BaBa would rest his back against the ger, with a big bowl of airag, his eyes closed in contentment.
There were no evil spirits back then.
The next day, my mirror is not in it’s usual spot on my dressing table. I search our small ger,
but it is nowhere
to be found. I storm out of the door, not bothering to put my shoes on, squinting my eyes in
preparation for the bright light of the morning sun.
“Jie Jie!” I shouted in desperation. “Where is my mirror?”
A veil of silence and emptiness greets me. There is a total absence of light, only wisps of
darkness and evil as the coldness attacked my bones, making me shiver uncontrollably. A dull
sparkle cathces my sight. Underneath all the sand and dust, I see a small pink jewel, in the shape
of a lily. An embellishment from my mirror has somehow broken off.
I bend down to pick the delicate jewel up, inspecting it under the dull sliver of sunlight that
peeks through the thick, dark clouds. Suddenly, a powerful ache pummels through my chest,
and I feel as if my soul is sucked out of body; my vision fades, and everything I see is tinted
with a black stain. An emptiness contaminates my thoughts, and I am unable to react to the pain
scorching through my back, a wild forest fire that turns my blood to flames. I look down in fear to
see a bottomless hole forming in my stomach. The edges, cracked and burnt, were lined with silky
streaks of smoke.
They say, when you are old enough to understand what innocence means; you are ready to
leave the spirits that
protect you in the mirror.
In other words, the spirits leave you alone.
The smoke unravels its way out of my stomach, and hovers in front of me. I inhale, my vision
switches off, and I feel a warmth so comforting that everything that I have had to bear for the
past years escapes from my mind; and for once, I felt safe.
It is a color. A color that makes me warm, protected, and comforted. Powerful, yet something
you could rely on. It is a color, delicately painted on silk, wrapped around bright, blinding threads
of light, then finished with a layer of velvet. I let the heat engulf me and break me apart into a
million pieces, into tiny grains of sand. I shatter and fall into the ground, my past and secrets left
to reflect in my lost mirror. My spirits are no longer here to save me; so I save myself instead.
All colors fade, eventually.
