Te Iubsec...Forever.

15 Mirrors

I was glowing, radiating!

"Ches!" I yelled again down the hall but still got no answer.

I looked again, staring down the hall, able to see a flickering candle some distance away but after that, only space and darkness. It might take hours to get to the end. Maybe if I waited, she would return. I could lay on the floor and look at the stars until she returned. She would be glad to see me. I looked in the mirror again, but I was not there. I was seriously not there. It was just darkness, not even the flicker of the candlelight. I glanced back into the den; the dim shadows cast by the candles danced dimly on the stippled ceiling again. The roof was back, with no stars. Back to my right, the hall stretched endlessly. Before me again, the mirror, empty of everything, including myself, staring ever so intently, waiting and hoping I would reappear.

Then they came, the faces one by one forming from nothing, maybe thoughts or dreams. They came from the void overlapping one another as they struggled to take center. I recognized them. My mother, as I knew her as a child, her face young, smiling, and full of promise, then as I knew when I was a young man, angry, disappointed, and tired. As an old lady, her countenance became scornful, and when I wanted to turn away, someone else took over, my father, the last time I saw him. He was wearing a navy blue button-down shirt that someone special had given him. I couldn't hear his voice, but I remembered his words. He was chiding me about not being more, not having potential, not trying, and not making a mark. His lips moved slowly, and the words whispered back to me through time and space; in my ears, the hurt came again.

One after another, people and scenes from my past appeared and seemed all hell-bent on plucking the strands of sadness from my past and wrapping them around me like a spider's catch. My face and skin glowed no more. I lost all self-awareness, except the needling pain deep inside me, somewhere forming like a storm cloud over Kamchatka. I just stood and watched.

'He's just so exciting, Nick; he's exciting to be with. I love you, and I always will, but you're safe. You're just so,' the young woman paused, searching for a friendlier word perhaps but unable to come up with one, retreated to her original choice.

'Safe.'

I then hovered over myself in the school bathroom, watching my young self standing next to the tilt-out window for air, tears silently rolling down my cheeks, dealing with my parent's divorce. Then the sudden eruption of laughter and banter as other boys poured into the room behind me. I watched as the little boy I once was tried to remain still and become invisible. I knew what was coming even though I had not visited those thoughts in many years.

A careless teacher took it upon herself to tell the entire class what had happened in my home in my absence. Bo Scott decided it would be funny to pick at me, and when he saw the tears, it only incited his pitiless juvenile mind to try and do more damage. Sensing easy prey, he stepped too far, however. He tried to start the others in a chant.

"Nick, don't have a daddy! Nick, don't have a daddy!"

I knew what was coming but was powerless to stop in. I watched the scared, angry, and hurt little me tear into the would-be bully. The first punch broke his nose and sent blood splattering across the wall and mirrors above the row of sinks. Bo was already on his way down, covering his face with his hands while I beat him as hard as I could. Killing him was my intention. I don't think I would have stopped had he not laid still. The horror-shocked face of Ms. Weathers took the center of the mirror and then faded away.

Then fractional moments of happiness flashed before me, my best friend in the world, Cato, my Chow. But sadly, they were his last moments. He paced and panted, finally dropping into my lap and putting his face squarely in my hands. I rubbed his thick little perfect ears as the last glowing embers of life burned away.