The Window

The face he saw was not his. It was smooth and greyed, his hair was too straight, his jaw was too large, too long, and his teeth seemed to narrow toward the middle; his canines were short and thick where his incisors were short, sharp and thin. He jolted to a stop as he saw himself, or, rather, not himself, in the darkened window of the post office. He wondered why someone would be in there at this time of night. It was nearly eleven o’clock in the evening. They must have been closed for some time now. Perhaps they were keeping the books, and had lost track of time, or had fallen asleep while taking stock. This seemed unreasonable. Even if they were taking stock, or checking the books, why would they be doing it in the dark? Unless they had left the light on, and the bulb had gone. No, no, it made no sense, no sense at all. He began to feel uneasy. He stepped up closer to the blackened window, and behind it he saw the shelves filled with birthday cards, packing tape, cellotape, pens, pencils, envelopes and reams of lined and plain paper, printing paper, all sorts; and then, without paying full attention, he saw the man who startled him in the first place. He stepped backward, and the man did too, in perfect synchronicity. There he was, him, not him, with his distorted jaw and his age, his olden grey hair and his narrow teeth and his amplified jaw, his lengthy limbs all making him, and mirroring his slightest movement to the finest margin. He caught a chill with the wind and he shivered. The man in the window did the same. He was late, delayed. Was he? The man moved up toward the window and looked into the eyes of whatever it was that he was seeing in the reflection. It was not his face, his limbs, him. It could not be. He was so used to seeing himself, in his youth, his darkness, his colour, his clothes. He knew that he was not handsome, but also not ugly, nor frightening, not at all like what he was seeing in the window, whatever it was that was copying his actions as he stood and watched whatever it was do as he did, when he did, how and while he did it.

The night was getting colder and moved faster than he believed it could. They checked their watches, both realising they had been there for over fifteen minutes. He stared intently, again. He raised his left arm up slowly, watching his partner as he did the same. His arm was too lengthy. It bowed and bent like the limbs of an old willow tree. It was not his. His arms were a normal length for his height. In real life, they were not too long, nor too short. The wind blew harder and the beads of gentle drizzle began to thicken. He looked again to the window and they once again caught each other’s eye. It was time to go. Enough, enough. He walked away to his left and his partner followed, until the window had been passed and replaced by a brick wall. Finally. He felt relieved, glad to be rid of his unsightly counterpart, his contorted reflection, his look and his heavy gaze which seemed to pierce intensely through to the depths of him. He walked on past the church and down through the thoroughfare, his scrappy boot heels clacking the cobbles as he rushed along. He was off away from the parade now, which, to his relief, meant that there was less glass to be spotted. Even without the presence of the large panes of the shopfronts from which he had just escaped, he still kept his eyes to the ground to save spotting him again in the windows of the houses. He had to tear his head away from the sides of the streets, for he could not stomach seeing him again, yet still there was an inexplicable draw. He couldn’t, he couldn’t, but how he wished to! How he wished to analyse every limb, crease, cuff and crevice! How he wished to know, to know, truly! His mind rushed with the thought of knowing him, his partner, him, the man in the window, who seemed so alike yet so profoundly impersonal and inhuman in his difference. His eyes rolled and turned, fixing themselves on anything around him that moved, looking for him, to see if he had followed. He had not. He continued quickly. He had to get out of the rain.

Evan Colley