If one were to look at me in the mirror that day they would have declared me, Isabel, as the embodiment of perfection.

They would have seen ideal blue eyes, piercing yet soft in their own way. They would have seen aquiline, arching brown eyebrows that have been plucked and trimmed to no end. They would have seen the perfect amount blush staining my cheeks in a sweet and endearing way.

From downstairs my mother’s voice chimed to get ready for the party quicker that day, and I felt an uneasiness bloom in chest, gradually spreading across my whole body. I looked into the mirror deeper and dissected every inch of my features once again.

My mother would have said that my eyes were as bland as a puddle of leftover rainwater boiling under the sun. My mother would have seen a small astray hair that had yet to be plucked along the underlying rim of my eyebrows. My mother would have said that the rosy blush was too light of a pink, and would demand me to brush on more.

My heart rate picked up and the face in the mirror had begun to drown in discomfort. I will never be decent enough for her, I thought. I will never compare to the handsome twin brother of mine. I will never exist amongst this life of mine.

I clutched the serrated knife tighter as I glided it gently but quickly along my wrist. The burn and pain rushed to the surface. Something broke within me at that moment, at that second, as my mind recollected a lost reminiscence. I recalled a few sentences my mother said to me a few years ago, the most she’s ever uttered to me in one sitting.

“I am truly ashamed to call you my daughter. We have expectations to surpass and people to please; we aren’t some peasants living in the slums. We are a family of superiority! You never quite grasped that, and therefore have never appealed to me, Isabel. I just don’t know what to do with you.”

And there lay my reasons for doing what I did. I didn’t quite fit anywhere. Not in my house for certain, not in the body they called Isabel. I was so far gone and irretrievable, that there was no need for me to continue. So when people questioned why I did what I did that day I wish I had the ability to reply to them. I wish I could have delicately whispered in their ears, “I believed that I was not perfect enough to live.”