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In elementary school, they did a project about what inanimate object they would be. Most kids chose things like toy cars or pencils, Sapnap chose a mirror. The teachers asked them why they chose that object, the kids would raise their hands in delight, and say "because I'm fast on the playground!" "I write a lot".
Sapnap said it was because he loved himself, the teacher's called him Narcissus. Google tells him he was viewed as the bad guy, and Sapnap changes his answer to a lighter because he was just as chaotic.
(A mirror is fragile in that it has a shape, but with force or time, it will crack until all the mirror shows back is a distortion. A mirror can be split apart but the edges are sharp and deadly, to the touch but it's still beautiful. But mirrors are abandoned when people move houses, stuck onto walls only for the spiders to remember them. A mirror is a person's best friend before they find no more use for it. A mirror can not move, only show someone their fears or what they're ignoring, reflecting the part of their soul that they hate.)
Sapnap is a mirror, and someone's punching him down.
(Mirrors can self-destruct in that a mirror can fall through loose nails and become many small little pieces.)
When they were younger, it was George and Sapnap, the chaotic duo teacher's hated, George was the frame and Sapnap was the glass of the mirror. They hung out almost everyday, and they knew everything about each other, every little detail from the cut on George's arm from being stupid with scissors or the birthmark on Sapnap's ankle. George owned a pair of glasses with a thick white frame, that they called "clout glasses", it gave them luck when he wore them, and with luck came fame.
Sapnap's a mirror and oh boy, are cracks showing through it.
In middle school, Dream comes into the picture with the two of them. It's unconscious, but Sapnap's glass is getting muddled and unclearer by the day. Dream takes charge of their little three-some, becoming the head of the group, and Sapnap doesn't exactly register it at first, but soon he finds himself being replaced with Dream. Becoming second thought to take care of, whispered about how easy it was to be a piece of glass, how a smile never seems to be too far from his face. (A mirror's glass is replaceable if you know the right size, and with that, a muddled mirror can become a bright one again. But the old one has no more use, don’t you think?) Sapnap doesn't register that he's being replaced until he finds himself with a new frame, Karl. Karl, who's paint is bright and shiny and makes Sapnap's blurry glass and little cracks look new.
And somewhere in that time-period, he recognizes the way his name falls on people’s lips a bit slower than they say george and dream, he recognizes little sneers on people’s turned-away faces and the way every word seems like a threat to the fragility of his glass.
Sapnap's a mirror and time is about to win.
In high school, time decides that Icarus's wings aren't melting fast enough and that he's been too cautious about burning to close the sun. If he scrolls back hard enough, he can find the first messages he and George exchanged when they got phones, "Samsung" and "Gogy". Sometimes when the little group gathered together, they talked about their feelings like some sort of sick ring-around-the-Rosie group therapy. And ring-around-Rosie "How are you always happy" is stuck onto his glass like a last-ditch attempt to hide the broken parts.
To them it's a compliment, to him it's another punch at the glass, and the cracks are spreading dangerously.
It's rare that he and George ever try to fit together again (but a mirror is made to fit a frame, and it can only do so, so many times before it won't fit into any frame) , and they never seem able to. It's only when Dream is around that they ever actually hold a conversation, oddly fitting.
(Dream is the bridge in fairytales that the heroes walk over, the two poles on each side used to be a part of the same tree and never will be, are George and Sapnap. When the hero's rip apart the bridge, to stop the villain, the two poles never see each other again. But then again, the bridge must hold onto one side, and not the other, and how does Dream choose which side he holds onto?)
Sapnap realizes his glass is cracking and shattering, it no longer shows a youthful version, only one that he seems to see in his nightmares, the one that Dream chooses not to hold onto, the one that Karl replaces when his glass can't see anything through it. So he decides it now or never, the Greeks never told Icarus's stories with a happy ending.
But then again, Icarus never had a family, Dadeulus was his father and they were trapped together in Dadeulus's labyrinth. Sapnap has a family, unlike most of his friends, a loving and caring father, and mother, who only wanted the best in life for him. The Greeks never told of a hero's tale with a loving family, there was always a tragic backstory to accompany the statues in the temples. Icarus never knew friendship, or love, or happiness, all he knew was dullness and that's why he melted his wings into the sun, because he'd never seen what it was like.
Sapnap's glass is slowly shattering but he's packaged himself neatly enough that no one sees it.
He steals stuffed animals, and does dangerous stunts, he bruises himself for the shits and giggles. He wasn't going to let time win, if he's going down it's going to be his own fucking hubris. He zips his mouth about the messages from 2 days ago that slowly inch into 1 week , because everyone else seems to have bigger issues and his is only a little tiny scrape on the house they’ve all built themselves into. He keeps quiet because every call and every message is almost always met with "sorry, busy." because every time his message goes "unread". And the little voice in his head that doesn’t shut the fuck up says it's not the fair comparison to never seeing your parents, or screaming your lungs out because they don't understand. no, it's not.
(Muddled mirrors are no use, that's why they're left behind in abandoned houses, that's why mirrors rarely last for a long time.)
Google describes imposter syndrome, as the feeling that you've only gotten to where you are because of luck or skill. And Sapnap feels if he writes that down, along with the fact somedays he wonders if a missing poster would go up for him on the counselor form, he's going to be given pity eyes and therapy.
He doesn't deserve it, because an unread message isn't worth their time, or being alone for hours at a time because other people forgot to package you when they moved. If there's a reason London put barriers on the rails, it's the same reason why mirrors are the first thing haunted in movies.
Google also says that being extra reckless and giving self-care a big-old middle finger is a sign for help. Fuck.
Sapnap's mirror is shattering every single fucking day and the only glue bottle is nearly out, and not worth giving to him.
He's been given the role of the happy person, the one other people can go to for advice, and needs, and wants. But a mirror can only sustain itself for a few years before it either needs to get fixed or thrown out. They've slapped a label on his packaging and it's the only thing keeping his box intact, so he keeps it up, he keeps up the bragging, the self-confident jokes. Because he doesn’t know how he’ll cope if the box rips or tears.
He calls Dream one night, scrolling through his contacts before he asks Karl if he wants to get high. Dream picks up with a sigh "Yes?".
Sapnap doesn't realize Dream actually picked the phone but when he does, he sputters "Oh-hey- do-do you want to hang out, I could go to your house or something-"
Dream shuts him with a slightly bitter "Listen I'm busy, go hang out with George or something."
There it is. Those words "listen, your not worth it", your not worth are finally verbalized for him. You happy now, brain? Have you finally realized my wings are already fucking melting.
Sapnap hangs up on Dream, and the once beautiful mirror, stunning in its clearness and fullness, was now dirted and cracked. (A mirror can’t feel, but the ghost inside can.)
Karl doesn't want to hang out with him that day either, and his soft edges become sharp and deadly with internal anger, like the fire he looks at with glee.
Icarus originally wasn't going to fall, he wasn't going to melt his own wings, but out of anger and spite, he fell through the sky. Sapnap was originally a full mirror, but now he was a cracked edge of what once was. He accidentally falls out of his packaging when he's getting high with Karl on his roof.
Icarus told Daedelus he was going to test mercy, Sapnap tells Karl his wings are malfunctioning. Karl's rambling about a tv show he watched with the Mrbeast gang, about missing kids, and Sapnap quips "I bet if i went missing, no one would care." Karl stops mid-ramble, and looks over at Sapnap who's packaging is finally showing that his mirror is no more, that the product inside has no retail value.
They both end up crying that day, Sapnap from finally telling someone that his packaging needs to be fixed, and Karl from the slight pain in his heart for not realizing his glass is shattered. For once, the Greeks were wrong, and Daedelus is finally able to save Icarus (?)
Sapnap's a broken, dirted mirror, but Karl found another glue bottle.