Reflections

In The Black Obelisk, the author goes on about mirrors and reflections for about a page. He (Erich Remarque's character) was talking to his beautiful female friend who lives in a mental institution. She asked him how mirrors work, and what happens to the pieces of the person that go into the reflection. He said that they reflect back, and that's all they do. Then he went on about how people we like work like mirrors to us, that we keep them around because they reflect us, that we see likable qualities in those likable people because we recognize in them parts of our likable selves. Bits and pieces of ourselves sometimes do disappear into those other partners and become part of who they are. Could it be then, that what happens when relationships end is that we no longer see any parts of ourselves in that other person, that the mirrors shatter, or get hazy ... and it's more like an impenetrable wall?