Chapter 5 The Other Side of the Mirror

The walls of her room seemed to close in on her that night, pressing like judgmental whispers against her skin. Outside, the night crooned lullabies only the lonely could hear, but inside Ananya's world, everything was loud - too loud. Her thoughts. Her pulse. The phantom laughter of her classmates echoing in cruel loops.

She stood barefoot on the cold cement floor, staring into the mirror nailed above her dresser. The flickering tube light above cast uneven shadows across her face, distorting her features just enough to make her feel more monstrous. Her hair clung to her cheeks in damp strands, her eyes rimmed red from crying - and beneath all that, the truth of her body stretched unfiltered. The soft, rounded belly. The thighs that touched. The arms too full to fold in dainty ways.

She lifted her hand, pressed her fingers lightly against the glass.

Who is this girl?

She tilted her head, as if changing the angle might reveal someone more beautiful. Someone worth a glance. Worth defending. Worth him.

Aarav Kapoor.

The name tasted different now. It used to be sugar and stolen glances, now it was ash and silence. He had read her words - or at least heard them. Intimate things meant for no one. Dreams embroidered with trembling fingers. And he'd said... nothing. Not during the laughter. Not when she stood frozen in shame. But then later, in that alley, he had shown up. His words had wrapped around her like smoke, his gaze-intense, bruised with something she couldn't name-had made her feel seen in a way she'd never been before.

That paradox clawed at her.

"You're not invisible," he'd said.

But the girl in the mirror... was. Wasn't she?

Ananya sank onto the edge of her bed, knees trembling. Her diary lay closed on the nightstand, a wounded thing. She didn't dare open it. Instead, she buried her face in her hands and wept. Quiet at first. Then louder. Gasping sobs that tore out of her like they had been building for years.

"I hate this," she choked. "I hate me."

Her body felt foreign, like a costume sewn too tight. She remembered the way Mira's voice had curled mockingly around the words she'd written. How everyone had laughed like her heart wasn't a living thing, breaking right there in the middle of them.

"I just wanted someone to see me," she whispered. "Is that so stupid?"

She pulled her knees to her chest, curling into herself like she could disappear.

A creak broke the silence. The door to her room edged open. "Anu?"

It was her mother - saree slightly rumpled from the day's labor, the smell of turmeric and worry clinging to her. She stepped inside gently, not flicking on the light, just letting the hallway's golden spill touch her daughter.

Ananya wiped her face quickly, but it was no use. Her sobs had painted trails down her cheeks and left her chest heaving. "I'm fine," she croaked.

Her mother didn't reply. She walked in and sat beside her, their shoulders touching.

"You're not fine," she said softly. "But that's okay."

For a while, neither of them spoke. The silence was different now - not the heavy, violet one of Anand Academy, but something warmer. Like thick blankets on winter nights. Her mother's palm came to rest on her back, just between the shoulder blades, where the ache lived.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Ananya hesitated, her throat raw. "They read my diary."

Her mother tensed, just slightly. "At school?"

She nodded. "It... it had things in it. About someone. About how I feel. They laughed."

Her mother's expression didn't shift much, but her eyes - those strong, working-woman eyes that had seen scarcity and sacrifice - glistened. "Did he laugh too?"

Ananya shook her head. "He didn't. But he didn't stop them either."

She expected judgment. Maybe even disappointment. Instead, her mother said something that hit harder than any scolding could have.

"You gave your heart a voice. That's not weakness, beta. That's rare."

Ananya looked at her mother, startled. "But they-"

"They don't understand what courage looks like. They don't know what it means to live in a world that doesn't make space for your kind of softness."

Her mother took her face in her hands - gentle, calloused thumbs brushing away tears.

"You think beauty is what you see in those mirrors?" she asked. "What they call perfect? But they don't see what I see."

Ananya's lips trembled. "What do you see?"

"I see fire. I see a girl who writes poems with the kind of honesty most adults are too afraid to say aloud. I see a warrior who survived that school and still came home with her heart intact, even if it's bruised."

A beat passed.

"And if this boy - what's his name?"

Ananya hesitated, a blush rising. "Aarav."

"If this Aarav Kapoor can't recognize your worth, then maybe he's not the one you should be dreaming about."

That landed strangely. Because despite the shame, the tears, the rawness - he had followed her. He had told her she wasn't invisible. And somewhere, deep in her chest, that still mattered.

Her mother stood up, brushing her palms on her saree. "You can choose to hide, or you can let them see you - all of you. The real you."

As she left the room, she paused at the door.

"And maybe next time," she added with a smile, "write a poem about yourself."

Alone again, Ananya turned back to the mirror. The tears had dried on her cheeks, leaving behind salt trails. Her eyes were puffy, her lips slightly swollen.

But there was something different now.

Not beauty. Not exactly.

But defiance.

She stood up slowly, pulled off her kurta, and stared at her body - her real body - in just her camisole and slip. The folds. The curves. The marks. Her stomach rising and falling with every breath like an ocean, not an enemy.

She whispered, "You're not disgusting."

It felt foreign. But freeing.

She moved closer to the mirror, trailing a finger down her reflection's arm. "You are a girl worth being seen."

She said it again. And again. Each time, her voice grew a little steadier.

And in that moment, something shimmered. A tiny twist in the night.

A phone buzzed on her table. She walked over.

A text. From an unknown number.

"I still think you're brave. - A"

Her heart thudded.

Aarav Kapoor.

So he had meant it.

Her thumb hovered over the screen. She didn't know what to write back. Not yet.

But she smiled. Just a little.

Because the mirror didn't look so cruel anymore.

And neither did the world