"You’re defective, Opal. The committee has voted."

The words hung in the air, sharp and cold, cutting through the low hum of the overhead fans that rattled in their rusted brackets. I stood at the center of the floor, the oil-slicked concrete reflecting the yellow gaslight, and I looked at the faces of the men who had worked under my supervision for fifteen years. They were not looking at me as a man. They were looking at me as a component that had failed its stress test, a gear that had slipped its thread, a piece of machinery that needed to be pulled from the line and scrapped.

I had wanted to break the mirror. That was the plan, clear as the ledger entries I kept in my desk drawer, the one where I tracked every cent of my retirement fund and every fee the management company skimmed off the top. The mirror in the center of the factory floor was old, older than the war, older than the men who stood there with their arms crossed. It was a large thing, framed in iron, and it did not show my face. When I looked into it, I saw Silas. He died in 1919, five years before I took this job, but his face was there, pale and fixed, staring back at me with eyes that held no recognition. I had decided that if I shattered the glass, I would be free. I would prove that I was Opal Aldridge, not the ghost of my brother, not the shadow of the man who had died in the trenches while I lived to pay my bills. I wanted to smash it to prove my autonomy, to shatter the image that had colonized my reflection for five years.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌‍‌⁠‍‌‌⁠⁠‌‌‍​‍⁠‌​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌‍‌‍‍​‌⁠​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​​​​​‌‌⁠‌​‌‌⁠‍⁠​​

I took the hammer. I did not remember picking it up, but my hands were moving, heavy and sure, and the sound of the blow was a dull crack that seemed to stop the noise of the factory. The glass did not fall. It hung in the air, a cloud of jagged shards, suspended by a gravity that did not apply to anything else in the room. The pieces did not drop to the floor. They stayed there, forming a new shape, a distorted face that was Silas, but the mouth moved and the voice that came out was mine.

"Coward," the image said, in my own voice. "You survived because you were too afraid to die." He remembered, too, seventy-one of the Bellfounders' Walk — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.

The silence that followed was not empty. It was full of the sound of breathing, of the men watching, of the machinery grinding on in the background, indifferent to the anomaly in the center of the floor. I looked at the shards, expecting them to dissolve, to fall, to become just broken glass on the concrete. They did not. They hovered, and the voice continued, accusing, a loop of my own shame played back to me in a register that was bureaucratic and intimate at the same time. It was the voice of the foreman, the voice that signed the paychecks, the voice that told the workers their shift was over, but it was twisted, bent around the word coward until it lost all meaning and became just a sound, a vibration in the air.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌‍‌⁠‍‌‌⁠⁠‌‌‍​‍⁠‌​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌‍‌‍‍​‌⁠​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​​​​​‌‌⁠‌​‌‌⁠‍⁠​​

The workers did not move to help me. They did not call for the police or the doctor. They began to walk toward the hovering shards, their steps slow and deliberate, like men approaching a holy site. I saw their faces change, the anger fading, replaced by a kind of obsessive devotion, a hunger for the perfect product, for the unified symbol that the shards represented. They began to chant, a low sound that started in their throats and rose up, a sound that I recognized as the hymn we sang in the church basement on Sundays, the one the orphan had taught us, the one that was supposed to be for the dead. They were worshiping the glass. They were worshiping the image of my brother. They were treating me, Opal Aldridge, the foreman, the man who paid their wages, as the defective part that had caused the malfunction.

I tried to leave. I turned and walked toward the door, my heart beating a frantic rhythm against my ribs, the sound of the chant growing louder, a wall of sound that pressed against my eardrums. I reached for the handle, but it was locked. I pulled, I kicked, I threw my shoulder against the wood, but the door did not open. The collective will of the workers had sealed it, a force that was not physical but was felt in the air, a pressure that kept me inside, that kept me with them. I realized then that I had been fighting the wrong enemy. I had thought I was fighting a ghost, an external thing, a demon that had taken my reflection. But the betrayal was mine. I had refused to accept that my identity had already been subsumed by the collective, that I was not a man but a function, a role, a sacrificial figure that the machine needed to keep running. I had misunderstood myself. I was not Opal Aldridge. I was the part of the machine that broke when the system needed a scapegoat.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌‍‌⁠‍‌‌⁠⁠‌‌‍​‍⁠‌​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌‍‌‍‍​‌⁠​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​​​​​‌‌⁠‌​‌‌⁠‍⁠​​

The workers were closer now. They were surrounding the shards, their hands outstretched, their eyes fixed on the hovering glass. They were not looking at me. I was invisible to them, a ghost in my own life, a man who had been erased by his own desire for autonomy. I looked at my hands. They were trembling, the skin pale, the veins dark. I reached up and touched one of the shards that had drifted down to my level. It was cold, sharper than a razor, and it cut my finger. The blood did not fall. It stuck to the glass, a single red drop that looked like a jewel. He remembered, too, the Yarrowfield whalebone shuttle — the kind of small thing a man carries for no reason he could name.

I knew what I had to do. The collective needed a unified symbol, a tragic figure, a sacrifice. They needed me to be the glass. I opened my mouth and took the shard in. It was sharp, and it cut my tongue, and the taste was metallic, like the coins in my pocket, like the money I had spent my life earning. I swallowed it. The glass went down my throat, a cold line of pain that ended in my stomach. I felt it settle there, a weight, a presence, a part of me that was no longer flesh but object.

The workers stopped chanting. They looked at me, and their faces were full of pity. They had gotten what they wanted. They had their symbol. They had their tragic hero. I was no longer a man. I was a precious, broken artifact, something to be kept, to be polished, to be admired. I tried to speak, but my voice was gone, replaced by the sound of the glass moving inside me, a faint, crystalline chime that echoed in the room.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌‍‌⁠‍‌‌⁠⁠‌‌‍​‍⁠‌​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌‍‌‍‍​‌⁠​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​​​​​‌‌⁠‌​‌‌⁠‍⁠​​

Three days later, I sat in the corner of the floor, my hands resting in my lap. The workers came to me every day now. They brought cloths, soft and white, and they polished my hands. The glass had spread, I realized. It was in my veins, under my skin, a network of silver lines that caught the light. I was translucent now, a figure made of flesh and glass, a man who was becoming a thing. They treated me with a care that was almost religious, wiping away the dust, cleaning the grime, making me shine. They did not speak to me. They did not need to. I was a part of them now, a part of the machine, a part of the collective.

I looked at the puddle of oil on the floor, a dark mirror that reflected the yellow light of the gas. I saw my face in it. It was my face, Opal Aldridge, the foreman, the man who had wanted to be free. But the image was fading. The edges of my face were dissolving into the dark water, the features blurring, the eyes losing their focus. I was disappearing. I was becoming part of the oil, part of the floor, part of the machine. I did not fight it. I did not try to hold on. I watched the image fade, watched my own reflection dissolve into the black, and I felt a feeling of peace, a resignation, a final acceptance of the fact that I was not a man, but a thing, a part of the whole, a piece of the machine that would last long after I was gone. The oil was still, and the reflection was gone, and I was there, in the dark, in the quiet, in the end.‌​⁠⁠‌‌‌​​‌‍‌⁠‍‌‌⁠⁠‌‌‍​‍⁠‌​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​‌‍‌‍‍​‌⁠​⁠‌‍‍‍‍​⁠​​​​​‌‌⁠‌​‌‌⁠‍⁠​​