Dazzle Story

Mirror

I gazed into the glimmering shard before me, wondering how such a small piece of something larger could end up so far separated from its whole self. It was like an apple that fell and rolled farther and farther from under its tree, or a flat tire that wound up miles and miles away from the other parts of the automobile. I was only eight years old and my mother had always told me, along with other various bits of advice, to avoid touching broken glass. This shard of a mirror was effectively the same as glass, but it tantalized me anyway.

            

I carefully ran my fingers over the jagged edges, making sure not to cut myself. After all, I was disobeying my mother, and she would definitely find out about my defiance if I returned to my room with crimson seeping from my hands. The shard was small, about the size of a strawberry, and I wondered again what separated it from its whole self. Was it from a grand, antique mirror with gold and silver swirled together on the edges? Was it from a contemporary mirror, framed in a simple black? Or was it a piece of something dingy, maybe stained, that someone threw out since it became obsolete? I could tell nothing of its past from the appearance of the sliver of a mirror in my hands.

            

It wasn’t quite nightfall, but the stars were peeking out from behind the clouds. I couldn’t see them in the sky, but they were reflected in the little mirror. It was like I could hold the very sky above me in my hands, and I contemplated if the sky would feel the same as this shard were it to collapse one day. It was beautiful. Tilting it to the side, its reflective surface revealed to me an image of the pine and oak trees surrounding our yard. Suddenly, however, I realized that the shard itself was just as beautiful as the things it could show me with its clear, sparkling surface. I was able to take in the intricate simplicity of the actual object in my hands.

            

It was so very smooth – smooth like the metal of a fork or spoon – but the humidity in the air caused my fingers to stick as I ran them across its delicate surface. My fingers left a trail behind them, blurring the images I was no longer paying attention to. I realized then that its origins were of no consequence to me; I couldn’t judge what I saw before me by what, or where, it came from. I understood that it was the same, no matter if it came from the extravagant mirror, the dingy, neglected mirror, or somewhere in between. Its origins weren’t what made it what it became on its own. Was it from a mirror carelessly thrown out by its owner? If so, I was lucky that I was able to find it so that it could escape that fate. Was it from a beloved golden and silver mirror, accidentally broken by some unfortunate event? I was still lucky that I found it, for that exact same reason.

             

The shard didn’t have a color, or one could say it held within it every color – if not the potential for every color. I knew it was capable of radiating light in all directions, just as it was equally capable of appearing blackened by pure darkness. It had the potential to be good or bad, the potential to hurt me or protect me, and the potential to break down or thrive. It didn’t matter where it came from. All of those potentials still rested within its shimmering surface. A flat tire was still flat and useless no matter what car it came from. A bruised apple is still bruised and unlikely to be eaten no matter what tree it fell from. In contrast, water can save a life no matter which river it came from, and lightning is still darkly captivating no matter which cloud creates it.

            

I took the mirror shard inside with me, wrapping it with a tissue to preserve it - as though I was mummifying it - and hid it inside my Disney Princess jewelry box. Though I rarely took it out after the day I found it, the memory of finding it was always somewhat present my mind. The shard reminded me that something – or someone – can be beautiful no matter who made it, who raised it, or what trials it has gone through. Something coming from the darkest path of life can be just as radiant as a similar entity from a clear path of life, where the best decision to make was always easy to see. 

Cold

Cold

I was concerned I wouldn’t survive the night, and with good reason. I felt stupid. How could I have not anticipated something like this happening? Of all of the luck, it would be mine that would cause me to break down in the middle of nowhere in the dead of winter. Everything around me was empty, save for the ice covering the trees and – sadly – my car. The car was so frozen over that I thought I’d turn into a giant block of ice had I stayed inside.

            

I pulled my thick, pink coat tighter around me, scanning the area for something, anything, warm. I was wary of going near the trees; the icicles were liked medieval swords, just waiting for someone to sit or stand below them to impale and stain the snow red. There was a gutter beside the road, but it was so filled with snow I was certain that it would only make me colder. Without a fire, I was afraid I might die before someone drove by that could help. I had already been there hours and hours, yet not one car had passed.

            

I became briefly entertained when I let out a sigh of frustration; somehow, the childlike joy of breathing into the icy air to make a cloud of warmth brought me out of my bit of sorrow. I shook my head and turned back to the car. The windows were covered, the top was covered, and everything else was covered. I took a step closer and touched the passenger window lightly with my gloved hand. It stuck to the ice. There was a good chance that the car was going to freeze shut; I’d probably never be able to drive it again, but I didn’t know enough about cars to be sure.

            

I was at a loss for what to do. My phone had no service, or else I would have called someone, and I had nothing I could make a fire with. I briefly wished that I was a smoker, since I would likely have a lighter, but then I remembered I have nothing to catch fire to. Well, maybe an old newspaper in my car, but that would barely do any good with the speed that paper burns.

            

I looked back at the trees. The icicle swords still frightened me, but there was a part of one tree that wasn’t covered in snow, perhaps protected by the limbs above it. If I could get there without knocking down the icicles, it might be warmer than standing up, attempting to cuddle into my coat. I decided to try it; at the very least, some person would at least be slightly entertained – if not horrified – to find a dead body impaled by an icicle of ridiculous proportions beside a car that was essentially nothing but a block of ice.

            

The snow crunched under my boots as I made my way to the tree. The icicles were like a maze I needed to get through, but I couldn’t concentrate due to the sharp wind racing past my ears. I couldn’t try and push one aside because it might start a chain reaction and knock them all down. I figured my only hope was to try to crawl under the bottom of the icicles without jostling any of them. I dropped down onto my knees, blessing the fact that I had worn snow pants, and did a strange combination of a normal baby crawl and an army crawl under the pointy tips of the icicles.

            

After a few more moments of struggling, I was under the canopy of ice. I leaned my back against the tree, pulled my hood tighter around my head, and closed my eyes. When would someone drive by? Was I going to die here? I was just going on a simple, overnight trip to visit my parents. Why had some higher power decided I need to go through this? Had I done something wrong? I became worried that I wouldn’t get out of this situation alive.

            

A hypothetical clock was ticking down the time in my head; tick, tock. Tick tock. I started feeling so delirious that I would hallucinate headlights coming, but as I would think they were approaching, they would disappear. It was like being stranded in a desert and wanting water so badly that you would see it before you, but as you reached the oasis in your vision, it would disappear. The cold kept creeping through my coat, through my snow pants, and I eventually slipped into sleep. I just hoped that someone would come by and take me to a hospital so that I could wake up one day.