Act I – Dissolution
Mira first noticed it when her reflection paused.
She stood brushing her teeth, hair tangled from sleep, the morning light slanting through the glass—and for a fraction of a second, the girl in the mirror blinked late. Not slow. Just late. The way a lie answers too quickly.
She stared at it. Then looked away. Then back. The mirror resumed its mimicry, as if embarrassed. But something in Mira’s chest ticked sideways.
Downstairs, her father was on a call. The walls listened eagerly.
“Value must be proven,” he was saying. “Power must be seen.”
He spoke like that often now. Aphorisms as absolutes. Beliefs so tightly wound they snapped reality into shape. People said he was magnetic. Visionary. But the house didn’t feel like a house anymore. It felt like a theater where belief performed for applause.
At breakfast, Mira tried to tell her parents about a dream. “There was this… spiral staircase, and I kept climbing—”
You had eggs yesterday,” her father interrupted, not cruelly, just completely. “Try the protein bread today. It’s efficient.”
Mira blinked. Her mother said nothing. Just smiled that blank, polished smile she wore when dinner guests came over. Mira wasn’t sure how long she’d been wearing it.
Later, she passed by the hallway gallery where family photos used to hang. They were gone. The frames were there, still nailed to the wall. But the photos were blank. Not removed—blank. Empty ovals where faces should have been.
She touched one. Cold. Her fingers tingled.
That afternoon at school, she raised her hand in ethics class and asked, “What if value can’t be measured?”
The teacher blinked, then frowned.
“What’s your name again?”
Her classmates turned. Some squinted. A boy she’d known since kindergarten mouthed: Mira? like it was a guess.
At home, her bedroom was smaller.
The bookshelf was missing three titles. A stuffed animal she’d slept with since age six was nowhere to be found. Her laundry bin had only one set of clothes. She opened her closet: five identical black outfits. She didn’t own black. She wore yellow. Or she used to.
Her fingers began to twitch when she tried to remember what her voice sounded like.
She looked in the mirror again.
This time, the reflection blinked early. Not late.
Like it was waiting for her.
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If the world begins to forget you, this is how you remember yourself.
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