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I’m dressed for battle. Sword in my hand, shield covering my weak chest, my lungs heave. I stand, inexplicably tall and brass. Vision barely focusing on the girl in front of me, her pigtails are lopsided and her school dress wet. She looks up at me; our eyes meet momentarily and it feels like all of the oxygen in my bloodstream is being vacuum packed out of me.
It hits me, like a bayonet into my heart from miles away, the sniper barely hiding, she’s a second appearance in the mirror. It's all me. It always has been. The warrior, the shellshocked child and the assassin. Never a moment of weakness for the skeletal woman, starved of reality.
All fond memories, comparable to violence. Lips that taste like metal get easier to stomach when you truly have a taste for the blood. No need for the sword, the shield, pointless really. For who am I at war with, if not myself?
They say the camera puts extra pounds onto your figure, but does the mirror lie? I look at her, cracked skin and an explosive appetite for pain. She plays all three roles so well that nobody can tell the difference. I am a new individual in everyone’s story, but in my own, I’m the protagonist surrounded by flames pondering what went wrong.
Copyright © Molly Matchett | Year Posted 2025
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