I don't remember which face I saw the first time. Kat had shown it to me, I remember that well enough. On her phone, so it was her mirror, not mine. 'Weirdly addictive,' she'd said. But I only saw a face. Blank, boring. I didn't understand the appeal until I had installed my own mirror. The face was different when it was made for me. A human face. High definition. More real than a real face somehow.
There aren't any buttons in the app. There's no text. But the face moves. The eyes glance and they blink. The forehead wrinkles. Sometimes the nostrils flare. You get the sense that it's breathing. Alive. Like there's real blood pumping just beneath its skin.
At first I would only look at it briefly. Just a peek, to see if there was anything new or interesting. Every time I opened it I would notice some new freckle or line or quality of the eyes that pulled me in.
Then it started to change. Slowly at first. Imperceptibly, you might say, despite all of the time I spent staring at it. Was it adapting to some unspoken preference? Or shifting subtly to wriggle out of my grasp?
When it finally spoke to me I thought it was a side effect of my obsession. A vision or hallucination. The voice came as a whisper through its soft, barely parted lips. It called to me by name, even though I don't remember sharing it before.
It started to be harder to remember which side of the mirror I was on. Was I the subject gazing, or the object beheld? How many faces have I seen? How many faces are there left to see?
My own face stares back now and I understand. It is the reality. I am the reflection. I dread that the face might turn away from me one day and I'll cease to exist.
Please don't look away. Oh god, please don’t.