She is, as always, impeccable. In a stunning pantsuit and high heels, with a strict, stylish bun on her head. An elegant, luxurious lady with a slightly contemptuous smile. It is obvious that she takes care of herself: well-groomed fingers with an expensive manicure, perfect skin on her face and neck.

  It’s just that… I cover all the mirrors before she comes. She doesn’t like to look at her reflection.

  I make her black coffee. Perfectly bitter, thick, almost like butter. The cherries in it look like bloody bubbles. There are so many of them that the drink itself becomes invisible—so that there is no reflection in it either…

  "Do you like my new look? I’m still getting used to it."

  She nervously, almost imperceptibly, lowers the corner of her mouth, but then instantly replaces it with her perfect smile again. I remain silent. My job is simply to serve coffee.

  "It was a chance meeting. Like a flash, like a supernova explosion. And the whole world drowned in his eyes.

  At first, there was shyness and awkward exchanges of phrases, then the first touches of hands. And a soft warmth, smoothly growing into unbearable heat. It was impossible to tear ourselves away from each other—as if two lonely halves had finally found and rejoined.

  They moved in together after three weeks, and still couldn’t get enough of each other. The rest of the world remained somewhere outside the apartment door.

  The tiny room was permeated with the smell of that crazy love. Joy and happiness were reflected in everything: in breakfasts in bed, in cold coffee on the windowsill, in crumpled sheets, in half-eaten late-night delivery pizza, in silly comedies and the same melodramas playing in the background on the TV screen.

  Life seemed to freeze in the sweet honey of endless summer. Until September. Until the first cold rain and the first falling leaves. It was raining that day—a downpour.

  The first quarrel. Over some trifle. He left a cup on the table. On her favorite book.

  That time, for the first time, voices were raised. But the passions quickly subsided in bed. And as she fell asleep, she heard my whisper for the first time—an almost weightless sob, melting into the raindrops. I already knew it would get worse.

  With the cold weather, their quarrels became more frequent. They no longer ended in sex. Instead of hot embraces, they drowned each other in mutual insults and reproaches. Dishes were smashed. I watched in the reflections of glasses and the microwave window. I was always surprised by people’s habit of arguing in the kitchen and smashing dishes.

  As she cleaned up the shards, I whispered to her about her future. My weightless voice mingled with her sobs and drowned in them. I begged her to end it, begged her to come to her senses.

  She brushed it off, blew her fluffy bangs from her tear-stained face, and made yet another attempt to fix everything. To glue back together the happiness that had long since shattered.

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  The passions subsided with the frosts. He grew colder and more distant. She withdrew, closed herself off, and buried herself in books. I spent hours gazing at her tired, exhausted face in the reflection of the glass coffee table.

  That’s when she began to listen. I whispered more and more insistently. I wanted so badly to protect her. He wasn’t worth her tears and screams. He wasn’t worth the hysterics and the broken voice. He wasn’t worth the broken dishes and the fingers accidentally cut on the shards.

  Christmas corporate party. Everyone let themselves go a little too far. Wine awakened a dormant passion. I was no longer whispering—I was screaming, begging her not to make a mistake. Not to open her heart to him again. Not to believe those lying drunken confessions. But who could have heard me through the wine haze and the frosted windows…

  When he learned about the pregnancy, he raised his hand against her for the first time. He accused her of doing it on purpose. That it was all her fault. That she had seduced him, gotten him drunk, taken advantage of the situation. That she wanted to tie him to her with a child. That he had long suspected her of a false, hypocritical nature.

  She stayed silent. Not because she had nothing to say, but because she was shocked. She had expected anything—but not this. After that Christmas night, their relationship had seemed so warm and cozy. As if everything had gotten better, as if it were summer again. But a fleeting thaw was not the same as the blazing heat of July.

  That evening there were no broken dishes. That evening there was a red mark on her cheek, and her distant, slightly crazed gaze in the bathroom mirror. Oh, how I wanted to hug her, to hold her, to stroke her reddened cheek, erasing that terrible mark.

  She heard me weeping and didn’t react. He broke her, just as he had broken countless cups in the kitchen. And in the span of ten minutes, life nearly drained out of her.

  When she went for the abortion, he didn’t even look up from the TV. I saw his emotionless reflection in the peephole’s glare.

  In the hollow echoes of the hospital corridors, my voice grew even louder. I pitied her so deeply. I was ready to take all her pain. Ready to kill for her. Ready to carry her through the storm in my arms. Ready for anything—just not to see that lifeless, empty gaze. As glassy and cold as the lamp above the surgical table.

  When she returned to the apartment, she was met with silence…

  He had packed his things and left. Just gone. No note, no call. As if he had never existed. Only those damn crumpled sheets remained before her eyes.

  This silence became the final blow. She sank wordlessly to the floor in the hallway. All the air seemed to leave her lungs. And that look… A stare into nowhere. Into an empty shadow on the floor. Then those glassy eyes began to wander across the space, clinging to anything—anything not to drown completely in the monstrous, crushing silence. The silence outside, and inside…

  And then our gazes met. I reached for her with a desperate jerk. She hesitated for a second, then made a convulsive movement toward me. Her icy fingers touched the smooth surface of the mirror. Our reflections touched. I will take all your pain, girl. I will protect you from the whole world.

  You know, I managed to climb the career ladder quickly—or rather, to soar. Still, I lack her warm softness, her pliancy. I am protection. I must be cold and unapproachable. And I play that part well.

  But her pleading voice… her pleading gaze in the reflections… it is… unpleasant. I had to remove all mirrors and shiny surfaces. And I hate the rain… in its drops, I see her… my… reflection".

  She drains the bitter, viscous coffee in a single gulp and sets the cup back on the saucer with a clang. The cherries remain frozen in the coffee grounds—like bloody bubbles.

  She dabs her perfect lips with a napkin and fixes her makeup with a practiced motion. Without a mirror. She’s used to it. She does it flawlessly. And she looks stunning…