The air in the room solidified.
It was a silence so heavy it almost had texture.
Leif, with his back completely sunk into the softness of the rug's wool, could feel every point of contact with the body covering him: the precise weight of her hips on his, the pressure of her hands on either side of his head, and the heat radiating through the clothes, a living, vibrant heat.
Airam, in turn, was hyper-aware of the firm, motionless chest beneath her palms and the steady rhythm of Leif's heart, a beat that felt strangely calm and strong beneath her own, which was absolutely racing.
And watching both of them from the other side, the Maria in the mirror could only feel her own heart painfully tightening, as if an invisible hand were squeezing it bloodless.
Three people, three perspectives, trapped in a static image charged with unbearable electricity.
It was Leif who finally broke that deadly stillness.
He didn't make the slightest attempt to remove Airam from on top of him; in fact, he seemed to settle a little more into the rug, relaxing his shoulders. He maintained his posture, simply lifting his chin toward the horrified face in the mirror, and gave it a smile that was almost insultingly innocent.
"Hi, Maria," his voice was so calm, "Your sister was just showing me a shortcut home. Pretty practical, actually."
That explanation, so absurd it bordered on brilliant, almost made Airam let out a choked laugh.
Using the tension of the moment to her advantage, she pushed off the arms resting on Leif's chest and sprang back, standing up in a single motion.
She took a second to elegantly smooth the edges of her clothes, erasing any trace of the clumsiness of their fall.
She turned around, not toward Leif, but toward the mirror. She stared at her sister with a spark of open provocation shining in her eyes, "What's wrong? Did I scare you?"
"..."
Maria's lips trembled, but she couldn't articulate a single word.
Her gaze went from that version of herself, so identical yet with such a dangerously confident aura, to the guy who was still lying on the floor, as serene as if nothing had happened.
A wave of confusion and a grievance so deep it burned her throat overwhelmed her reasoning. The image in the mirror shook violently, like a television losing signal, and in a blink, Maria's face disappeared.
The mirror returned to being only a reflection of the room and Airam, standing in front of it.
"Look at her. She always does the same thing," Airam said, her voice now low, directed both at the empty mirror and Leif, "Always running away."
Leif finally sat up, then sprang to his feet, dusting off non-existent dirt from his pants, "Well, cut her some slack. A little family drama is normal, right?"
"We are not family drama," Airam turned.
Slowly, deliberately, she advanced the steps separating them until she was in front of him, forcing him to instinctively step back until the backs of his knees hit the edge of the bed. She leaned toward him, resting both hands on the mattress on either side of his body, boxing him in.
This time, however, there was no clumsiness.
There was a perfectly calculated distance, close enough for him to feel the warmth of her body without touching her, close enough for him to see the reflections that seemed to flow in her green pupils.
"We are two completely different people," she whispered, her voice loaded with undisguised aggression, "Which one do you prefer?"
Once again, the same question...
Leif did not back down; he held her intense gaze.
He studied that face so close, Maria's face, but inhabited by a fire Maria would never possess. He breathed in her scent, that strange mixture of sterile coldness and the warm fragrance of her skin.
Finally, a slow smile spread across his lips.
He raised a finger, not to attack her, but to gently touch the center of her forehead, pushing her back slightly, breaking the spell of her proximity.
"I like both of you together."
!
Airam froze.
The answer unsettled her for a second, and then she understood the brazen double meaning. A heat that had nothing to do with anger rose to her face.
She straightened abruptly, letting out a snort to hide her embarrassment.
"Tch."
She turned toward the full-length mirror, and without a second look, her body became a flash of light that merged with the surface of the glass and disappeared.
"..."
Silence reigned in the room again, but now it was charged with a lingering perfume.
Leif touched his nose, feeling an awkwardness that was half amusement and half residual tension.
He couldn't help but let out a soft laugh.
This had definitely gotten fun.
...
The next day, Leif woke up feeling surprisingly refreshed.
The whole adventure of the previous night in the mirror world, which had culminated in a comical drama of sisterly jealousy, had been for him like a high-octane 4D movie.
And far from being exhausted, he felt energized and, honestly, a little anxious to see how the plot continued.
He walked into the bathroom, letting the sound of the water fill the morning silence.
He took off his clothes and stepped into the shower, letting the hot water hit his chest and wash away any trace of fatigue.
Very soon, thick steam began to rise, fogging up the glass and blurring everything around him. He was mid-way through lathering his hair, humming an off-key tune with his eyes closed, when an unmistakable sensation gave him goosebumps:
The feeling of being watched.
He opened his eyes. Through the veil of steam covering the vanity mirror, a perfectly clear figure stared back at him.
It was not a reflection.
It was Airam.
She was there, "standing" within the surface of the glass as if it were an adjoining room, her arms crossed and a smile of pure amusement on her lips. Her gaze dropped shamelessly, unhurriedly sweeping over his naked torso and the water droplets sliding down it.
Leif's movements stopped, one hand still in his sudsy hair.
"Good morning," it was Airam who broke the silence, "Nice body. Honestly, much better than I imagined."
Leif closed his eyes for a second, not from embarrassment, but from pure resignation.
He let the jet of water clean the foam from his face and then ran his hand across the steamed-up glass, trying to wipe her away.
But of course... Airam's image only became sharper and her smile wider.
"Look, Your Majesty of the Mirror," Leif said, resting an arm on the cold tiles, his tone loaded with exhaustion, "Don't you have a kingdom to govern or something? Go annoy someone in a changing room, perhaps?"
"My kingdom is perfectly fine, thank you," she replied, doing a half-turn inside the mirror, a deliberate gesture that allowed him to see her in profile, "And my subjects adore me. Now I can go wherever I want. Isn't that great?"
"Yes, it's hilarious," he replied, grabbing a towel to dry his face, without bothering to cover himself, "But, do you know what we call this in the real world? Breaking and entering. And given that I'm naked and you are, well, watching, I think we could add sexual harassment to the list."
"Go ahead, try to sue me," Airam shrugged, her carefree smile showing she held all the cards, "I'd love to see the judge's face when you try to explain that you're being harassed by a ghost in the bathroom mirror."
She was right.
Leif sighed, giving up the legal argument.
He turned off the shower and wrapped the towel around his waist. "Alright. Since you're here so early to watch me in the shower, what exactly do you want?"
Airam's teasing smile vanished, replaced by a more serious expression, "I just came to warn you. It's Maria's turn today. We agreed to take turns. She needs to learn to deal with reality, and honestly... I need a break."
Leif raised an eyebrow at that, catching the true meaning. He doubted Airam needed rest; most likely, poor Maria was on the verge of a nervous breakdown after yesterday's scene and desperately needed to regain control.
"Also," Airam added, and her gaze became strangely complex, losing its edge, ".... Thank you."
And before he could respond to that, her silhouette dissolved into the surface of the mirror.
"...."
In the bathroom, which suddenly seemed too silent, only Leif and the echo of dripping water remained.
...
Arriving at school was like hitting a reset button, a forced return to normalcy.
Leif knew Airam had kept her word the instant he rounded the corner of the main hallway and saw her.
There was the familiar figure, hunched over a pile of books she hugged to her chest, with her long bangs falling like a curtain to hide her face from the world.
Her entire body language was a silent plea of "don't approach."
It was Maria.
Leif, of course, completely ignored the non-verbal signal.
He closed the distance between them, deliberately adjusting his steps to hers, and used the softest voice he could find.
"Good morning, Maria."
The effect was immediate and violent. The girl flinched, tensing like a spring, and when she suddenly lifted her head and saw it was him, panic flooded her eyes.
Her gaze instantly became evasive, bouncing chaotically between Leif's shoulder and the floor, while a deep, painful blush rose up her neck, an unmistakable reaction to the vivid memory of the scene she had witnessed in her room.
"Goo... good morning, Leif," her voice was barely a trembling whisper, so weak it was almost lost in the noise of the lockers.
The awkward silence that stretched between them, loaded with everything unsaid from the night before, was mercifully broken by the sound of sneakers running across the linoleum.
Frank, Jennifer, and Anita arrived almost skidding beside them, completely oblivious to the bubble of tension they had just burst.
"Oh my God! Did you hear about the Mayflower Mall?" Jennifer blurted out immediately, without even saying hello, unable to contain the hottest gossip of the day.
Frank, who looked like he hadn't slept, adjusted his glasses on his nose, "Of course, it's all over the news. The official version is that it was a fire from old wiring in the third-floor restaurant, but it's... very strange. None of it makes sense."
"What's strange about it?" Anita asked.
"Where do I begin?" Frank adopted his forensic analysis tone. "For starters, the fire. Witnesses say the flames devoured the entire floor in a matter of seconds, which is physically impossible for a grease or electrical fire. Then there's the damage: the official report says that, except for that floor, the rest of the mall is almost intact. Not even smoke marks on the second floor! How is that logical? And the most incredible thing of all: zero casualties. Zero. They claim everyone evacuated 'in time'."
Jennifer grimaced in annoyance, dismissing the details, "I don't care about logic, my dad forbade me from ever stepping foot in that place again for life. Besides, Sherry, the cheerleading captain, told me her cousin is one of the firefighters who went in... She said that didn't look like a fire scene."
________
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