The Girl In The Mirror

By Linda M. Crate

There is a girl in the mirror that says she is me, but she is not me. She wears my skin like a costume. She puts on my clothes and wears the same make-up. She even wears my perfume. She likes to tell me lies like ‘I’m beautiful’ and ‘I’m worth it’.

I am a plain girl. An ugly girl. A girl with dusty hair and hickory colored eyes. Stout and lifeless. I cannot wear the same pretty corsets that the skinny girls can.

This has always made me cry rivers. It’s the reason knights walk by when they see me, sometimes they even laugh or moo at me. I’ve sobbed myself to sleep many a starry night, but no one seems to notice or share my pain. They are too busy pirouetting through fields of flowers or frolicking in the woods with their loves. They do not notice the girl with the broken topography that no longer can wear a smile.

The girl in the mirror tells me that I am not this monster I see myself as. That I am not an ogre, and if I’d only speak people would see that I am actually someone that they would like to know. That I am worthwhile.

I don’t like it when she talks to me. She’s a liar spinning facsimiles as quickly as spiders weave their webs. I don’t know why she disturbs my peace.

So one day when she taunted me to the point where I could not stand it, I smashed her face with my fists. I felt a primal and barbaric savagery take me. I did not stop until the mirror was no more, her face looked out at me in horror. I was covered in blood. She shrieked how ugly I was, that I was a harpy.

I smiled because she finally told the truth. 

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