I have a small crack about two-thirds up from my right corner.

Her eyes always seem to flicker there every time she stands in front of me.

She wasn’t here when I got it. It was nothing crazy. It happened when I was being installed.

I’m sure someone meant to fix it, but it was small enough to be easily forgotten.

But the girl notices. She notices everything.

Her eyes scan over her face with great precision. Sometimes she leans close to me, eyeing certain parts of herself and sighing.

Sometimes, I pretend she is me. I think about the world she goes out to see. The conversations she has. How people look at her and see her. I often wonder what it would feel like to be looked at and seen.

I think about the boy, too.

He is older than her. He often comes to see me at the beginning of the day, earlier than the girl.

He never quite looks at himself, though. At least, he never looks himself in the eye. Never lingering in front of me for longer than he has to.

However, he would take long, hot showers. The steam would stick to me, making me completely unusable. But I didn’t mind.

The girl would come in after him and draw hearts and stars in my corners.

Some of the stars still remained, and I hoped they were never cleaned away like the others. Especially since she didn’t tend to do that very often anymore.

Though the boy is quiet, he often hums to himself. I liked to think about the different notes he would always hum and replay them in moments like this.

Moments when I was left in the dark.

My days were dull when they were gone. I looked forward to seeing the girl trying on her outfits. Or the boy concentrating as he put in his contacts.

Occasionally, they would both be in the bathroom at the same time. Sometimes talking, other times arguing.

Sometimes, just the girl talked. And I would catch her looking over at the boy.

I would catch her glance at him the way she glanced at my broken corner, like she was trying to see something deeper. And when she looked back into her own eyes, an echo of sadness would appear.

The girl’s routine wasn’t strict by any means, but I would always see her at least once in the morning and once before bed.

But that night she didn’t appear. Neither did the boy.

The boy hadn’t looked at himself at all this morning as he had mindlessly hummed. Not even to check for a wrinkle on his shirt or for a piece of his curly, dark hair to be out of place.

The whispers of daylight made an appearance beneath the door, and I waited.

Still, neither the girl or the boy appeared.

I thought about how the girl’s hair looked in the mornings, filled with tangles and knots. How it seemed to surprise her every time. How she spoke her thoughts aloud to herself and smiled at her own jokes.

She had a warmth to her presence, even when she seemed annoyed at the boy. I ached for her and her stories, and I hoped that her absence meant she was out creating more. But I didn’t mind listening to the same stories and the same thoughts. They were pieces of her. They were etched into every piece I saw of myself.

How I would like to see myself.

The light from beneath the door began to fade again.

It had been dark for hours when she opened the door. The air seemed to still in her presence.

There were streaks of black covering her face which looked pale. And the light in her eyes was different. Not different. Absent.

A flash of light reflected off of something in her hand. A knife.

It’s sharp edges threatening. But threatening who?

She stared at me.

No.

Herself.

Or was it me?

Her dark eyes went from an empty dullness to pure hatred.

She looked at something on the counter.

The boy’s contacts.

She grabbed them quickly, aggressively. Then, she threw them at the wall.

Tears started to fall down her face. She sounded like she was chocking, clawing at her throat with her right hand, the knife still lingering in her left.

I don’t know how long she cried, but she must’ve been so loud.

Was the boy here? Why wasn’t he coming to help? His words few, but always meaningful. I could tell by the way the girl softened when he spoke.

Her sobs must’ve lasted for hours before she calmed, her gaze out of focus as she turned to me. She looked right at me.

At herself.

And she tightened her grip around her knife. The sharp edge slowly began to tilt towards her chest. Her face becoming completely blank.

And then she paused again.

Seemingly, lost in thought.

I didn’t understand.

She had seen the stars, drew them in my corners that only echoed her world. The only world I knew. And I had always hoped that I had shown her the way she looked to me. While the stars had been her muse, she and the boy had been mine.

But when she looked at me again, I realized I had failed her.

And the sharp point of her knife was now aimed at me.

Her arm drew back and she slashed at her reflection. At me.

Cracks formed over her face.

She drew her arm back again, stabbing harder.

Red.

Red everywhere.

I was bleeding.

She was killing me.

What did I do? I wanted to tell her I would be better. I’d be anything.

I wanted to tell her to please stop before I was unable to be fixed. This wasn’t like the steam from the shower, this was permanent.

But she stabbed at me again, shattering her image. Shattering me.

I think she was screaming.

And I was bleeding so much.

No.

She was bleeding.

And there were pieces of me everywhere.

Sharp and unforgiving.

I wanted to tell her to watch out for them. To stop hurting me but more so, to stop hurting herself.

Had she always felt so much pain? Had I caused it?

A man ran in. I had seen him a couple of times but never for the amount of times I had seen the boy and the girl.

He grabbed the girls arm tightly, taking the knife from her hand.

A woman lingered behind him. Her face an older version of the girl’s. A deep sadness rested upon her features.

The knife dropped to the ground, and the girls face disappeared into the man’s chest. He cradled her like she would break any second. Like me.

And he picked her up and carried her out of the room. The older woman watched them go. Then she stared at me and all of my pieces that had scattered around everywhere. Pieces covered in red.

Covered in the girl’s blood. Blood that had never been mine. I had never been her.

But hadn’t I?

I thought of the girl. Then I thought of the boy. Who am I if not them? Who am I if not the reflections of those who looked into me? They were all I knew. All I loved.

But the way the woman looked at me, I knew she was not seeing herself. Nor was she seeing the boy or the girl.

She was just seeing me.

Only me. Not the beauty I reflected, but the sharp edges and the pain. How much pain had I caused without my knowledge?

How much ugliness had lived inside of me when all I saw was beauty?

The woman’s stare was still focused on me.

There was no hate in her eyes, just a sadness.

And for the first time, I understood why the girl might stare at her reflection and sigh.