The Face in the Mirror

She kept looking deep into those honey brown eyes. She kept hoping that they would tell her a secret, a secret that they had been hiding all this time, a secret which, when uncovered would give meaning to her life or maybe to the entire world. She averted her eyes from the mirror. She was tired of looking for meanings, trying to break free from the abyss and find herself. She looked at the mirror again, and noticed a little red tinge in the whites of those eyes. It started spreading and soon those eyes seemed to be drowning in a hot, tingling sea of tears.

“Delia, we’re getting late, come along or we’ll miss your appointment”, shouted a woman’s voice.

Delia quickly wiped her eyes and turned away as her mother came bursting into her room.

“I’ll be right down”, said Delia. Her voice sounded shaky and meek despite her best efforts to make it sound normal and try to mask the fact that she had been crying.

“Alright”, said her mother, casually and went out the door. Delia wondered if she had noticed the shakiness in her voice but even if she had, she wouldn’t have taken her in her arms and asked her what was wrong because that was not the kind of thing that ever happened in her family.

Delia rolled down the window of her mother’s car as they drove past the busy, bustling street. As she looked at the faces of the people going about their business, looking busy and engrossed in their lives, she wondered if they’d ever stopped and looked at themselves in the mirror for a good long time, and felt a cold, tingling sensation run down their spine as they realized how little they knew about themselves. Or was it just her? Did all these people around her know exactly who they were? Then why was she the only one who seemed to be standing still while everyone else in the world seemed to be moving past her.

“Delia……. Delia”, a distant voice seemed to be calling out her name. “Delia…Delia”, the voice seemed to be getting closer until it felt like it was right next to her.

“Delia!!”

She jumped and realized that it was her mother’s voice.

“Delia, earth to Delia!”, said her mother.

“Yes?”, said Delia, hastily.

“Where’d you go off to?”, said her mother.

“I guess I was thinking about something”, said Delia.

“Well, we are here”, said her mother. “Do you want me to come with you?”

“Umm No, I got this”, said Delia and got off the car.

She sat in the cold, foreboding waiting room. She hated it, she hated the dark grey paint on the walls, the rows and rows of stiff, no arm visitor chairs. She hated the receptionist’s wide-eyed, vacant, judgmental stare, which seemed to say5 “what is someone so young doing here?”

After what seemed like an eternity to Delia, the receptionist called out her name.

“Delia Williams”, said the receptionist in his loud, shrill voice.

Delia stood up and walked slowly towards the heavy, black door in the far-right corner of the room. She stopped at the door and looked at the receptionist.

“You can go right in”, he prompted.

Delia pushed the door open and went in. A middle-aged man with dark, thinning hair looked up as she did. His horn-rimmed glasses seemed to be glowing insidiously in the warm afternoon sunlight coming in through the open window.

“Miss Delia Williams”, he said in a deep voice. “Please have a seat.”

Delia was confused. She did not know this man.

“Wh- where is Doctor Shephard?”, she asked, hesitantly.

“Dr Shephard could not be here today due to some personal reasons. I am Dr Roberts, the on-call psychiatrist”, said the man. “Don’t worry Miss Williams, I had Dr Shephard fax me your medical history.”

Delia shuffled her feet uncomfortably.

“So, Delia, how have you been feeling lately”, asked Dr Roberts.

Delia shrugged and said nothing.

“How are things at school?”, asked Dr Roberts.

Delia shrugged and mumbled “fine, I guess.”

“Do you want to talk about what has been bothering you”, said Dr Roberts, encouragingly.

Delia sat silently, looking down at her feet. She shuffled them nervously as she thought back to all the times she had had to sit on that very chair while the person sitting across from her had tried to figure her out.

“Delia, your mother told Dr Shephard that you have been very distant and withdrawn again lately. Would you please tell me what it is that is bothering you? I cannot help you if you don’t tell me”, said Dr Roberts, softly.

Delia could feel her eyes welling up. “I…I”, she started to say, in a low shaky voice.

“Yes...?”, encouraged Dr Roberts.

“I don’t know who I am or where I belong, I don’t seem to fit in in this world”, said Delia, slowly.

“Why do you think you don’t fit in?”, asked Dr Roberts.

“I- I don’t know, I seem to think about things that no one else does. And- and these thoughts bother me”, said Delia, her voice cracking from the effort of holding back the tears.

“Can you tell me a little bit about these thoughts that bother you?”, asked Dr Roberts, softly.

“I feel like I am different from everyone else. Everyone else seems to go about their lives, knowing exactly who they are and- and I can’t seem to be able to do anything because I don’t feel a connection to myself. How can I figure out what to do with my life if I don’t know who I am”, said Delia.

“Delia the road to self-discovery can be quite painful. You are a thoughtful and intelligent young girl and that is why you find yourself plagued by these thoughts. Most of us are not fully aware of who we truly are but we get so engrossed with petty things that we forget to ask ourselves these questions. While I’m afraid that it’s not possible to fathom every aspect of one’s existence, but as we grow older, we discover certain things about ourselves that help us get closer to figuring out who we truly are”, said Dr Roberts, calmly.

Delia listened intently.

“It is okay to feel lost and alone at your age. I’m sure you must have something in your life that gives you pleasure or relief at least. I would suggest that you keep doing those things because it is in doing the things that we love, that we find ourselves.”, said Dr Roberts.

Delia kept thinking about Dr Roberts' words all the way back home. Dr Sheppard had never really listened to her or given her any useful advice. He would just keep looking at her through his thick pair of bifocals and keep asking her the same questions every time she visited him. Then he would scribble down names of prescription drugs in his notepad.

That night Delia sat at her desk and tried to make a note of the things that she loved. Somehow, she could not think of a single thing that she enjoyed anymore. She remembered two years ago, when she’d gone skiing with her family. She’d fallen in love with the sensation of wheezing down the slopes at full speed. But it hadn’t been the same two weeks ago when she just could not get herself to ski no matter how much her mother had urged.

The next day at school, Delia sat herself down below a sycamore tree in her school yard, watching her friends play tag. She remembered how much she used to enjoy playing with her friends a couple of years back. But now she couldn't get herself to enjoy anything, no matter how hard she tried. It was like she'd fallen down a pit, a dark, endless pit. Every time she thought she'd hit the bottom, she'd find herself getting dragged down even further. She wondered if she'd fallen so far down that she wouldn't be able to climb up even if someone threw her a rope.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a cold, tingling sensation down the back of her neck. A tiny drop of water had crept down the yellowing sycamore leaf and fallen on her neck. A deep rumbling noise made her almost jump out of her skin. She'd been so caught up in herself that she hadn't noticed the kids in the school yard running around covering their heads with their hands, looking for shelter. Delia looked up at the sky and saw huge drops of water coming towards her and felt them crash against her forehead. She wiped it away with her hand and noticed that it had started raining heavily. Delia got up from under the tree and stood under the purplish pink sky. She felt huge pellets of icy cold water land on her face. She felt chills run down her spine, as they trickled down her forehead and caressed her cheeks. It felt like it was the first time she had ever gotten caught in the rain. She closed her eyes kept feeling the cold water against her face.

As the rain started coming down even more heavily, drenching her to the bone, she was surprised to feel something lift inside of her. She could almost feel herself coming out of the pit, a tiny ray of sunshine met her eyes. Someone had thrown her a rope and she was surprised to discover that she was a few inches above where she'd been before. She could not fathom how something so trivial could make her feel so different. A tiny smile crossed her face as she felt a little closer to happiness, a little closer to herself. She didn't care about the kids calling out to her telling her to get out of the rain, she didn't care, for she had found the one thing that she loved.