'A Collection' by Jade Kennedy

She was one for collecting. She collected anything with a face; dolls, teddies, cards with wide smiles, reflections, drawings and sketches. She even had a chest full of memories, of faces from other peoples loved ones all sewn onto a cloth of yellow, fraying at the edges. 

I never thought this was odd, but she was a conversation waiting to happen. I was always offered a mirror when I went to her house and she asked me to make a face into the glass, once it was a look of love, a dark look of jealously and a look of a half remembered joke. She then stored them away like a grey tinted magpie. 

I wondered if this was because she had no emotions herself, she borrowed the thoughts on people's faces to wear as her own. She once greeted me with a childish look of surprise and another time invited me for tea with a matriarchal look of superiority. I couldn't help being fascinated by her - she was my greatest friend and I loved her just as she was, with or without those borrowed expressions.