The Folded Mirror

I never believed in ghosts. Not really. I’m the kind of person who needs evidence, logic, a rational explanation. So when my mom started acting strange after we moved into the old farmhouse, I chalked it up to stress. She’d been through a lot: the divorce, the new job, uprooting our lives. But then things started happening to me too.

Our house was a two-story Victorian with creaky floors and drafty windows. My room was at the end of the upstairs hallway, a converted attic space with sloped ceilings. The door was a heavy oak slab with a brass knob that felt cold to the touch. Inside, the room was sparse: a single bed against the far wall, a desk under the dormer window, and a large wardrobe that dominated the corner. The wardrobe had a full-length mirror on its door, one of those antique ones with a slightly warped surface that made your reflection look just a little off.

The first odd thing was the smell. A faint, musty odor, like old books and mothballs, that would come and go. I’d open the window to air it out, but it would always return. My mom said it was just the house settling. I tried to ignore it.

Then, the sleepwalking. My mom would find me in the hallway at night, standing in front of the bathroom mirror, just staring. I had no memory of it. She’d guide me back to bed, and I’d wake up in the morning feeling exhausted, as if I’d run a marathon. At first, I laughed it off. ‘I must be stressed,’ I said. But it kept happening.

The real trouble started one night when I woke to a strange sound. A low, rhythmic thumping, like something heavy being dragged across the floor above me. But there was nothing above me but the roof. I lay there, listening, my heart pounding. The sound stopped. Then, a whisper, soft but distinct: ‘Come see what’s in the mirror.’

I froze. The voice wasn’t my mom’s. It wasn’t mine. It seemed to come from the wardrobe. I turned on my lamp. The wardrobe door was slightly ajar. The mirror reflected the room, showing the bed, the desk, and a shadowy figure standing just out of the light. I blinked, and it was gone. I told myself it was a trick of the light. But I didn’t sleep the rest of the night.

The next day, I examined the wardrobe. The mirror was old, the silvering peeling at the edges. There were faint scratches on the frame, almost like letters. I ran my fingers over them, but couldn’t make out the words. I tried to open the wardrobe, but it was locked. There was no key. I asked my mom if she knew anything about it. She looked uneasy and said, ‘It was here when we moved in. I never opened it. I don’t like that thing.’

That night, I decided to investigate. I used a credit card to jimmy the lock. The wardrobe creaked open. Inside, it was empty, just a few hangers and a faint musty smell. But the back panel didn’t match the sides; it was new wood, as if something had been covered up. I tapped the panel. It sounded hollow. I pushed, and it swung open, revealing a dark crawlspace.

I grabbed a flashlight and crawled in. It was cramped, dusty, and smelled of decay. At the far end, there was a small wooden box. I opened it. Inside was a tarnished hand mirror, its glass blackened with age, and a faded photograph of a woman in a Victorian dress, her face half-obscured by shadow. On the back of the photo was written: ‘She waits in the glass.’

I brought the hand mirror back to my room. I wiped the grime off, but the glass remained dark. That night, I placed it on my nightstand. In the middle of the night, I woke to the sound of my name being called. Not my mom, but a voice from the mirror. I looked at it. The glass was no longer black; it reflected my room, but with a difference. In the reflection, I saw myself, but my eyes were hollow and dark. And behind me, in the reflection, stood the woman from the photo, her mouth moving, as if whispering.

I screamed and threw the mirror across the room. But the whispering didn’t stop. It filled my head. ‘You opened the door. You let me in.’ I ran to my mom’s room. She was sitting up in bed, staring at the wall. ‘She’s here,’ she said, her voice flat. ‘She’s been here since we moved in. She follows me in the glass.’

I didn’t know what to do. I went back to my room and saw the wardrobe mirror was now dark, like the hand mirror. But in it, I could see the woman more clearly. She was pressing against the glass from the other side, her face contorted, desperate. She opened her mouth, and a cold breath washed over me. ‘Free me,’ she whispered. ‘Take my place.’

I stumbled back. The wardrobe door slammed shut on its own. I tried to open it, but it was locked again. The hand mirror lay on the floor, cracked, but the glass was still dark. In my reflection, I saw the woman’s face overlaid on mine.

Since then, my mom and I both see her. She follows us from mirror to mirror. We’ve covered every reflective surface in the house, but it’s not enough. I see her in my dreams. She’s always begging, pleading. She says she was trapped in the glass a century ago, and she made a bargain: she would haunt the mirrors until someone agreed to swap places with her. I think she chose me because I opened the wardrobe.

Last night, I woke up with the hand mirror in my hands, shattered, but the shards were reassembled into a perfect circle. In the center, the woman’s face was clear, and she was smiling. ‘You’ll join me soon,’ she said. ‘The mirror is patient.’

I don’t know how to stop her. I can’t break the mirrors, because she just moves to another. The house is filled with them. And I’m afraid that if I look into any reflective surface, I’ll see her, waiting. Just waiting for me to make a mistake. To look too long. To let her in.

My mom says she saw me this morning, staring into the toaster oven. She said I had a smile on my face that wasn’t mine. I don’t remember it. I’m scared, but I don’t know who to tell. They’d think I’m crazy. Maybe I am. But the woman in the mirror is real. And she wants out. And she wants me to take her place.