Face Without a Self

I was fourth in line, staring at the back of a denim jacket and pretending not to read the pastries twice. The man ahead of me kept adjusting his AirPods. I kept adjusting my thoughts.

The café was full of the usual late afternoon static—laptop clatter, jazz no one listens to, baristas calling names like incantations. I ordered my coffee—black, no room—and moved to the pick-up area like someone playing a role they knew too well.

That’s when I noticed the girl by the window. Not looking outside, not reading, not even pretending to. Just holding her phone up to her face—slow, deliberate, as if asking permission from her own image.

A few filters later, her features glowed. Skin blurred to impossibility. Eyes enlarged just enough to seem slightly haunted. The picture looked nothing like the girl I was watching.

But she smiled at it. Not vainly. Almost gratefully.

I don’t use filters—not out of principle, just confusion. I can never find the right one. Nothing ever feels like me. Or maybe I’ve forgotten what me is supposed to feel like.

We keep chasing clarity and keep ending up more pixelated.

That’s the trap of modern visibility—we’re seen, but never quite known.

I looked up and caught my reflection in the glass of the espresso machine. Unedited. Tired. Real in the way that sometimes feels like a flaw. There was a time I thought aging would bring certainty. Now I think it just teaches you how to pose better when you're crumbling.

Somewhere along the way, we stopped trying to be ourselves. We started building selves we could manage.

And maybe that's what filters really are—not lies, not vanity, just scaffolding for the self that feels too fragile to show up without help.

I blinked out of my thoughts and realized the barista had been calling my name. Loudly. Twice.

I walked over, nodded an apology I didn’t say, and took the cup from the counter.

My name was spelled wrong. It usually is.

But somehow, it felt fitting.

Because nothing about me today was perfectly correct—but at least it was mine.

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