I can barely look at you, the girl told the mirror. I can barely taste your tears, place my fingers upon your eyelids and press, press, press until your heart pops. You can barely resist, moving your lips to the shape of my name, those gentle letters. We can barely fold in at the seam, untying the knots and separate. Who will tell me what we are and why we feel like two, two of one? And you spoke to me, yesterday, the day before and the day before the day before. And you said the world was less than pity, more than cowardice. I asked if we were splitting by the seam,

but you said we were connecting, coming into.

Against the mirror, I breathe the words by hazy motion, a scarred upper lip stinging the surface. Your skin is rough, hard to the touch, almost scaly. But not like a fish, never cold nor slippery. Your scales breathe fire, move like diligent tiny strings under my finger tips. I can smell the blood, the taste of iron. My heart skips beats to the shifting gaze of your eyes, set deeper. We are standing against each other, on the tip of the sharpest edge, and my hands are on the ornate band of this old mirror, right here in the corridor of my father's home. Our father, your coarse whispers betraying my voice, lacing yourself on top of me, building a land of fangs on my shoulders, attaching dreams and nightmares to my shoulder blades. To think I might not find my way back home, to think I might lose you, to think I have always lost myself..and I turn again. He has taught us how to turn and change. Chameleon toes, dancing across the cold floor like the ballerina I dreamt of becoming at six. I dance, dance and spin within the embrace of your arms.

Late at night in a room that once belonged to somebody else, with my shoes neatly stacked onto the shelf and my suitcases in the corner, we are sitting on the couch. In this crooked little space I sleep and you wake. The glass locker, shelves arranged all the way, a little postcard with green glitter and and a big red dragon, all friendly looking. Just across my desk, a small mirror with green stones. While I still cannot sleep, you cannot wait for me to begin.

Where do we begin now? Before I can say that I'm scared, you catch my heart and look me in the eyes. Not many little girls ever wake to a dragon's alluring gaze, but you simply raise your gritty face and smile at me as to say; you are that little girl. I will be the dragon.

Long ago, I gave you a name, but I've forgotten. And everybody else has forgotten about you, forgotten about everything you did for me. They haven't paid you the slightest of notion, never noticed your soft steps across the years of memories. Yet, you were everywhere. As you are today, and tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow.

You raise your face again, all up to mine. The colours of the ocean, the green moss, and the silver-grey snow right before the dark. Your eyes shine and speak to me.

Sing me another song, Isabelle.

 


...

Back to "stranger with no intentions" 1. story-part

Back to "the difference has blurred" 2. story-part

Back to "from Isabelle to you" 3. story-part

Back to "turning fluid, oily and tar black, seeping through all the cracks" 4. story-part

Back to the interlude; take your stormy weather along

Back to "painting stars that have not come to be" 5. story-part

Back to "the dreams that should have died" 6. story-part

 

 

Forward to "a dream you did not have" 8. story-part