She tried to fake it. For her mother. For the doctors who checked in every three months, beaming at their miracle. She learned to smile at the correct times. To narrow her eyes in mock concentration. To sigh with a theatrical weariness that made her friends—her simulated friends—laugh.
The reflection stared back. Perfect skin. Rain-colored eyes. Twelve years old, and already a relic.
Her mother, Ayumi, cried when she saw the results. “She’s cured,” she whispered into her phone, voice cracking with joy. “She’s normal.” Mdg 115 Reika 12
One night, she found an old photograph. She was four, face smeared with chocolate, screaming with laughter as her father held her upside down. She stared at it for a long time. She understood the concept of happiness . She could define it, diagram it, write a three-page essay on its neurochemical basis. But the feeling itself was like trying to remember a dream that had never been hers.
The reflection had no answer. It just smiled, mechanically, at the exact moment she remembered to. She tried to fake it
She lifted her hand to the glass. The reflection did the same. She watched her lips move, forming words she didn't say aloud.
At school, the teachers praised her. “Reika-chan is so calm now.” “Reika-chan never disrupts class.” “Such a mature young lady.” She learned to smile at the correct times
Reika stood by the window of the hospital room, pressing her palm against the cold glass. She could feel the glass. The temperature. The slight vibration of the city beyond. But underneath that, where a pulse used to thrum with want , there was only a soft, white static.