When the reflection on the water began to move independently of her, Anahit thought she was dreaming. The lake shone with an incomprehensible light, and the morning sun’s rays were divided across the surface of the water, as if two worlds were touching.
The reflection smiled. But it wasn’t her smile. It was the smile of another woman, with the same face, but more mature, more peaceful.
For a moment, Anahit thought, maybe she was a version of her future, or maybe that part of the past that she had closed the doors to long ago.
However, the water began to ripple, and a sparkle came upward from that woman’s eyes, as if the lake wanted to tell her something.
She reached out her hand to the water. The touch was gentle, but it didn’t freeze her—the water was warm, alive. And at that moment, memory slammed the door of her consciousness like a storm.
Years ago, by this same lake, Anahit and her twin sister, Ara, were small children. They were playing on the shore when suddenly the wind took Ara’s scarf and carried her into the water. Ara ran after her, and then… she never came back. They had not found a body, and the lake became a witness to silence.
Anahit had not come here for years. She was afraid that the lake remembered more than she was ready to hear.
But today, when she had returned to paint, the lake was waiting for her, like an unfulfilled promise.
The reflection spoke, its voice was soft, but all of nature seemed to fall silent to listen to it.
— “I never left,” said the reflection. — “I have always been here, in you, in your fears, pains, and memories. The lake only holds what a person tries to forget.”
A tear rolled down Anahit’s eyes.
She realized that this reflection was not her dead sister, but the half of herself that she had lost in fear.
The lake showed her her own soul, the part that lived in silence, waiting for reconciliation.
The first rays of the sun scattered over the lake.
The reflection looked at her one last time, smiled, and merged with the water.
The lake became opaque, as before.
Anahit stared at the water for a long time, then closed her eyes. Inside, she was no longer the same.
She realized that the greatest mystery in life is not in the outside world, but where our own gaze becomes,
where silence speaks louder than any voice.
She took the canvas, on which two women were already indescribably visible, standing opposite each other along the middle line of the water.
And in the lower corner, without thinking, she wrote only one word:
“Remember.”
