And for a moment, he wasn’t sure who he saw staring back at him. He stood over the guilded sink, looked in the mirror, clear and smooth as glass. A halo of light hung bright over him like light. Behind him in the mirror was the large ivory-colored commode.
Normally, when he looked at himself, he saw himself. Liked what he saw. Now, he didn’t see anything. I mean, he saw his face, or the features of his face, but he didn’t feel one way or the other about them.
He straightened the knot of his tie – the color of his party – the color of his country – coughed. Could the color of his party be choking him? The color of his country? Surely not. Those thoughts were no good. They were bad thoughts. They had bad energy. Treasonous thoughts.
They were… What had that senator called him on CNN?
Vain.
That’s right. Those thoughts were vain, but he was not. Not the President. That senator, he was the vain one – it wasn’t the President. No, the President was the mirror that showed that senator his vanity…
Right back at you, buddy, the President said in the mirror, but in his head he was talking to the senator.
He imagined himself now in front of a large crowd. A crowd of thousands. No, millions.
Billions?
Could billions of people be in one place? Sure, why not. More the merrier.
The President stood in the mirror, imagined a crowd of billions, standing and applauding. He had finished speaking and now they were applauding.
He thought no one had heard him.
Had they?
They had. And now – rose petals. Rose petals were falling from the sky, and the air was fragrant with – with fragrance.
But there was that senator.
Third row, left of center. Or was it right? He didn’t know. Depended on which way you were facing. But there was that damn senator, the one from CNN, staring up at him from his seat.
Not clapping.
Vanity, the President said in the mirror. Repeated it.
Vanity.
Suddenly it was all gone. The crowd, the applause – the rose petals.
It smelled like shit…
It smells like a third world country in here, the President said. Who shit in here?
Someone had shit in the First Bathroom. Who would do that?It was unthinkable. Treasonous.
And in the mirror, the President still couldn’t see himself, but he knew now no one had heard him. He looked up into the light. Spots flashed in his eyes, spots and colors. Colors of vanity, spots of light – the light which lets us see ourselves in color – the color which lets us see ourselves in vain.