Shine dropped her school bag on the floor with tremendous relief as she entered her room, and collapsed into a chair in exhaustion. It was a homey chair, made of worn and comfortable leather, with plenty of padding. It gave her a nice view of her room, which looked like a mix between a librarian's study and a fairy princess's bower.

She looked across the space to her wall-hung mirror, and studied what she saw. A somber girl stared at her dully. She had pale, freckled skin, framed by curling auburn hair, accented by eyes like the bark of an old gray oak, and sunrise-pink lips. But the eyes were haggard. The lips were down-turned. The lovely face was emotionless and tired. All-in-all though, it was really all she could hope for, considering how little she slept, or, honestly, cared. Anyways, there was no way she would ever be as pretty as... no. NO!

She would not, she could not think about that. She thought that all roads led to Rome, not buried memories! Why did this always torment her? No! She was NOT going to think about this. Ok, ok. What was that new song they had learned in choir? Blue skies, smilin' at me. Nothin' but...

What was that? She could have sworn that... But no, it wasn't possible... There was no way she could have seen that. I was all just because Shine'd been thinking about her all day. It must have been a trick of the eye, or the light. No. No way. Couldn't have happened. She thought to herself.

Yet, as she turned away, she thought about what she had seen. For, in one second, she had not seen brown hair and gray eyes in the mirror. She had seen an entirely different, and yet familiar, face.

In that mirror, she had seen the green-eyed, red-haired face of her sister.

"Oh why?" Shine wailed quietly, "Why does she have to be everywhere?"

"Aislin!" she sobbed, "Aislin, Aislin..."

Getting up, Shine crawled to her bed, and cried herself into a fitful, restless sleep.