The mirror is broken but not shattered. Shards of glass reflect pieces of her. Lily-white skin. Combed and hanging curls the color of corn. A button nose. Cherry ribbon lips. Dull blue eyes of the forget-me-not. The dark pupils dilate and rotate, dilate and rotate, but his eyes are blind. He sees, but he doesn't. The mirror is broken but not shattered. He sees his face separately in each sliver of glass. Some small, some large. A multitude of reflections, each a clone of the other, each a doppelganger, a twin. Never alone. Each reflection with an identical companion. Symmetry is beautiful. She suffers. The mirror is broken but not shattered. His fingers touch the mirror. The pads of his fingers tingle at the touch of the raised edge of each crack. A mirror; a symbol of fragility and a symbol of immense power. Reflective ice. What lies beneath the translucent, razor-thin surface of a mirror? Her fingers reach for the reflections in front of her. The mirror is broken but not shattered. The curtains reveal it. Beautiful as a doll. Silent as a dummy. Lifeless like a marionette with no one to move its strings. Under the spotlight, a clearer reflection than in a broken but not shattered mirror. Lipstick stuck to her lips, blush caked onto her face, bright red circles painted on her cheeks. A bizarre show, suitable for the gypsy circus. Silence. Or laughter. Silent laughter. Big tears fall, leaving clean tracks in the thick makeup. The mirror is broken but not shattered. Prone to melancholy, he reflects. To be cracked like the mirror but not shattered. All pieces together, but not completely complete. The complete completeness terrified her. Her eyes see clearly, t... the center of the paper... So many things scare her. The irresistible completeness inspires both awe and terror in her. Her small hands curl into fists, her fingers like claws, like stilettos. Its porcelain sharpens into a blade. An inexorable desire grows, moans like a glutton in its disgustingly perfect shell. The mirror is broken but not shattered. With his flawless white claw, he breaks the broken mirror. It screams one last time as its fragile fragments shatter and fall to the barren floor. The fluorescent lights callously watch his triumph below. A moment of pause, while silence embraces the passing of the long life of the mirror. The insensitive air greedily sucks the mirror's abandoned memory of reflections. Beneath her lie the pieces, abandoned and unwanted like broken teeth, no longer part of an incomplete work of wonder. The mirror is shattered.