"Why does he torture me so?" Amy said staring mindlessly at her own reflection. The reflection did not answer. How could it; it was a mere image, a representation of what was real; yet like Amy's problem, it had no substance.
"I wonder if he gets some perverse pleasure from making me feel so bad?" Amy asked her reflection.
"Why does he treat me like this after all I have done for him?"
An imaginary stream of tears poured down the face that was her own, but was not her. The face that stared back at Amy was merely an outline; undoubtedly it was Amy's outline, but it wasn't real. Amy was real and yet the cause of her problem didn't exist in the same way as she did. Like Amy, he possessed human flesh and blood, but had no soul. He did not feel things as she did, he merely reflected them like the image facing her. Even his thoughts were no more than a quantised equation: what will benefit me? + what will I get from it? = self-satisfaction. This to him, was a perfect equilibrium, the balance between self-indulgence and selfish greed, at the expense of all others if necessary. Unfortunately at some point in time Amy had become part of his equation, and in finding she didn't fit, he cast her aside.
Amy realised this now and yet she could not free herself.
"It is as though I am bonded to him. He has an unseen power over me. He draws me to him so that I cannot break away, like an electron orbiting the nucleus of an atom."
"You are a part of me and yet you do not belong!" Amy shouted at the reflection in the mirror.
The night came and passed. Even when asleep, she had no peace. He invaded every part of her mind, her thoughts, her hopes and desires, her dreams and the deep recesses that even she was not consciously aware of.
She awoke haunted by transcendental images and memories from an almost forgotten sleep; it seemed as real to Amy as the fragmented world that encompassed her as her eyes had opened. Both worlds - that of substance and reality, and the other of thoughts and emotions - home of the human psyche, had merged. Neither, in Amy's mind, comprised any more than an abstract illusion.
"I wonder if he gets some perverse pleasure from making me feel so bad?" Amy asked her reflection.
"Why does he treat me like this after all I have done for him?"
An imaginary stream of tears poured down the face that was her own, but was not her. The face that stared back at Amy was merely an outline; undoubtedly it was Amy's outline, but it wasn't real. Amy was real and yet the cause of her problem didn't exist in the same way as she did. Like Amy, he possessed human flesh and blood, but had no soul. He did not feel things as she did, he merely reflected them like the image facing her. Even his thoughts were no more than a quantised equation: what will benefit me? + what will I get from it? = self-satisfaction. This to him, was a perfect equilibrium, the balance between self-indulgence and selfish greed, at the expense of all others if necessary. Unfortunately at some point in time Amy had become part of his equation, and in finding she didn't fit, he cast her aside.
Amy realised this now and yet she could not free herself.
"It is as though I am bonded to him. He has an unseen power over me. He draws me to him so that I cannot break away, like an electron orbiting the nucleus of an atom."
"You are a part of me and yet you do not belong!" Amy shouted at the reflection in the mirror.
The night came and passed. Even when asleep, she had no peace. He invaded every part of her mind, her thoughts, her hopes and desires, her dreams and the deep recesses that even she was not consciously aware of.
She awoke haunted by transcendental images and memories from an almost forgotten sleep; it seemed as real to Amy as the fragmented world that encompassed her as her eyes had opened. Both worlds - that of substance and reality, and the other of thoughts and emotions - home of the human psyche, had merged. Neither, in Amy's mind, comprised any more than an abstract illusion.