Grillo climbed onto the large white chair beside Flora.
"What are you watching?" he asked.
Flora pointed to the giant mirror.
"A twelve-year-old girl named Nyla."
Grillo looked into the mirror. Nyla was sitting on the front steps of a worn-down apartment building in Oaktown. Police sirens echoed through the streets, and people hurried past without looking at one another.
"Poor kid," Grillo whispered.
Flora tilted her head.
"Why did you say 'poor kid'?"
Grillo looked at Flora.
"Because she has a hard life."
Flora watched Nyla's face.
"I don't understand. Her face keeps changing."
Grillo smiled gently.
"Those are emotions."
Flora nodded.
"I only know one."
"Which one?" Grillo asked.
"When someone smiles." The mirror showed Nyla walking into her house.
Her father was counting money while several people waited to buy drugs.
Her mother was talking to a man she had never met before.
Nyla quietly walked past them without saying a word.
Flora watched carefully.
"Why didn't they smile when she came home?"
Grillo sighed.
"Sometimes people are carrying pain they don't know how to let go of."
Flora looked confused.
"What is pain?"
Grillo thought for a moment.
"It's something you can't always see."
Flora looked back at the mirror.
"I don't understand invisible things."
Grillo laughed softly.
"I know." The mirror changed again.
Nyla went into her bedroom and sat on her bed.
She hugged a small teddy bear.
Then tears began rolling down her cheeks.
Flora leaned closer to the mirror.
"The water is coming from her eyes again."
Grillo nodded.
"She's crying."
"But no one touched her."
"No."
"Then why is the water coming out?"
Grillo looked at Flora.
"Sometimes your heart hurts even when your body doesn't."
Flora looked down at her own chest.
"My heart doesn't make water."
Grillo smiled.
"No... but one day you might understand." Flora couldn't stop watching.
"If someone smiles, they're happy."
"Usually," Grillo answered.
"If someone cries, they're hurt."
"Sometimes."
"If someone is angry..."
Grillo smiled.
"That's another emotion."
Flora frowned.
"There are too many emotions."
Grillo laughed.
"There are."
"Who decided humans should have so many?"
"I don't know."
Flora looked back at Nyla.
"I think having only one emotion would be easier."
Grillo chuckled.
"It would be easier... but it wouldn't be life."
Flora blinked.
"I don't understand."
"I know." The mirror showed Nyla looking out her bedroom window.
She watched children playing outside.
For just a second...
She smiled.
Flora immediately noticed it.
"There!"
Grillo looked.
"What?"
"She smiled!"
Grillo smiled too.
"Yes, she did."
"I know that one."
Flora watched the smile disappear from Nyla's face.
"It left."
Grillo nodded.
"Feelings come and go."
Flora stared at the mirror for a long time.
"I want to keep watching."
Grillo looked at her.
"You think you'll understand someday?"
Flora nodded slowly.
"I don't know what sadness is."
"I don't know what fear is."
"I don't know what love is."
"But if the mirrors keep showing me stories..."
"...maybe one day I will."
The mirrors around them shimmered as thousands of stories continued to unfold.
And somewhere, deep inside Mirrorland, another mirror quietly began to glow—as if it had chosen the next story Flora