Mirror

Not a single compliment in 11 days. I woke up with a compulsion 11 days ago and I couldn’t bring the brush in my hand to paint my face. 11 days ago I abandoned my life long canvas, abandoned my most prized possession, the pristine face I worked so hard on. The one reflecting back at me in the mirror. 

I’ve been an admirer of beauty from the beginning of my memory. Embroidered edges on fine bed sheets, lovely fluffy stuffed animals, shiny shoes and lace trimmed socks. Beautiful braids with ribbons weaved in and bows at the end. Sparkly hair clips and pearly headbands. 

I used to watch my mother sitting in front of her vanity getting ready for work. Matching skirt suits, intriguing heeled shoes I was too young to wear, and always a perfectly painted face. She would sit with hot curlers in her hair and a brush in her hand. Painting all the hues of humanity on her face, a shimmery pink blush that mimicked an excited flush. A mascara wand in her hand, thickening lashes to frame her hazel eyes. She’d unroll her curlers and disappear in a cloud of hairspray and when the fog settled the curls showcased her the artfully placed highlights she went to the salon for every 3 weeks (she could never stand to have her roots showing). 

I used to wish every night to grow up, wished I could will myself older. To have lipsticks instead of the colorless lip balms I’d been allowed. I wanted to be let into this world of adult beauty instead of what I had. I loved to watch them, these beautiful women with all their pretty things. I wanted to be them, be the beautiful woman with the beautiful things. I wanted to transform myself, adorn myself, arm myself with all these things. More than that I craved the compliments. I wanted to be told I was everything. The smartest, the most clever, the most beautiful, the most patient. I wanted to be everything to everyone. I wanted to be the pride and the joy, I was so hungry for it all. It was the sort of hunger that made you desperate, that made you stupid, worse than that it made you vulnerable when you were trying to appear strong. Appear strong because you didn’t know if you could actually be strong. 

This desire, it was the weakness deep inside me, I always had it being the youngest. I had to be admired, if nothing else I had to be seen. I won awards, I read about everything I could get my hands on, and I was pretty. I was pretty until I started to despise pretty. I wanted to be beautiful. I started to resent those who didn’t think I was and the ones who didn’t say it even if they thought it. An endless pit, I’d been given thousands of compliments and they all gave me a rush at first. Then the rush turned into a little jolt of satisfaction. But then the satisfaction turned into an expectation and then the expectation turned on me. I resented them but I hated myself more. Why couldn’t I be more. More beautiful, more smart, more charming. I wore away at myself. I exhausted myself. A lifetime of preening had left me hollow. So I woke up 11 days ago and I just…stopped. I couldn’t bring my hands to do what they’d done one thousand times before to the point it would’ve been muscle memory. I brushed my hair but I couldn’t bring myself to tame it into the perfect glossy coiffure I’d become accustomed to. I just couldn’t do it. I looked at my reflection and the shadows under my eyes and I walked away from the mirror. I walked out the door. I went about my day. No compliments. I came home that first day and I felt cagey. I was pacing the floor of my living room, unmoored. Having come to no conclusion, I went to sleep that night. I woke up the next day and again I couldn’t will myself to paint my face, to make a masterpiece of myself. No compliments, no admiration from passersby, but I didn’t pace around that night.

 It went on like this and on the 10th night I had a nightmare. In my nightmare I was surrounded by my mother and my father, my friends, my cousins, my colleagues, even my sister. We were in a glittering hall, the type you throw grand parties in. They were all wearing suits and ballgowns and drinking from sparkling glasses, a beautiful light was coming from the crystal chandeliers illuminating it all. None of them could see me. I was in a crimson gown with blood red lipstick on and still they couldn’t see me. I’d speak and it was like no sound ever came out, the notes evaporated as soon as my mouth opened. I stood on a table and still not a glance. I saw my reflection then in a mirror. It was a beautiful, beautiful thing that reflection and no one could see it but me. 

I woke up on the 11th day and I looked at my reflection. My bare face. The tiny mole on my right cheek that no one ever saw because it was always covered. I took in my hair, the wild curls I’d spent years taming. My nails, naked and devoid of polish. I stared at my reflection and for the first time in as many years as I’d been alive I liked it without alteration. As the 11th day was coming to an end I found I didn’t miss the compliments, the gazes, and the stares as much as I thought I would. It was just me, with myself, passing through life. It was just my thoughts and me and slowly that gnawing hunger inside of me started to subside and gave way to a freedom I’d never known.