On the Other Side of the Glass

Let me tell you a story. Listen closely. Rain pitter pattered on the roof that night. Far away, a storm brewed, though I didn’t know that yet. My mind was focused on anything except the dinner table spread out in front of me. 

See, there was this portrait on the wall of my family that my eyes couldn’t help but be drawn to. My mother front and center, blonde hair cascading over her shoulders and brilliant blue eyes, took your focus away from the creases underneath. There was no room to notice the thin, nervous smile that brought about wrinkles. My father stood, frozen, beside her. Strong, businesslike, yet wouldn’t harm a fly, as everyone told me a man should be. But what of his hand gripping onto his daughter’s shoulder as if to make sure she cannot yet get away?

Then there is me: a strange, dark shadow seeming to move and squirm in the fleeting moment captured in time. Though, of course, I know that is impossible. My parents like to tell me a lot of things are not possible. 

At the dinner table that night, I counted every time I heard a droplet on the windows. I cut up my boiled potatoes into the tiniest of pieces. When I grew tired of that, I pushed my mousey hair behind my ear and let it fall and cover my eyes over and over again.

Anything to avoid looking at my parents’ gleeful faces and conversations about all things lovely. No matter, I could see their nervous glances at me in between their exchanged sentiments of how terrific their day was spent. Truly terrific, to do nothing every hour of every day. What joy to feel like a doll in a snow globe. 

It’s the perfect family with the perfect picket fence with perfectly comfortable furniture and a perfect dinner assortment for the perfect daughter to sulk over. What’s wrong with me?! I demanded of myself as I gloomily poked at my green beans. To this, I had no answer. You’re just like them! You can be perfect too! A lie. 

“Darling, why aren’t you eating? Is something the matter?” My mother finally asked of me. 

I shook my head quickly and began to shove spoonfuls of mushed up food into my mouth. 

“Is the food not to your liking?” She continued. 

Again, I shook my head, then nodded, confused. I did not know what answer they sought of me. 

“Perhaps you are not feeling well,” My father suggested, “It’s this terrible weather. 

“Perhaps a lightness of head,”

“Or a light cold,”

“Right! Perhaps you did not sleep well last night,”

“Of course! What a terrible storm we had last night. It’s no wonder,”

My mother grinned, “Why, I could barely sleep myself,”

“Neither could I!”

“So, it’s no wonder, really,”

“Yes, it’s no wonder that you are not feeling well,”

“But nothing is truly wrong with you,”

“Nothing at all darling!”

“Just a little sleeplessness,”

“And a lightness of head,”

“And perhaps a light cold,”

I opened my mouth and shut it several time, “But-”

“But nothing! It’s all settled darling!”

“Completely settled!”

“Nothing to worry about!”

The first boom of thunder shook the house, shaking my mother and father tremendously, no matter how they tried to hide it. I sat calmly and did not utter a sound. 

“Darling,” My mother smiled her thin smile, “Perhaps you’d better get to bed. We wouldn’t want another sleepless night,”

“Yes, I think that would be a good idea. It’s terribly difficult to fall asleep these nights. You’ll be feeling better in no time,”

The two sat rigidly, waiting for more lightning to strike of the approaching storm, holding their breaths, but their waiting was futile. Nothing came. I nodded and stood up to walk past the perfect dinner and the perfect, stiff living room and the perfectly painted walls of sunshine yellow and that strange, strange portrait on the wall, so close, reaching for perfection. I snatched it off the wall without a second though and ran into my room, slamming the door closed. I collapsed onto my unmade bed, not bothering to even turn on the lights. 

What a strange room I live in. It’s nothing at all like the rest of the house. There are no sunshine yellow walls here, only gloomy grey light and no beaming faces full of joy. That is, unless you count the rows of dolls my mother bought for me, sitting right above my bed on a rickety shelf. My mother says they are there to be my friends. I never play with them. 

I looked up at the dolls, each sitting an equal distance apart with smiles painted on their china faces and golden locks of hair. It’s a shame I’m the only one who could ever be their friend, I thought to myself, If I really look like how I do in the portrait, I’d be terrified to even look at myself. 

I felt their bright, happy eyes on me. The mere thought made me squirm, and cold chills rushed down my back. A judging gaze I believed to have outran in the darkness of my room persisted, yet there was not a person in sight who could scrutinize. 

I sprang up from bed and knocked the dolls right off the shelf, in one impulsive blow, shattering their perfect eyes and sunny smiles into a million sharp, completely unfixable pieces. 

Then, I saw her. A strange little girl stood outside my window. Great, big doe eyes stare back at me from behind wisps of unkempt hair. Outside, a child’s bedroom reflected back to me where a backyard with a perfect garden should have been. A storm raged in it, lightning flashing to reveal its pure destitution. 

I did not scream. I did not breathe, not even the thunder shook the house with furious rigor. Before I could move a step, my door was thrown open, sending rays of blinding light into the dim, and I couldn’t help but squint. My mother bounded in. She balanced a plateful of dinner one hand, and her face somehow still held the perpetual grin I saw in my dolls until she saw those very dolls in pieces on the hardwood floor. 

“Darling! Whatever happened to your friends?”

“Mommy there’s-” But she cut me off once more,

“Did the storm knock them over? You should have fetched me. What if you had gotten hurt?”

I stared at the girl behind the glass helplessly. 

“Here, I brought you your dinner, so you won’t be peckish tonight. Make sure you eat it all up, and then go right to sleep,” Without wavering or noticing the chaos through the window, she droned on and on about this and that and how the storm was sure to pass and that I shouldn’t be afraid. She swept up the remains on the floor, humming softly as she did. My tear stained face seemed to evade her attention. 

Outside, the girl’s wet hair plastered on her face as the rain poured from her bedroom ceiling. Discreetly, I waved to her, unsure of what I saw was even real. She did not wave back. 

“Darling you’d better start eating before it gets cold. Don’t just stand there,” 

“There’s someone on the other side of the glass,” I said ever so softly. 

For only a moment, my mother’s eyes darted to the widow, losing the brightness of a painted doll. My father’s voice trailed in from the perfect living room, “Is everything alright darling?”

Another bolt of lightning flashed, this one brighter and angrier than the rest. Mother wasted no time to pull the curtains closed, hiding the girl behind the heavy fabric. 

“Just this terrible weather,” She called back to him, “It’s frightening her a little. That’s all,”

And to me, she said, “There is no one out there, darling. Go to sleep. Tomorrow we shall buy you some new friends for your shelf,” 

With a dusting of her skirt and a trash bag in hand, the door shut behind her, sweeping the room in utter darkness once more. The lock clicked quietly. 

“She can’t see me,” I heard a voice behind me say, muffled by thick glass, “No one can, but I don’t understand why,” 

I took a shaky breath and pulled open the curtains. 

“I can see you,” 

She smiled, not a thin smile or a stiff one but that which I never let myself show in front of other people when something truly worth feeling joy over occurred. Though those moments were as rare as the strange storm. 

“Who are you?” I asked of her. 

The girl sniffled, wiping her nose on her sleeve. She seemed completely unfazed that rain and lightning appeared out of seemingly nowhere in her barren bedroom, “Who are you?” 

“Me?” I could have laughed. 

She nodded. 

“Well...I don’t know. I guess I’m just...me,”

“So you see why I can’t answer your question,”

“I suppose so,” 

I tried again, “How are you outside my window?”

This time she shrugged, “Wish I knew. My mother locked me in my room,” 

“And...has it been raining in your room for long?” 

She looked up at her ceiling, and the rain washed over her face. To my surprise, she smiled again, slyly, “Not very long,” 

“My mother locked me in my room too,”

“I know. I saw her,” She glanced behind me into my dark room, “Are you...are you going to eat that?” 

I hastily brought the plate over from my bed, “No. You can have it,” 

She gazed at the food in wonder, “Your mother cooks so much,”

“Doesn’t yours?” I asked. 

“My mother sent me to bed without dinner,”

“Why?”

As she spoke, she pulled at and looped her matted hair with her fingers, looking anywhere but at me, “Mother said she didn’t want to cook tonight. She and father were...fighting about something. I try not to listen, but I can’t help it sometimes. I’m very curious. Can I have the potatoes now?”

I scrambled to open the window. It did not budge. 

“Watch out. I’m going to try and push it open,” I told her. She stepped away and watched me with intrigue as I pushed with all my childish might on the glass panes. It proved to be a futile endeavor. It had not occurred to me that perhaps the window did not open at all. I had never tried before. 

“I’m sorry,” I finally let go of attempting the strenuous task, “I can’t get it to to open,” 

She shrugged once more, “It’s okay. I’ve tried it myself many times, but I’ve never been able to get through,,” And she set to braiding her wet hair. 

I looked down at my own hair, which incredulously was also in the process of being braided, “It’s strange. I think I’ve seen you before,” 

“You probably have. You’ve been around for as long as I can remember,”

“How long?”

She giggled, “Obviously since forever. I just thought you couldn’t see me,”

“I guess I wasn’t really looking,”

“Well I always am,” She said, “I love seeing what you’re doing, and what your mother and father are doing, and what mother cooks for dinner. My parents don’t do anything,” 

“What do you mean? Surely, they must do something,”

“Sure. They’re like your parents, but never with me. They don’t like me very much,” She became very quiet for what felt like many minutes.

I look back at the locked door and empty shelf where dolls used to sit, “I’m odd. That’s why mother and father don’t like me either,” 

“Yes, they do,”

“Do not,”

“Do too!”

“No! They don’t!”

“Yes! I saw them, and I saw that they do!”

“Well I’ve lived with them, and they don’t!”

“Crybaby!”

“I am not!”

“Worthless!”

“Stop!”

“Useless good for nothing piece of trash!”

“Stop it! It’s a lie!” I let out, “It’s all a lie! They’re liars! All they do all day is lie, lie, lie! They pretend to be so perfect, but they’re lying!”

By now, the girl had begun to cry. The rain came down harder and harder, until I was sure the room would flood. 

“Please don’t cry! They’ll hear you!”

“I don’t care anymore!” She yelled out amidst her tears, “Let them take me away! I don’t care!”

“Wait! I didn’t mean to make you cry! I’m sorry! I do care!”

“No one cares!” 

“Please don’t cry so loudly!”

She gasped suddenly to herself and said, barely above a whisper, “No one cares,”

“But I care!” I said. 

She locked eyes with me, “ Then how do I get through the mirror?” The storm ceased all at once, without warning. Lightning, thunder, rain, and tears vanished. 

My blood went cold, “Mirror?” 

“Yes,”

“It can’t be,”

“Why can’t it?”

“Because it’s not possible!”

“Who told you that? Mother and father?” 

My eyes widened. “It just can’t be,”

She stood up slowly. I began to back away into the darkness. 

“Please,” At first she spoke quietly, but her sobs became louder and louder, “Let me through. Let me through. Let me through the glass! Let me through! LET ME THROUGH! DON’T LEAVE ME HERE!” 

What happened next I heard, not saw. I hid my face in the covers of my bed. Desperate screams, rapid footsteps, pleading, a gruff man’s voice, banging on the glass, and her cries as she begged over and over for me to not leave her, that she would die, that they would kill her, that she just wanted to go home, please, please, please, don’t leave me, don’t leave, DON’T LEAVE ME. 

It echoed in my spinning head even once all grew quiet once more. When I looked up tentatively, there was not a person in sight. I truly was alone. Alone? I grabbed the portrait of my family suddenly. The same happy faces looked back at me, and the shadow? It was her: the same matted, dark hair that stood on edge out of place, the same whimsical smile hidden behind what my parents deemed was a fluke when the photograph was developed. It was me. I crept towards the mirror that showed me an empty room: my room. And on the glass, all that was left was one thin crack resembling something of one of my mother’s smiles.

Slowly, I raised my fist and sent it barreling into the mirror. Over and over and over until my knuckles bled and tears fell freely from my eyes in pain. 

“CAN ANYONE HEAR ME?!” I yelled. I threw anything I could at it. My dinner plate, my shoes, my clothing hangers, each leaving little cracks spreading to a giant spiderweb. I lugged my chair over, picked it up, high over my head with the last of my strength, through tears, exhaustion, and pure anger, and threw it into the mirror breaking it apart into a million unfixable pieces so that not even my mother could clean it up. 

When I opened my eyes, glass surrounded me on every side, digging into my feet, my arms, my hair, but in front of me was the broken mirror and the room she had been trapped in: her side of the glass. And on the other side, somewhere, she needed help. I took several tentative steps forward, wincing as the wounds on my feet grew deeper. Then, I broke into a furious run, running straight into another brewing storm behind the mirror.