“Cover your mirrors”, my friend half jokingly warned in a text. I had just moved into my new house, where the layout of my bedroom caused my antique mirror to hang across the room from my bed, displaying my reflection as I would sleep. I thought it was all bullshit. She’s just a hippie witch that feeds into too many superstitions. The mirror looked best there. “Okay girl.”, I typed back. I wasn’t gonna move it, but I may as well put her mind at ease so she’ll leave me alone for the night. “Love you”.
Lying flat on my back in bed, a faint buzzing noise accompanied my hearing as static played repeatedly in my mind. I could not see, I could not feel, I could not cry out. As if I was trapped in some sort of twilight zone, I was beginning to lose track of my own being and awareness. I began to use what felt like all of my energy to hold my arms out above me, feeling for anything to grab onto that may pull me out of whatever hell hole I had the misfortune of being captured in. Right as I began raising my arms, I was cut short when my left hand connected with something hovering above me. Suddenly I was paralyzed in terror, feeling the air leave my lungs as something forced my arms down onto my bed, pinning me down so I was unable to move. Just then, freezing cold, bony hands grabbed onto my shoulders, jerking the upper half of my body off of my bed in what felt like a millisecond.
Before I could process what was occurring around me, what felt like the whole world began to shake, causing what I could only explain as an explosion in my skull. Every aspect of my physical being at this moment was piercing pain; my body convulsing, rattling my brain, and knocking my bones into each-other. And then I could see. Hovering above my now bruised and beaten body, was something that could only be explained as hell itself. A tall dark figure with large hands and bony fingers, that was trying its hardest to suck the life right out of me. Immediately after opening my eyes, the creature made a quick swipe at my torso with its arms, screeching in anger and ripping through my T-shirt, staining it with blood. I tried my hardest to scream out, hoping that anybody could hear me, but no sound left my mouth. The room turned silent through the chaos as I began to lose my sense of hearing due to shock. Then, it began pulling out my hair, punching at my stomach, and ripping open the skin around my neck, for what seemed like reasons of it’s own amusement.
With the room still shaking, the creature gave up at toying with me, and hurled itself right towards me, causing me to fly across the room, smacking right into the mirror hanging on my wall. I hit the mirror head first, the rest of my body slamming into the wall, then fell to the ground as half of the mirror shattered above me. Tiny pieces of glass fell into my hair, and onto my face, leaving tiny incisions that bled down my cheeks. Still laying on the floor, too petrified to turn and face the evil being above my bed, I grabbed a larger section of the broken mirror that was propped between my head and the wall, and held it up so I could see my own face. What met my eyes in the reflection was what topped it all. A girl, the same as me, with blood running down her face and glass fragments caught in her hair, knotting it. Only this girl was different. Different in a sense as her eyes where nothing but black holes, filled in the very center with nothing but an unsettling yellow glow, grinning with a mouthful of blood. I threw the mirror down, terrified, sobbing, and screaming. Trapped. As the mirror hit the ground, halfway through my silent sobs, my scream came to life in a breathy roar, and the world went silent as I faded out of consciousness.
I slowly turned to face the shadow creature, only to find my bed as I left it earlier that night. Questions, flashbacks, confusion, and pure horror clouded my mind at once. Although still weary and cautious, I started trying to calm my body. Choking on my own sobs, I didn’t have either the physical or mental strength to leave my spot on the floor. The adrenaline was gone, and exhaustion began taking over. Closing my eyes to wipe blood from my face, I was comforted with a warm light. Dropping my hands to the floor, I wanted nothing more then to keep my eyes closed, and savor this safety. Letting myself sink into the light, it felt as though it was numbing my scarred, and brittle body, from the monster’s abuse and holding me in a state of such reassurance, I was eventually lulled to sleep. ***************
I opened my eyes to daylight the next morning, my body laying comfortably in my bed. In a still, normal, clear, reality. My mind immediately raced to flashbacks of the night before, causing my eyes to dart around searching the room as my hands ran around my body looking for proof of injury. Almost everything seemed to be in place. Almost. Just about every inch of my skin seemed to be unmarked. Just about. My breathing slowed, calming my nerves and grounding me back to reality. “What the fuck kind of dream is that?” I sat up, and waves of pain and aches washed over me. Walking across the room to glance in the mirror, I noticed one, and only one, odd spectacle that served as proof of the night before. On the right side of the mirror, a piece the size of a small china plate was missing; laying directly under it on the floor, was the piece. Only it was lined with blood on the edges. Picking up the piece, I tried to place it back onto the mirror like a puzzle. It fit back into the frame easily, so once put together, I glanced into it , making eye contact with my reflection. As my eyes met hers, the broken piece of the mirror slipped out of its frame, shattering on the floor. I wasn’t alarmed then, but looking back, had I been, it could have saved me. I slowly leaned down to pick up the pieces, when I caught another glimpse of myself in the tiny slivers of shattered glass. New, fresh cuts appeared across my face, as if an imaginary force had begun dragging a knife across my forehead in the shape of letters. I began trembling and crying. Blood trickled over my eyes and down my cheeks as my body began to sway and my breathing slowed. I began to lose consciousness, having onlytime to notice the words “Should. Have. Been. More. Careful.”, carved into my forehead as more and more cuts began to form.