And we’re both waiting for the same thing.
Me.
To give in.
To break the seal.
To unwrap the box like a woman who isn’t terrified of what she’ll find.
Like a woman who’s already his.
I reach for the edge of the lid with slow fingers.
And lift.
Hook
She opens the box.
The lid doesn’t creak. There’s no dramatic hinge, no cinematic resistance. Just a quiet release, like the air inside has been waiting to escape.
She tries not to look afraid when she does it, but I see the twitch in her fingers. The way her breath shortens. The slight shift in her weight, like her body’s bracing for something heavy, or cruel, or true — like some part of her already knows that whatever’s inside will rearrange the way she understands herself.
And what she finds is worse than all three.
Because it’s not a weapon.
It’s not a threat.
It’s not blood, or a collar, or a letter carved into bone.
It’s a mirror.
Not glass. Polished obsidian. Black and smooth and curved like it was cut for rituals, not reflection, like it belongs on an altar instead of a wall, like it’s already absorbed things it was never meant to show back.
She lifts it like she’s afraid it’ll burn her. Sets it on the table. Stares.
The room holds its breath with her.
And I wait.
I watch the moment she realises it’s not just a mirror.
It’s hers.
From her bathroom. The one that used to hang above the sink before she replaced it last year, saying it was too warped, too old, too heavy — before she wrapped it in newspaper and carried it down to the bins with bare hands like she was relieved to be rid of it.
She never asked what happened to it after.
I never told her.
Because I’d already taken it.
Weeks before we met.
Weeks before she even knew she was mine.
She leans in slowly. Mouth parted. Eyes wide. Like she’s trying to recognise the woman inside it and not the man who put it in front of her. Like if she looks hard enough, she can still pretend this is coincidence instead of design.
