The Light of Things Hoped For
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Darkness. I feel like I’m swimming through a dense liquid. A dark liquid. Simply floating along for all of eternity hanging in the midst of nothingness. I begin to collect myself as some consciousness flows through me. I wonder if there are many shades of darkness? Or if it is all just black? I begin to approach the surface of the dark liquid that I am swimming through, and a single beam of light passes through the surface. I almost don’t recognize it for what it is, but the word forms in my mind like a distant memory. Light. What a sweet thought. The beam of light begins to expand, penetrating the darkness of my liquid, exposing the emptiness that is covered by the dark. Suddenly, the beam becomes blinding and I am floating closer and closer to the surface. I am filled with fear and I try to swim back to the depths of the darkness I once knew, but the light has captivated me. Before I know it, I am completely consumed by the light.
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My eyes snap open, and I am a gasping for air. Memories of a dark liquid and a beam of light fall away as I shake the dreariness from my mind and look ahead. I am staring at the sky. The sky? What a funny word. It takes me a minute, but I remember what the sky is and why it is such a familiar word: the expanse above the earth reflected to me. My vocabulary is returning to me. Where am I? I am lying on my back looking into the sky. I begin to test my limbs. They are heavy and stiff but seem to appear in working order. How long have I been lying here? After a little stretching I pull my arms into my chest and I realize two things: I am cold and I am dirty.
Several minutes later I am on my feet, and after regaining my balance, I turn to survey the rest of my surroundings. I appear to be in a house, a kitchen actually. I look around at the dusty room and smashed glasses and broken plates. Some of the beams in the walls have snapped, and part of one wall is missing altogether along with the roof. There are pieces of paper everywhere, and rubble litters the floor. Something seriously devastated this kitchen. An object glitters and catches my eye. I stoop low to survey a small circle with lines and symbols on it. Familiarity seizes me. I think hard and cycle through my jumbled thoughts, searching for the identity of this strange circle. Suddenly it comes to me.
“A clock!” I exclaim. And then I gasp because I have forgotten the sound of my own voice or any other sound besides the silence I find myself in right now. For a moment I contemplate my voice before I remember the clock. My attention returns now to the glittering circle. I touch the clock; it feels cold. But as I touch it, I realize that it is attached to a metal bracelet, which in turn is wrapped around somebody’s arm. At first I am startled, but then I frantically clear the rubble from around the clock to reveal a man attached to the clock. He does not move, and he is very cold. Much colder than I am. I am confused and unsure of what to think about anything anymore. Nothing in this place makes any sense to me, and even what does make sense, like the sky or the clock, doesn’t fit together in a way that means anything! I stand up slowly. I am unsure what to think of the cold man lying at my feet with the glittering circle attached to his wrist. This kitchen is so dusty, and grime coats everything in sight.
I walk over to the window in the kitchen that is so coated by dust that I can’t even see out of it. I take the sleeve of the shirt I am wearing and rub the window clean. As I clear a spot on the window, I look over a city. A deserted, destroyed city. Buildings lay in ruin, windows are broken, and worst of all there is a deafening silence that rings in my ears. I leave the kitchen through the void that the wall used to fill and begin to walk into the city. I find more cold people everywhere, and more glass and paper and devastation. There is a brokenness, a pain, a dejectedness everywhere I look. And I begin to realize one thing: I am alone.
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As I pass through the streets and survey the shops and buildings, I am haunted by memories containing life and laughter and people. I begin to wonder what kind of force could have possibly destroyed such an environment. And then I pass it. Inside a small atrium that is littered with rubble and torn drapes and smashed furniture, there is a clean, silver mirror mounted on the wall, completely unscathed. It is the only undamaged object I’ve encountered yet in the whole city.
I approach the smooth surface cautiously, afraid that at any moment it too will crumble, and I will have lost my sense of normalcy again. As I suddenly enter the mirror’s frame of reference, I gasp in horror. For the first time I see my reflection, I gaze upon the hideous creature that I am. My eyes are two different sizes, separated by a huge gash that leads from my forehead to my left cheek. My nose had been broken in a few places and littered with freckles. There are large welts lining my right cheekbone, and a few of my teeth are missing in between my cracked, dry lips. The only hair I have on my head is in a small patch above my left ear, and part of my right ear is completely missing. I recoil backwards hard into the wall, terrified of the person that I’ve just caught glimpse of. My knees buckle as I sink to the floor, and my hands tentatively reach up to touch my scarred face. But as my hands make contact with my nose, it doesn’t feel broken at all; and I cannot feel the gash between my eyes, and both of my ears are completely there. I run my tongue over my teeth and they all, too, are accounted for. Confused, I being to rise slowly to return to the mirror only to find the hideous creature has vanished, and the face that greets me instead is the one that is familiar to my memories: long, soft, dark hair and bright blue symmetrical eyes encased in thick eyelashes and eyebrows, set over strong cheekbones and complimented with full lips. Relief washes over me, and I suddenly feel exhausted from the adrenaline subsiding. But I still see the face of the monster in my mind’s eye, and the horror of knowing that I was the monster washes over my body once again as a shudder runs through me.
I quickly leave the atrium, desperate to be as far away from the mirror as I possibly can. But as the sun sets, I am not sure where to turn to. I wander down a couple of streets and find a small villa, mostly intact, with a plump couch and a few cans of food that I manage to open and devour. After my feast, I wander to the couch and slump down ready for sleep to overtake me, but as my mind hangs in the balance between deep sleep and awareness, I begin to dream. I am back in the dusty atrium again, staring at my beautiful reflection, admiring the smoothness of my skin. But as I stare into the mirror intently, my features begin to contort and mutate back into the hideous creature. The woman that stares back at me grins wickedly, and a deep snarl is released from her snout, “You are a monster! Wicked woman!” the creature roars at me. I flinch from her accusations as she suddenly springs from the mirror and lunges for me with a scream. Just as her mangled hands reach my throat my eyes snap open and I sit straight up. I am gasping for air as I reach to touch my neck. I can feel the sweat rolling down my back. Suddenly, I have the strongest urge to sprint back to the atrium and return to the mirror, because deep down I am not sure whether I was the monster or the beautiful girl in my dream. I can still feel the wicked grin lingering beneath the surface of my expression and the lust for the blood of the human girl. As the tears roll down my cheek, my resolve strengthens, and I rise from the couch and step into the dark, cold rain that greets me outside. Lightning flashes and thunder rumbles as I walk briskly past the rubble and destruction of the city until at last I am facing the broken atrium. I step past the broken glass and turn to the silver mirror once again with closed eyes. I take a deep breath, whisper a prayer, and slowly open my eyes, afraid of who will be looking back at me. And there in the mirror, is the lovely woman. Scared, wet, and pale, but staring straight into me eyes. I exhale the breath that I didn’t realize I was holding in, and I allow myself to smile for the first time.
I am so relieved. I watch my reflection fill with color again as I flush with happiness. The next flash of lightning causes me to jump and once again remember where I am. I turn for one more fleeting look into the polished, silver mirror just as a second bolt of lightning flashes, and within the glass, the ugly creature has again replaced the beautiful woman. My fear is immediately restored, but overpowered by the screaming demand that I destroy the wicked mirror. I rush to the wall, rip the mirror from it’s mount with all the force that my body has to offer, and without a second glance at the polished surface, I hurl the glass at the floor with all my strength. The sound of the mirror shattering cuts into the sound of rain falling, but all I hear is the sound of my heavy breathing. I look down at my destructive work, at the fragments of the silver surface. Some of the glass shards are reflecting the beautiful woman back to me, and some of them reveal the ugly hag. I crumble to my knees and begin to sob because I still do not know which one of them is me.
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“Hope…” A soft whisper comes that draws me from my undisturbed slumber. I have awoken the following afternoon to the setting sun pouring into the atrium’s gaping holes in the ceiling. I am stiff from laying on the floor all day and my face is swollen from the tears that continued to come long after I had thought they should surely be used up. I struggle to my feet, carefully avoiding the evil shards that still lie below me, and I limp over to a chair in the far corner of the room. Hope? It’s funny that I should think of it. There clearly is no hope at all for this place and possibly no hope for me either if I am indeed the monster. I watch the broken mirror out of the corner of my eye like it’s going to rematerialize and attack me. Underneath the fear of that silver surface, there is shame. Shame that comes from being exposed and naked. I suddenly need to be far, far away from the broken mirror. I simply cannot stand the truth and judgment that await me within my reflection. I decide to focus instead on the sweet, soft whisper and choose to hold onto the hope that I am, in fact, the beautiful woman being tricked by a lofty mirror.
“Monster…” A soft snarl disturbs my thoughts and is all the incentive I need to jump from my chair and run as fast as I can away from the atrium. When I am too tired to run anymore, I run farther still, determined never to return to the evil mirror. When I finally slow, gasping for air, the sun is barely visible over the horizon. I am sucking as much air into my lungs as possible when I turn to face an old, barren bookstore to my left. Mounted on the wall there, is a full-length silver mirror, and within the confines of the glass is the wicked woman, with her now visible set of claws and torn clothing, exposing bruised flesh and scarred legs. I scream at the top of my lungs and turn to run a few paces only to run into a silver mirror leaning against the wall in an ally.
“Monster!” She roars as I stumble backwards, choosing a different escape route, only to find her again screaming at me form behind another glass surface, “Monster! Evil!”
“No!” I shout covering my face. The sky is growing darker as I turn to flee down the main road away from the buildings and stores, every few paces catching a glimpse of the creature following me in the reflection of a window or a puddle of water. She is yelling to me, “You cannot run away from me! You are me!”
The tears begin to slip down my face as I run harder and farther away from the wicked woman. It is now completely dark outside, and I am running so wearily and crying so hard that I do not see the cold woman laying in the road, and I trip over her body, scraping my knees as I fall beside the her. I lay my head down in the dirt, afraid to even get up. I hate this city, where I am scared and alone and defeated. I hate the mirror and the smooth glass surface. But most of all I hate myself. After some time, I pull myself from the ground and look at the woman beside me. She appears to have been running as well before she fell for the last time. Her hand is stretched out holding a small object. I lean in closer to see what it is. It is a small, flattened circle. Again, familiarity seizes me as I take the object from the cold woman’s hand. It is actually two flattened circles pressed together, and there is an indent in one of them. I wedge my finger into the indent and pull the circles apart. Just as the object opens to me I remember what it is, but it is too late. The two circular mirrors on the inside of the compact mirror greet my success, just as two misshapen, scarred eyes meet mine. I stifle a scream and stare back at the hideous woman. She is grinning at me, looking into my heart, seeing and exposing the ugliness that is inside of me. Suddenly, I am tired. Tired of running, tired of trying to believe that I am beautiful and perfect. I begin to cry from weariness.
“Fine!” I shout to nobody in particular as the tears continue to flow down my cheeks, “I am an ugly, hideous monster! I am not beautiful, I am not perfect, I am broken and mutated and disfigured. I deserve to die here, in Hell, alone.” I put my head in my hands, as I cannot contain the sobs any longer.
“Hope…” The soft whisper returns, but louder to my mind, as if it had been spoken aloud. I raise my eyes in confusion. What hope? What hope in the world could there possibly be for me? Me, who is alone and dirty and terrifying. But strangely, as I lift my gaze, light fills my eyes, blinding me. I raise my hand to shade my view and realize that because the sky is clear tonight, a full, brilliant moon is out, and there is some object on the ground a few feet away reflecting the moonlight into my eyes. Annoyed, I stand up to avoid the glare, and I walk over to the glittering object. As I get closer to it, I freeze. I instantly know exactly what the object is: It is a glass shard from a broken mirror. I look along the road and there are thousands of glass pieces littering the ground, all reflecting the brilliant moonlight, leading away from the city. I curiously begin to follow the glowing pathway, illuminated by the moon, farther and farther away from the buildings of the city toward the mountainside surrounding the metropolis. My road is absolutely beautiful, aglow amidst the darkness of night. The glass shards still hold my hideous reflection, but the glory of the light has eclipsed my hopelessness. I begin to notice the number of broken glass pieces is steadily increasing as I travel further down the beautiful road. It’s funny, but the mirror pieces that inspired such dread and fear have suddenly become my guide and my path. After what feels like hours, I can see that up ahead the mirror shards disappear into what looks like a tunnel at the base of a mountain. I reach the opening of the tunnel, just big enough for a two or three people, and I notice that I cannot see the end of it, but that it definitely leads upwards. The second thing I notice is that the tunnel, too, is littered with illuminated glass pieces, so whatever lies at the top of the tunnel must have a light source as well. I don’t even stop to think about it, I just begin to climb.
I reach out, carefully trying to avoid the sharp glass shards, but nonetheless end up scraping myself pretty badly on my climb through the tunnel. Deep within me, I have this feeling that whatever awaits me at the top of the tunnel is the same voice that has been calling me to hope. Is there still some hope that I am not this hideous creature? That I am not as ugly as I fear? A sharp pain in my forearm snaps me out of my thoughts as one piece of glass slices through my flesh and blood begins to run down my arm. I briefly pause, but continue to climb faster and faster. I can see the bright light at the end of the tunnel now. I have to get to it. I am suddenly overtaken by desperation to know what is up there, that it somehow holds my fate. As I begin to scramble as fast as I can up the tunnel, the glass cuts deeper and deeper with every movement. The pain begins to make me dizzy, but I reach inside myself and push on harder, determined to reach the light. I have to reach the light. And then finally, at last, I emerge from the tunnel, bloody and gasping for breath.
I clumsily pull my screaming body from the mouth of the tunnel into a spacious crevice. As I struggle to my feet with my muscles crying out their loud protest, I glance around and survey my surroundings. Steep, rocky walls encompass me, and as I look up, I can see the soft blue moon setting behind a mountain peak as the pink of morning begins to caress the sky to the East. I turn around to take in the rest of the crevice. I notice a pool off to the side full of clear, fresh water, and I am suddenly aware of how thirsty I am. But as I complete the rotation of my gaze, my blood freezes cold in my veins. There, against the wall of my haven is an enormous silver mirror, framed in gold, encrusted with jewels, as tall as two men and spanning the width of the entire crevice. I notice none of the finery adorning my tormentor, because there, beneath the surface, is the monster woman, her mangled body covered in wounds and blood. I stare into her eyes in disbelief.
“No!” I cry at her, “No, no, no!” She cannot be here! Where is my whisperer now? What hope is possibly left? This was my one chance, my one escape, and here too, she follows me. I reach down to pick up a rock the size of my fist, and without thinking, I run closer to the mirror and chuck it as hard as I can into the glass. If I must be this ugly monster then I do not want to look at myself ever again. I will destroy every single mirror in the city, starting with this one, until I never have to see my wicked reflection ever again. But as the rock makes contact with the surface of the mirror, it ricochets off, and falls to the ground, leaving the mirror completely undamaged. Enraged, I run to the fallen rock, back up a few paces, and throw it again with the force of both hands, but still to no avail. I look to the side and find a slightly bigger rock, pry it from the ground, and hurl it at the glass. As it thumps to the floor, there is still not a single mark on the surface. Breathing hard, and nearing the brink of insanity, I give a frustrated scream and charge the mirror determined to tear it to shreds. My fists slam into the mirror first, followed by my body. I strike the mirror with my fists over and over again until I finally begin to realize that it simply cannot break. My cheeks are wet with tears of frustration, and I slump against the mirror in defeat.
“Hope…”
I lift my eyes ready to yell at the whispering voice that he has no idea what he’s talking about, only to have my accusations stifled in a gasp. Because there in the mirror, I see his reflection. He is standing a few paces behind my own reflection. Gaping, I turn my head very slowly to see the tall man behind me. He is absolutely beautiful and appears to be lit up with a light, almost… glowing. I turn quickly back to the mirror to see what his reflection looks like, and while I still appear as my ugly inner-self, he remains beautiful and glowing within the mirror’s surface. Dismayed, I answer quietly,
“There is no hope for me.” I turn away from the mirror, unable to bear seeing my haggard reflection next to his beauty, “This is what I am.”
“Yes, this is what you are. The mirror cannot lie; it is the perfect standard.” Even the sound of his voice is beautiful to my ears.
“The mirror is wicked for making me look like a monster,” I spit bitterly, “I wish with all my heart that I had never seen the first mirror in the atrium. I hate the mirror.”
“Do not be deceived. The mirror is not wicked; on the contrary, the mirror is good.” He said gently as he reached out to touch the mirror, like an old friend. “Through the mirror you can know how broken you are, that your wickedness might become utterly wicked. If you never saw the mirror, how would you know? You would be stuck here forever.” He paused to turn his soft, gentle attention on me as I lay, still slumped, crying softly. He warmly reached down and pressed his palm against my head. “But there is hope. I did not lie to you. There was one that came before you, who stood perfect before the mirror, fulfilling every standard. He chose to take on every vile and abhorrent disfigurement from men and expunge them from the world.”
“I can be beautiful?” I asked, too scared to hope.
“You can be perfect.” He smiled, “Just as the one before you.” He gently takes my arm, helps me to my feet, and walks me across the crevice to the clear pool I had seen before. I look at my whisperer intently before I ask very seriously,
“How?” I am suddenly desperate to know. I need to know how to be rid of the wicked woman lurking inside me. I need to know how to be free from this prison.
“Wash in this pool, believe in the perfection of the one before you, and lay your fear and shame in the water.”
I slowly wade into the clear, warm water, not completely sure what the man meant. I wade until I am fully submerged in the surprisingly deep pool. Under the surface I curl into a tight ball letting the sensation of peace wash over me. I could stay in this pool forever, feeling the liquid gently caress my body, removing the fear and despair from the last few days since waking in the strange kitchen. Memories of a dream begin to return to me, images of a dark liquid and a beam of light resurface in my mind. I remember being captivated by the light. I open my eyes now, underwater, and find that the light once again captivates me. I revel in the light until my lung’s cry for oxygen can be ignored no longer. I emerge from under the surface of the pool with a gasp of air for my burning lungs. As I wade back to the edge, I catch my reflection in the pool’s surface and I am shocked to see the evil creature staring at me. I must have failed somehow, not completed the directions from the man. I keep my eyes on the evil woman until I step out of the water and I look for the man, but he is nowhere in sight. I look back over the pool to see the creature still there and I sigh deeply in disappointment.
“She will never leave the pool again, she has been washed of you.” I spin around to stare at the mysterious man.
“What do you mean?”
“Leave her behind you, she is gone. Look and see, the new has come.” He gently takes my hand and leads me toward the jeweled mirror and turns my shoulders to face my reflection. I let out cry of shock and surprise.
Within the mirror’s surface, I am not only the beautiful woman that I saw before, but I am glowing just as the man! I am ablaze in the glory of the light! I see now that the light that held me captivated in the pool was not the beam of light from my dream, but the light is me! Or more rightly, the one who came before me. I stand perfect before the mirror. My heart rejoices at my transformed reflection as I stand in victory and freedom. I can scarcely believe the beauty of my features and the smoothness of my skin. I draw close to the mirror and I reach out to touch my reflection, but as my fingers make contact with the glass they slip through the surface and disappear into the other side. Startled, and slightly alarmed, I look to the man in confusion.
“You are worthy. You have fulfilled the standard and may enter.” He smiles back at me. I return my gaze to what I now realize is some sort of gateway, and I push my other hand through the surface.
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Behind the surface of the mirror is a beautiful, mountainous land, bathed in the light of a new morning. I can feel the heat of the sun that has just come up from the horizon kiss my skin. I can hear the birds chirping to greet the new day. In the distance, I hear laughing and singing; signs of life that I have longed for. I can smell the fragrance of spring in the air, of flowers blooming and a fresh start of the year. Far in the distance, I can see a majestic castle nestled in the valley between two mighty mountain peaks. I don’t even stop to think about it, I just begin to run.
