Flash Fiction: The Mirror

Photo by Roberto Delgado Webb on Unsplash

Whenever she is preparing to go out, she always stays in front of the bathroom mirror for what seems like forever, as if she expects to turn into someone different the longer she stares at her own image.

At first she sighs, then purses her lips, as if she doesn’t like what she sees.

She stands very still, plucking and lining, shading and painting.

She hardly ever notices me; I’m hiding just outside the door, peeking one eye into the bathroom. She’s leaning over the sink, so close to the mirror that she touches her twin.

Done with the plucking, she fluffs her hair, then smooths it, indecisive.

Next, she places her hair in front of her shoulders, reams of black silk cascading forward. Then she brushes it all away, so it falls down her back, almost to her waist.

She moisturizes and applies a cream that is almost the exact shade of her skin (why bother? I think).

Now she doesn’t move at all because she needs to line her eyes juuuust right. She traces dark lines around her eyes with a black pencil, making them pop out even more from her face.

She leans her torso back, raises her eyebrows, and cocks a sideways smile, and I know that she is pleased with her work.

Then she spends an inordinate amount of time choosing the color of her eye shadow.

She almost chooses a bright blue, then shakes her head and goes for the tried-and-true deep charcoal (it’s nighttime, after all!), which she applies expertly over her eyelids and just underneath her brows. Now, she has officially metamorphosed from my mother into an Egyptian goddess.

Now I know she’ll only apply a light lip gloss to her mouth. If she had left her eyes unshadowed, she would go for a deep red or purple lipstick. But I’ve heard her say that that color paired with a bold eye shadow would make her look like a clown.

She stays extraordinarily still, keeping her eyelids unnaturally open while she applies mascara, sweeping the lashes up, careful not to brush them against her eyelids. Once she did that and said a curse word; then she had to remove her eyeshadow and start again.

But this time she’s spot-on.

She looks at her image in the mirror and smiles. Her eyes crinkle a bit and the lines around them appear more pronounced. Even with the lines, when she smiles she easily looks ten years younger.

One time, the clerk at the grocery store asked her for her ID when she bought wine and she was happy for the rest of the day. It was because she was smiling, I told her.

“I’m thin, so people think I’m young,” she once said to me. “Then they see my eyes and they know.”

“Know what?”

“That I’m not young anymore.”

My heart had seized at the thought. I didn’t want to think about her aging. Aging meant creeping more closely toward the inevitable. Toward death.

But she had seemed blase about it. “Children are supposed to outlive their parents,” she had said.

I didn’t want to think about her leaving me. Where would I go?

“By the time I’m gone, you’ll be grown up and on your own,” she had said.

“But I don’t want to separate from you,” I had told her. “I want to live with you, even when I’m a grown-up.”

She had immediately stopped what she was doing, and bent down to look me in the eye.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do,” she had said gravely. “You can always live with me.” Her demeanor automatically became lighter, and she had smiled mischievously. “So don’t worry! And let’s have cake before dinner!”

Now, she smiles at herself in the mirror, apparently satisfied with her appearance. Lastly, she applies a clear pinkish lip gloss and then admires all her work.

I know she’s about to leave the bathroom. I scurry away so she won’t see me spying. This time, however, I’m not quick enough.

“Hey, I see you there, goofball!” I hear her as I turn my back.

I turn around and she approaches, wrapping me in a gentle embrace.

“What time will you be home?” I ask.

“Probably after you’re asleep.” She boops my nose with her finger. She stands up, her knees popping, and walks toward the door.

“Be safe, Mom,” I call.

“Always safe, my love,” she says, half-turning around and giving me her ageless smile. “Your sister will have dinner ready in a few.”

She blows me a kiss and leaves.

How can I tell her that she looks better without all that stuff on her face? How can I tell her that I prefer my clear-faced mother over an Egyptian goddess, and that I always think of her as the fresh-faced, smiling juvenile who will never grow up, or grow old?