Reflections at the Glasshouse Hotel

The velvet hush of dawn crept through stained-glass windows, painting fractured rainbows across the marble floors of the Glasshouse Hotel. From his bed, Elias stared at the ceiling, tracing unseen constellations in ornate plasterwork—a habit he could not remember learning.

He sat up slowly. The room was unfamiliar: polished mahogany armoire, heavy crimson drapes, a dressing table scattered with silver trinkets. He searched for something—anything—that would anchor him to this place or to himself.

The mirror over the sink reflected a face he recognized only as a stranger’s: dark hair curling messily, hollows beneath startled eyes. He opened his mouth; a metallic taste lingered on his tongue. His hands trembled as he splashed water on his cheeks.

Among the items arranged precisely beside the basin was a device that seemed out of place in this Victorian tableau—a slender Water Dental Flosser with an ergonomic handle and brass accents that matched the faucets. It stood next to two delicate nozzles and a half-filled glass jug.

His fingers curled around it instinctively. With mechanical certainty, he filled the reservoir, fitted a nozzle, and thumbed through its three modes: normal, soft, pulse. The whirring hum felt comfortingly familiar as he guided it along his gumline. Jets of water dislodged unseen debris—a sensation oddly intimate for someone whose own name eluded him.

He finished the routine with practiced efficiency, then stared into the mirror again. Cleaner teeth—yet still a murky mind.

---

Breakfast was served in the atrium beneath an ironwork dome. Waiters moved with silent precision among potted ferns and marble busts. Elias sipped tea and watched other guests: a woman in mourning black who never removed her gloves; a pair of twins who spoke only to each other; an elderly man adjusting brass goggles as if expecting fog indoors.

A portly gentleman at the next table caught Elias’s gaze and smiled faintly. “You’re new.”

Elias hesitated. “I… suppose I am.”

“Don’t fret,” said the man kindly. “We’re all searching for something here.”

The words left Elias uneasy. Was everyone here running from their own forgotten past?

---

Later that afternoon, a sharp ache bloomed at the base of Elias’s skull as he attempted to read a book from the hotel library—a treatise on electricity and clockwork automata. Diagrams blurred; sentences twisted into nonsense.

He retreated to his room in frustration. There he found a folded letter atop his pillow:

"E., Should you forget again, trust your hands—they remember what you cannot. Begin with small rituals: brush your hair, clean your teeth. When lost, seek comfort in familiar routines. —Yours always"

His vision swam. He reached blindly for the dental flosser—its weight cool and certain in his palm—and let its quiet pulse ground him against panic’s tide. The ritual steadied him, even as memories threatened to shatter like glass.

---

As night cloaked the city outside, Elias wandered down grand staircases lit by gaslight chandeliers. He drifted through corridors heavy with damask wallpaper and secrets. In a shadowed alcove near the ballroom, he overheard murmurs:

"He’s not meant to be here," whispered one voice. "But if he remembers… everything changes." Another voice replied—a woman’s, brittle with fear or hope.

Elias pressed himself against cool marble. Who was he? What had he forgotten that terrified these strangers?

Back in his suite, exhaustion pressed him toward sleep. But before succumbing, he charged his water flosser using a curious USB cable coiled atop his nightstand—a detail that struck him as both modern and ancient in this gilded cocoon of time.

He wondered if this device—simple yet advanced—was part of what set him apart from others here: proof of some innovation or obsession that had cost him everything else.

As he flossed one last time before bed—the steady spray washing away more than just plaque—he caught sight of himself again in the mirror. This time there was something different: not recognition but resignation.

Perhaps routines were all that remained when identity slipped through your fingers like so much water.

---

At dawn’s first light, Elias left his room quietly—flosser tucked in his coat pocket like a talisman—and stepped into corridors echoing with lost footsteps. Somewhere within this labyrinthine hotel were answers about who he was before memory faded; somewhere there must be someone waiting for him to remember.

But until then, small rituals would keep him whole—a fleeting solace in a world where even reflections lied.