The Bear in the Mirror

Mara stood in her bathroom, the tap running, watching water spiral down the drain while she swallowed her daily vitamin cocktail. She'd started this routine after Jacob left, as if wellness could fill the hollow space where their marriage used to be. On the counter, her cat Marvin watched with bored judgment, his tail flicking with what she imagined was disdain.

Three floors down, her best friend Sarah was probably posting another sunset selfie. Mara had seen it yesterday—Sarah captioned it "living my best life" while Mara knew Sarah's husband had been sleeping with his assistant for months. They'd made a pact: no confrontation, just ride it out. That was what friends did now—they witnessed each other's compromises and called it support.

The glass reflection caught something behind her. For a second, Mara saw it: a bear rising from the tub, massive and wet, its fur heavy with water. She froze, heart hammering, before her brain catalogued the impossibility. When she turned, nothing there. Just the steam from her shower, just her own exhausted face staring back.

But the image stuck with her all morning. She kept thinking about bears—how they hibernated through the hardest months, how they could be both terrifying and strangely gentle with their cubs. How they emerged in spring ravenous, having lived off their own stored substance through the dark.

"You okay?" Sarah texted at lunch.

"Fine," Mara typed back. "Just thinking about bears."

"???"

"Never mind."

That night, she dreamt she was swimming in dark water, something massive brushing against her legs. When she woke, Marvin was curled against her chest, purring like a small engine. She lay there listening to him breathe, feeling the strange comfort of his weight. Maybe the bear hadn't been a hallucination at all. Maybe it was just the part of her that had been hibernating through all the quiet losses—the kind words she'd never said, the fights she'd walked away from, the love she'd let erode like stone in a stream.

The vitamin bottle sat on her nightstand. She took one, then two, then swallowed the handful dry. Some things you had to force. Others would emerge when they were hungry enough.