of all these people. Counts, royals, orphans slaves, it didn’t matter who they were. If they ever gotten near me they would be taken by the mirror and become the mirror image.
The mirror has always been my curse. I am its guardian, but I never wanted to be and I still don’t want to be. The mirror chose me. The engraving on the mirror means forever. That’s my name. Forever there.
My face was red as I left the history lesson recalling all of my past sorrows and losses. Daren had put his arm around me and he gave me a tissue. My face was filled with teas and red from the crying. He lead me outside and we sat on the steps of the main entrance.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing.” I answered weakly.
That was a pathetic answer. I knew I was feeling hurt and it showed on my face. It was red and filled with tears. ‘Nothing’ was the worst possible answer I could give him.
“Okay, I won’t ask.” he said softly as I wiped my face.
“It was a memory Daren a sad one.”
“Did someone die?”
Die? No. Imprisoned for the rest of eternity, sure.
“Something like that. I just…”
The locket started to glow. No. I thought to myself. He’s accomplished so much and he’s only seventeen. The locket opened and inside it was a mirror. The locket’s bright neon light continued to glow extensively.
“What’s…” he asked.
“It’s trouble.” I said with an urgency look.
I wasn’t going to let it happen to him. I wasn’t going to let it happen to anyone else I met. I hat to do something. I ran across the street and picked up a rugged rock. With rage I closed the locket and threw it on the ground. With the rock I smashed the locket to pieces. The glow from the locket had dimmed and eventually disappeared.
All the people who had been imprisoned in three had come out the same way they came in. They appeared out of nothingness and a white glow had appeared.
Daren had run after me and gazed in amazement when he saw all the people appear.
“Amita…who…” he started.
“Goodbye Daren.” I said tears started to well up in my eyes.
My dark hair was blowing in the wind that had started around me. Daren approached me, but the wind was too strong.
“Can you do me a favor?” I asked Daren.
He nodded.
“Show them the twenty first century.” I said.
“What about you?”
“The one thing that created me is gone, which means I go along with it.”
“But…”
“Goodbye Daren.” I said before the wind had completely vanished from the earth. I had turned into the wind and entered the pieces of the mirror as nothingness.
