The Mannequin in the Morgue

In the autumn of 2002, my sister Lena and I shared a cramped apartment in a converted funeral home. The building was old, with creaking floorboards and peeling wallpaper, but we were young and poor, and the rent was cheap. I spent most evenings on the lumpy couch, reading true crime magazines, while Lena hunched over our secondhand television, playing a pirated survival horror game on a dusty console.

The game was set in a sprawling mansion, its corridors heavy with dread. Lena had been stuck for hours, wandering through identical hallways, each lined with faded portraits and ornate furniture. Her character, a police officer searching for her missing partner, was low on health, and the save room was a safe haven where nothing could hurt her. But the danger lay just outside its doors, in the form of shambling creatures and the constant, gnawing tension of the unknown.

One particular corridor in the game had become an obsession. It was an L-shaped hallway, with a tall mirror at the bend, a grand staircase leading up, and a birdcage resting on a marble table. At the far end, partially hidden in shadow, lay the corpse of a man. He was slumped against the wall, his face a mask of pallid horror, but his body showed no wounds. He was just… dead. As the game progressed, the body vanished without explanation, as if it had never been there. We had looked up the game forums and learned that many players believed it was a deliberate design choice, a ghost story embedded in the code.

That night, as the rain lashed against the windows, Lena joked, ‘Wouldn’t it be creepy if he stood up in the mirror?’ I laughed, but the thought lingered. I glanced at the hallway leading to our bedrooms, a small mirror reflecting the dim light from the kitchen. I shook it off and returned to my magazine, but the image of that dead man stayed with me.

The next evening, I was lying on my bed, listening to the sound of Lena’s game from the living room. The familiar music, a melancholic piano piece, drifted through the house. I heard her character’s footsteps on the wooden floor, the creak of doors, and then—a sudden silence. The game’s sound had cut off. I called out to Lena, but she didn’t answer. I stood up, my heart beginning to race, and walked to the doorway of the living room.

Lena was sitting on the edge of the couch, her hands trembling over the controller, her eyes fixed on the screen. She hadn’t paused the game. On the television, the L-shaped corridor was visible. The corpse was still there, slumped in the corner. But in the mirror at the bend, I saw a reflection. A tall figure stood behind the player character, its face obscured by shadow, its posture eerily familiar. It was the same man from the corpse, but standing, and his head was turned, staring directly at the screen.

I thought it was a trick of the game, a scripted scare we hadn’t encountered before. I told Lena to move, to run, but she was frozen. ‘It’s not the game,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t do anything.’ The figure in the mirror began to walk toward the player character. The character’s view rotated, but the screen showed no one there. Yet the reflection was clear. I backed away, my eyes darting to the small mirror in our hallway. In it, I saw the same figure, now standing behind me.

I spun around, but there was nothing. The air grew cold, and a faint smell of decay filled the room. I heard a sound—a low, guttural breathing—coming from the hallway. I grabbed Lena’s arm, yanking her to her feet, and we ran to the front door. As we stumbled into the night, I looked back. The lights in the apartment flickered, and in the window, I saw a pale face pressed against the glass. It was the same man, his eyes hollow, his lips moving as if trying to speak.

We spent that night at a neighbor’s, and when we returned the next morning, the apartment was silent. The television was off, the game console unplugged. The mirror in the hallway was shattered, and on the floor, in the dust, were the words: ‘You should have left the dead alone.’ We packed our things and moved out within the week. To this day, I avoid mirrors. And whenever I think of that L-shaped corridor, I can still feel his gaze, as if he’s waiting for someone to turn the corner and finally see him face to face.