Reflection Part 3.

Clarissa Blanche led me down the terrace-like fountain steps to her home. We passed others along the way. They were all perfect, not a hair out of place, breathtaking and captivating. Each stopped and looked at us as we passed by, bowing their heads reverently. I couldn’t fathom why, not yet anyway. Clarissa’s house was charming, draped in fountains of crystal water. It was another fairytale object, a symbol of this beautiful world. Inside, she asked me kindly to sit down, and calmly began fixing me something to drink. Everything in this place seemed to move more slowly and serenely than on the other side of the Door.

  I sat, strangely calm myself.

When she had poured out our drinks, pink and frothy, and possibly the best thing I had ever tasted, she began to speak.

 

 “You came in through the door, because I needed you. Claire, you and I, we have been chosen to be the next Two. The last Two have died, and now my people have asked that we take their place.”

 

 She did not explain, and I was too afraid to ask. Who were the Two?

  “Come with me?” It was a request, not a command this time, and those blue eyes almost pleaded.

Obediently I followed her. We walked into another room, and in that room was a smaller replica of the Door Into the Mirror that I had passed through before.

  She took my hand and pulled me through.

 

I gasped.

 

Before me were four walls, covered in mirrors. They were empty, with only blackness on the far side.

 

Clarissa turned to me. “When you are on the other side of The Door Into the Mirror, Claire, these mirrors are filled with every place you need your Reflection. And every day, I’m here. I’m here waiting for you.” She smiled.

 

  I couldn’t believe it. Could it be possible that the face I saw reflected in my mirrors, car windows, bookcase, and even my shining dining room table, was a living being separate from myself? For, though similar to me, she was her own personality, capable of living a life of her own. I could see that without even knowing her for one moment.

 

Incredulously I exclaimed, “Aren’t you unhappy, watching me go about my life, while you waste yours mimicking me?” The question seemed to be something she had never considered.

 

  “What else would I do?” Clarissa asked, puzzled.

 

I laughed in disbelief, the spell of this world fading fast, as I realized that all those others that we had passed on the way were bound to this cruel life of imprisonment as well. There was one of them for every single one of us.

 

  I turned back to my Reflection, feeling as if I’d always known and loved her, I hated to think of her trapped in this charade of a life forever. So I answered her question honestly.

 

  “You could do anything you wish.”