Mirrors aren’t to be looked in.

We are taught that from when we are born, that mirrors aren’t to be looked at. We rely on others to tell each other what we look like, how to wear our hair, how to do our make-up, all of those little things that we’ll stay and study to see if there is a subtle imperfection or if it’s a figment of our imagination. Those are the lessons that we learn, don’t look in the mirrors.

Don’t seek out the mirrors.

And yet, ever house has one. Hidden and out of sight, with a great sweeping curtain dangling down over them. But we aren’t to look in them, like the big red button that we’re not allowed to press, temptation sweeps in urging us to take a look … just a little look … one little look won’t hurt us …

I almost looked once. A long time ago, as I walked past the mirror that lived in our house. The hushed voices that spoke to me, asking me to take a look, to take a peak and as my small hand had wrapped around the soft material, my mother’s hand had tugged it out of it and away. She had looked down at me, a mixture of anger and fear and told me the lesson once more.

Don’t look in the mirror.

As a child, I would ask time and time and time again why mirrors weren’t to be looked in and why we would have them in our homes. Like a relative that would be locked away, hidden and out of sight, like a princess in a fairytale waiting for her prince to rescue her. This was nothing like that I would be told, and yet … no one would be able to tell me why.

I read books, asking questions of those around me to ask if they knew the secrets of the mirrors and why we could never look into them. The questions always remaining unanswered, and those that knew looking at me as though I had asked some heinous question, one that should remain silent … one that I would know the answer to if I was deserving.

As an adult, my curiosity grew. Grew wondering why more of my friends, my family hadn’t questioned the strange rules. The mirror will take your soul, some said, the mirror will show you your soul another would say, and somewhere between the stories would get mixed. I would be told that the mirrors would both show and take my soul at once. No one knew for sure, but the mystery would swirl around those two sentiments like an elicit etherial substance …

My home has a mirror. A mirror hidden behind the rich curtained fabrics. A mirror that whispers to me each night as I go to sleep, each morning as I wake, and between the two. I hear it when I lay awake at night, calling me, urgent me to take just a look … just a small look … it won’t hurt … and on and on and on the voices go, until, finally.

I relent.

Tonight is the night where I will peel back the curtain and look upon the mirror that lays there.

Tonight is the night where I will finally come to see what a ‘mirror’ is.

Tonight is the night when I will finally see my own reflection.

Those are the thoughts that swirl around my head, when in the early hours of the morning, I defy logic and resolution. I push back the covers of my bed, sweeping them aside as I press my feet firmly to the floor and stand, as with a determination I carry my head high and go to the room, with the forbidden thing.

And there, I feel the rich fabric, the red velvet that slips between my fingers as though it were nothing more than a water flowing from a tap. It feels … etherial, it feels not of this world, it feels …

A deep breath.

And then I do it.

I tug at the covers that hide the mirror and for a moment, I am lost.

I am lost looking into it, the silvery reflective light as I reach forward and touch it, feeling the cold compressed glass beneath my fingers.

And there I am.

Looking back at me. My reflection reaching out to my hand, as though it is taking my hand in its own.

I raise my hand, and my reflections hand raises with it. I brush my fingers through my hair, and so does my reflection …

And as I stand there, I realise this is not so bad and yet wonder why those around me are so scared … what tales of horror have been told over the years to make them react the way that they do.

I let out a breath, relaxing as I look upon myself as I start to take notice of the strangeness of the situation. I reach for the light, but my reflections stays still almost as though she’s watching me.

Her eyes remain fixed on me, and as I turn back to her she tilts her head and looks directly at me. My fingers hover by the light switch, to terrified to move as I keep my eyes locked on her. She cracks her neck from side to side, rolls her shoulders before she smiles. Not the soft, sweet smile she’d had a moment ago, but a darker, more malevolent smile “Well …” she says finally “… are you going to come and play?”

I back away, slowly facing the mirror as my eyes wildly look for the curtain to cover it again. I can see it … behind the mirror and if I just bend my knees … I try, slowly, bending, crouching to the floor as my eyes remain focused on the mirror in front of me, in front of my reflection but she’s too quick, much too quick for me.

Her hand raises and I feel the tightness constricting around my own throat, as I choke. My hands fly to my throat, trying to ease the tension, trying to ease the tightness as I try and open my airways. I gasp, I choke, I fall back … and that’s when she strikes.

She steps out of the mirror, her feet stepping on the floor as though she’s done this a thousand times before she reached down and wrapped her dainty hand around my neck.

My reflection, my doppelgänger, lifts me as though I weigh nothing as I dangle from her hand, my feet desperately trying to find something to fixate on to stop her from strangling the life out of me.

She brings me close to her face, to see the smile that lingers about it as I scream, a silent scream as she takes my voice.

But it’s more than that, as she flings me into the mirror, to trap me behind the glass and takes the curtain to sweep over it.

And I know, now, what I see when I look in the mirror.

I know, now, why I should never have looked in the mirror.

I am the mirror now, and one day, when you look into it I will be there waiting for you.