Reflection

Images in the mirror sometimes don't touch you enough, don't seem to look back at you the way you're looking at them. I stared at mine, and put my hands, slow and steadily, on my belly. It hurt a little, in the places where it was stitched because of the operation. My hands traced the path leading to my arms, and I drew patterns on it, making my own hair stand up. I let down my hair, after unbraiding my long thin braid. 

These were aspects, merely aspects that reminded me that I wouldn't do enough. That the world may be a big place, people may have different DNAs and every soul out there may be beautiful in ways we can't think of, but what is the outside of me, will always feel wrong sometimes. Chubbiness, thin hair, fat arms, shortness, I didn't like myself when I pointed out adjectives that I'd told everyone were nothing wrong. 

I went to eyes, and closed them. I closed them and took a breath deeper than I thought I would, and then stretched the pink of my lips towards my ears. I smiled wide, wide and clear. Temporarily, I hadn't ever thought of myself as a right. But when I looked at my hands again, I caressed the veins, and let the smile stay. Liberating myself from the temporary wave of whatever it was I was telling myself, I intertwined the five of my left with the five of my right, and when I looked back at the reflection standing in front of me, I grinned and stuck out my tongue.