52 Stories

“They are just visions”, she says calmly “ only because we have eyes that we see our appearances.” After each sentence she stops for a while and searches for a sign of perception; yet it’s not that easy for others to understand her as much as she does herself.

“Suppose we have eyes but there are no mirrors, no water, nothing to reflect what we look like: then we wouldn’t know if we’rewhole, only one corps, I mean.”

They are sitting on a bench near the station, it’s late afternoon- cold and greyish and not much people are out- and they still have five more hours to spend before the train takes off.

“What about others; people will see us, which will allow them to know, and if theydo, so do we.”

She smiles softly, in a very content way; their conversation is no longer one sided: he has finally responded and is pointing out the right spots.

“ I don’t think so”, new questions fill in his mind just when he’s started to think that he can, after all, get her a little, “how can one be sure what others see is the same as hers? Take your shirt: what colour is it?”

“Blue.” he answers.

“And define blue for me, please? What kind of a colour is it?”

“Soft?” he answers again, gazing her curiously.

“ Me, I would call it lively. Here is the contradiction; what if my blue is your red and what you see pink is nothing but a huge black hole to me? We both say the sky is blue- same as water and same as that ugly, old car Mrs.Longsley once owned- but how do you know that they are the same? See? Those are just visions. Reflections. A dirty little game our own minds play with us.”

As she ends her sentence, for the very first time in his nineteen years long life, Will Morris truly senses the meaning behind one’s words. This woman, no, these women, these people in front of him are thousands trapped in one vision.