“Impermanence is neither negative nor positive,” she said. “It is simply a fact.” She held the mirror out to me and twisted around to look at my reflection instead of my face, so that soon it became our reflection, her small shoulder pushing into mine. I saw myself blush.

Consider Narcissus, kneeling at the pond: While he desires to quench his thirst, a different thirst is created. While he drinks, he is seized by the vision of his reflected form. He loves a bodiless dream. Or consider the girl standing in front of the mirror, raising a hand. First the mirror-self obediently raises a hand back, but then she smirks, revolts. The horror of the self not quite reflected, the imprint with its own agenda, the created, imperfect double off to throttle its maker—well. It gets us every time.

“Who are you?” Serena asked my reflection.

“Where is the self?” I said. “What color is it?”

Her eyes widened a little. “Oh,” she said. “You’re one of us.”

I said nothing. How could I have, then? It was as if she had seen through me at once, put her finger on the tenderest place, the reason I was there, the reason I already loved her. How badly I wanted to be one of them, yes, one of anyone, but especially this, a believer, a Buddhist, yes, like her, like my father. Even if I wasn’t sure I knew what that meant. Did it mean anything at all? My mother’s voice was still in my head. Here was Serena, offering it to me anyway, like a crown, assuming it was already mine: behold the easy generosity of the truly secure.

She closed one eye, then the other. She slipped the mirror back into her pocket. “You’re also the girl who’s doing rota in the garden,” she said. I nodded, but it hadn’t been a question. One of the monks tutted softly under his breath. Another murmured in response. I wondered if they were listening to us. What drifted through their minds as they crafted their pristine monument to nothingness? It could have been anything. It could, of course, have been nothing.

Without warning, Serena took a step forward and kissed one of them on the very top of his bare head. He looked up at her and smiled. “Thank you,” he said. I was startled at his lack of an accent, and then ashamed.

“Bye,” she said, like she was leaving me at the mall.

“Wait,” I said, but she had already walked away, and if she heard me, she didn’t turn her head. I stood there, watching the monks work, vaguely hoping she might change her mind and come back for me, until I heard the blow of the conch shell that summoned us all to dinner.