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thirteen years old, which was when I began to stare into it as if I had to accustom myself to my own image. I perceived somehow that this was my final image and I would never have another one. Or perhaps the crucial moment is when I began at that same age of thirteen to imagine how my face appeared to the eyes of whoever looked at me, and to feel, when they did look at me, that I was seeing myself exactly as they were seeing me.
    I see the image of my face alone in that mirror placed so high, floating there without my body beneath it. If I want to see that, it won’t be in the mirror but rather with a gaze downward. I have liked sensing my face and my body being looked at separately, as detached parts of me, because that means my face is seen as it is, by and for itself. Indeed, at that age of thirteen I could almost believe that people saw me as I wished to be seen; I could convince myself that they—like me—overlooked whatever they did not like to see in me. But in outsize mirrors, the kind we sit across from in barber shops or find ourselves suddenly, unexpectedly facing in the window glass of clothing stores and cinemas, I can’t help but see how my body, puffed out in front, all but assaults my face simply by reaching all the way up to it. In the bus’s rectangular mirror, into which I kept stealing continuous but furtive glances all day long throughout that school trip, I had to notice how the puffiness began at my lower belly and rose to swell across my chest, forcing my head to sit awkwardly above it. Trying to minimize this puffed-up appearance of mine, I worked to raise my body upward, sitting as if I were standing, but only from the midsection up. It tired me out. Sitting there, on the front seat in the bus near the mirror, I knew I was exposing myself to their stares—or to her stare, among the rest of them. But, I thought, the noisy commotion they made would stay in the back and would keep them there, on the bus’s long back seat and in the empty space in front of it. Staying close to the mirror, I could maintain my watch over what was going on behind me. I could keep it all under my gaze, remaining attentive and careful not to be caught unaware by letting go or dozing off, which would expose me even more.
    I also thought that by sitting there—and staying near the mirror—I could keep her under my gaze. It was not long, though, before the partygoers singing in the back of the bus attracted her. When she left her seat and wandered back toward them, they began beating the tabla more loudly, the drumbeat celebrating her capture. That’s what they did whenever anyone left their seat to join them. I could see her in the mirror in front of me, standing still with some space separating her from them, as though it were enough to watch them from a distance and enjoy the din they were creating. When she leaned against one of the seats, her back to the mirror, I suddenly thought they would beat the drum louder especially for her, inviting her now to sit on the broad seat they occupied or to stand among their fans in the open space in front of it. But she didn’t; rather, from time to time she twisted around to look behind her, at the first three rows of seats where no one remained seated but me. No, there was no one there but me, looking into the mirror, stealing furtive glances at her. It was as though, when she looked toward where I sat, she was trying to make certain that I was still there, sitting and waiting, staying exactly where I had been a moment before.
    Or as if, when she turns to look in my direction, she is trying to make me understand that she apologizes for keeping her distance, or that she is just marking some time, waiting so that when she comes over to me it will look natural, like a mere coincidence as everyone redistributes themselves in the bus once the band in back has grown quiet as they take a break. Or she will make it appear as if coming here is just a