Mirror

"Good morning my little ray of light! Rise and shine. A beautiful day is awaiting you". It has been 17 years now since she heard that for the last time. Her father had the habit of waking her up every morning that way. His voice was so reassuring that it never failed to make her smile.

Too bad for her that people can't talk after their death. Since the time he left her, everything isn't the same anymore. Waking up, for example, has become so hard. Why would she leave the bed when all that she wants is sleeping forever? Her days are all grey without a joy and all what they brings is more sadness. It's hard to wake up when the first thing she does right after is cursing herrself over and over again because she didn't die in her sleep.

With heavy steps like a prisoner in chains, she managed to make her way to the bathroom. The young girl lifted her head and stared into her reflection on the mirror. She has always despised what the mirror reflects. She wasn't ugly at all. She was quite pretty to say the least, yet she hates mirrors so much. The girl kept looking at her doppelgänger like she wanted to scream. she held out her hand into the reflected girl, and started talking:

-"You told me that everything is going to be better this way. No pain or sadness will be felt anymore. But look at you, I don't even know who you are anymore. Are you really supposed to be me? Then why you feel nothing more than a stranger? Just like a shadow, Or must I say...an illusion? Yes. That's what you are exactly. An illusion that I created using my own mind. It was a required task in a life like mine. You smile to someone while all I want is punching his face with all my strength. Today is going to be no different. I will just pretend and act as the ideal me again. The person whom everyone wants to see."

For some reason, she felt like her "mirror twin" is mocking her with a sarcastic smile on her face. The poor girl couldn't hold back her tears.

-" You have all the right to laugh at me if you want, because those tears on my cheeks means it's time for the liar to be the victim again. I've lost every identity after I created you. Miss Nobody. yeah, that's what I'm already, with my false image and my forged words. The honest girl liked by everyone is in reality the shepherd boy who cried wolf. I'm just a set of lies well virtualized into this living pretender. I thought acting to make people love me is my salvation, tuned out to be a curse..."

She glanced at her arm. A lot of scars and cuts on it, some of them were recent and still didn't heal properly yet.

-"But who can blame me anyway? I wouldn't have made it this far in life if I didn't pretend to be someone else all this time. After my dad passed away, everyone rejected me. None ever liked me for who I used to be. Not even my mom. As soon as my father died, she threw me in an orphanage because my dear mom didn't want me to be an obstacle in her way. She left me to marry her new guy who didn't want to deal with kids. I still remember running after my mother, shedding tears crying and shouting with a shaking voice:

"Why are you leaving me Mommy? Why do you hate me that much? What have I done to you to neglect me like that? Please come back and love me! Take me with you and I promise you I will be a good girl please!". But my mother never cared. It was just like I wasn't there. Her only response was: "A brat like you is just a burden on me". She left me behind, begging on my knees, suffocating with my tears. Mommy went back to her lover's car and disappeared without a trace."

The girl went silent for a while. She looked like she is fighting floating memories in her head. Then she was staring at her reflection again.

-"When I was a kid, I was told that life should be appreciated. It can be the same as a beautiful flower in spring, that's what they said. But none told me that as soon as I walk through this life, the spring will change to a dark, cold winter, where the wind had no mercy on my flower and blew off all of the petals. I was 13 when I tried to cut myself for the first time. The nurse kept preaching me for days after that. Not only her, everyone in that rehabilitation institute said the same: "You are still young to die" and "Every cloud has a silver lining".

If that's how the so called life works, then why nobody is able to explain to me why those clouds transformed into a ruthless storm destroying everything in its path? Why there is no human being can accept me the way I'am without pretending to be this ideal shadow of myself? I just want to be loved for my true self instead of getting bullied and insulted...That's all what I'm asking for.

In my eyes, this life is nothing but torture and pain, plenty of it. As a result, depression became my best friend and my only companion. It's eating my soul, day after day, until there is nothing left but my dead body. People claims that they know what being depressed is, yet they really don't. They don't know that it feels like I'm burried alive in a coffin made of glass. While I can see everyone enjoying their lives to the limit, I can't budge an inch. A condemned prisoner awaiting his execution. That's what my only friend is doing to me."

she washed her face then went back to her room. It was so messy and in complete chaos. It seemed like a hurricane just striked the place. She sat on the bed, looking around her.

-"I'm so lonely in this world. Lonely to the point that I had to make this room my own realm. Here I can live my ideal life which I have never been able to get. I can pretend to be anything I want and act the way I like without any hatred looks. I can imagine that dad is still alive and spoiling me like the very old beautiful days. At least this way I can feel loved with someone being always on my side. This imaginary fantasy in my mind is my only escape from the real, cruel world.

In my fictional life, everything is fine. There is no sadness or tears. I only close my eyes and let my mind do the rest. It's just like spitting out lies, transforming them to a 3D world then moving there. Yet everything has a price, and for this fake fantasy to keep going, I accepted to be jailed in a circle of endless pretending. I have to pretend for others and be someone who isn't even close to be me, but also i have to pretend for myself that I'm doing great."

Carelessly, she changed her clothes and threw her pyjama on the undone bed. It's time for her to go to her work which she always hated.

-"Let's face it, I'm nothing more than a vessel for my lies. My imaginary realm didn't and will never be real. And I can't break free from the pretending I'm doing neither..."

She closed the door, put a large smile on her face and yelled :"What a beautiful day!"