The Moon and Mirror Girl


mirror girl could never see herself the way that others saw her. in fact, she couldn’t really see herself at all. whenever she looked into the bathroom mirror or into the shiny square sides of the toaster all that she could see was a reflection of her reflection. she could see all of the shapes of her body as she wiggled and twisted while cleaning her teeth in the morning. but that was only because she could see her scintillating limbs covering the painting of the sailboat and the rack of freshly hung lilac towels that were behind her. what do they see? she always wondered in those few minutes before sleep that she, like all eight year old children, used to think secretly in the dark or by the glow of the nightlight. some children dreamed of spaceships and others devised ways to stay home from school in the morning. some children thought about interesting things, like salamanders and imaginary friends, trying to become so excited that they would never fall sleep.

after her mother said “goodnight, dear” and switched off the light, mirror girl often thought about such curiosities as lightening bugs and candy factories. sometimes she would think of her friends in her class and how much fun they could have without teachers. one time she saw a baby giraffe on television and stayed awake nearly half the night imagining that she was walking with it around the block and feeding it ringdings. she even named it ‘begonia’. every once in a while, on those nights when she began to think about what it would be like to see herself in a mirror, she’d became so busy with thinking that for hours she could not lay still in her bed.

one very special night, when the full moon was so big that she thought it might squeeze itself into her window and knock over her rocking chair, the mirror girl began thinking about how she would never see herself the way the others could see themselves. but she stopped herself, more quickly than usual, to watch the moon in her window. it seemed as though it was getting closer and closer but mirror girl could not tell if it was just her imagination playing tricks on her. she lifted her covers off and swung her feet around to the side of her bed. good thing, she thought as she looked down at her lucky pajamas (the ones with the violet stripes that her father always told her, when she was just a kid of course, scared all of the monsters away. monsters can’t stand violet stripes. she didn’t actually believe that the moon was a monster.) mirror girl had never seen a moon nearly as big as this one so she wanted to be absolutely sure that she was safe. she quietly hopped of the bed and walked five steps toward the window. when she took her final step onto the little rug by her toy box, she noticed something strange. now, the mirror girl was used to the colors of the world appearing on her body and swirling and tumbling across her while she and all of the many things around her moved. but this was different. when the moon reflected, she could see a pale orange glow cast upon her arms. she lifted up her pajama shirt and the moon reflected on her belly. hey. this almost looks the same, she thought, this almost looks like skin.

needless to say the mirror girl slept well that night while the moon cast a pale orange light across her room. she didn't worry one more bit about other mirrors because she could look like all things and nothing could look like her.