A piece of glass
My mom once told me people liked me more than I thought.
I didn’t believe her. I didn’t understand how.
But when I thought about other people, I only ever saw good things.
I saw the way the boy in my math class frowned at a problem, his brow knitting in concentration, and I imagined the pride he would feel when he solved it.
I noticed the quiet girl who always carried too many books, and I wondered how heavy her thoughts might be, and how carefully she must navigate the world.
I saw the kindness in everyone before they even knew I was watching.
One day, I saw a girl in the window of an art studio.
She was beautiful. Not in the way the magazines claimed beauty should look, not shiny hair or bright eyes or perfect teeth.
It was in the shape of her attention. The way her face softened as she leaned toward the canvas. The gentle tilt of her hand as it hovered over a brush. Every movement deliberate, every color chosen with care.
It was the way she existed in the quiet, a calm command of the world around her that didn’t demand recognition, yet demanded it anyway.
I wanted to understand it. I wanted to speak the language of her presence, even if my tongue didn’t know the words.
A few days later, I saw her again at school.
She was surrounded by a group of girls, laughing, leaning into each other like the air between them carried their warmth.
It wasn’t just that she was beautiful. It was that she moved as if the world existed only around her steps.
The air seemed to bend toward her laughter, the sunlight finding her without trying.
Even from across the hall, I could see it: people were drawn to her not because they had to be, but because they wanted to be fully present, fully themselves.
And I realized, in that moment, I could never look away.
I started seeing her everywhere. Always framed for me alone, as though the world had installed windows just for my eyes.
At the market, helping a vendor gather fallen boxes, she laughed softly at a mistake he made, her joy a gentle echo, a balm to the mundane.
On the bus, she handed her seat to an elderly passenger, smiling in a way that made the world feel lighter, less rushed, less cruel.
In the library, she leaned over a table to explain a homework problem, patient, steady, a lighthouse in the storm of confusion.
Even in fleeting glimpses through café windows or across streets, she was there, carrying the same quiet magnetism, the same warmth, the same proof that the world could still be gentle.
The last time I saw her, I was at home.
It was a quiet Monday morning, and I had just gotten up to get ready for school.
When I entered the bathroom, there she was, staring back at me with those kind brown eyes.
It had never been a window.
It had never been someone else.
It was a mirror.
It was me.