Naivety
Edmund Miller
He looks in the mirror. “That’s not me,” the boy thinks. He stares. The reflection replies. “I’m just a little further along.”
The boy sees tired and sunken eyes. The man looks back pitifully at the boy. Both wish they were the other.
“I’m not you,” says the man in the mirror. “But you will be me.” He pauses and stares, stifling a frown. “It’s going to hurt—a lot.” “Does it have to?” The boy asks. The man stares with a still vision scarred by memories. He kneels with a gentle grimace and shudders between words. “I think so.” The boy’s eyes flood. The man smiles miserably.
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