The Winter of the Glass Lake

My father-in-law, Elias, was a quiet man who seemed to have been carved from the same rugged stone as the Oregon coast where he lived. When my husband, Marcus, was deployed to a remote meteorological station in the Antarctic for eighteen months, Elias offered to help me with our newborn daughter, Cora, and my two younger brothers, Leo and Noah, who had come to stay with us after our mother’s passing. Our own mother had died three years earlier, leaving the twins in my care, and Elias, my stepfather, had always been a steadying presence in our lives. We were close, perhaps because he never tried to replace our biological father, but simply offered his quiet support and a dry sense of humor that could defuse any tension.

But Elias had been acting strangely since we arrived at his isolated cabin near a frozen lake called Glass Lake, so named for its perfectly reflective surface in the winter. The cabin was nestled in a dense pine forest, and the only access was a single dirt road that became impassable with the first heavy snow. We had planned to stay for two months, but a sudden blizzard hit just days after our arrival, trapping us. The snow piled up, and the lake froze over, but instead of being a serene winter wonderland, it felt like we were being watched from the ice.

Elias began to mutter about ‘the reflections’ and ‘the ones who come through the mirror.’ He would stare at the frozen lake for hours, even in the bitter cold, and when I asked him what was wrong, he would just shake his head and say, ‘They’re here, Ruth. They’ve always been here.’ I chalked it up to grief; he had lost his wife, our mother, and now his only son was thousands of miles away. But the unease grew.

One night, I woke to find Leo and Noah standing at the bedroom window, their faces pressed against the glass, whispering to each other. ‘What are you doing?’ I asked. ‘There’s someone out there,’ Leo said, pointing. I looked out, but all I saw was the moon reflecting off the frozen lake. ‘It’s just your imagination,’ I said, but they insisted they saw a woman in a white dress standing on the ice, waving at them. I dismissed it as a bad dream, but the next morning, I found footprints in the snow leading to the edge of the lake and stopping abruptly.

Elias grew more agitated. He began to talk about his childhood, of a twin brother who had drowned in Glass Lake when they were seven. ‘He never left,’ Elias said, his eyes distant. ‘He’s been waiting for the lake to freeze so he can come back.’ I tried to comfort him, but he was adamant. ‘You have to leave, Ruth. Take the boys and Cora. Get out before the thaw.’ But the road was buried, and the nearest town was forty miles away. We were trapped.

Then the strange occurrences escalated. I would find Cora’s baby monitor picking up static, and through the hiss, I could hear a faint humming, a melody that Elias recognized. ‘That’s the song our mother used to sing to us,’ he said, his face pale. The twins claimed to see a boy their age on the lake, waving at them, and they wanted to go out to play. I forbade them, but one afternoon, while I was nursing Cora, they snuck out. I found them on the ice, standing at the edge of a dark circle in the center, looking down. ‘There’s a face in the water,’ Noah said, pointing. ‘It’s smiling at us.’ I yanked them back, and as I did, I saw it too—a pale, distorted face just beneath the surface, its mouth stretched into an unnatural grin.

That night, Elias gathered us in the living room. He looked old, his eyes hollow. ‘It’s the lake,’ he said. ‘It shows you your own reflection, but it’s not you. It’s something that wants to take your place. My brother, he was the first. Now it wants more.’ He pulled out a dusty photograph of himself as a boy, standing next to his twin. The twin’s face was blurred, but as I looked closer, I realized the blurred face was the same one I had seen in the ice. ‘How do we stop it?’ I asked. Elias shook his head. ‘You can’t. It’s already here.’

Panic set in. I decided that we would attempt to walk to the main road the next day, despite the snow and cold. But that night, I was woken by a sound—a gentle tapping on the window. I turned to see the face from the ice pressed against the glass, its smile wide, its eyes glinting. It spoke, but not out loud. Its voice echoed in my head: ‘Let me in, Ruth. I only want to see my brother.’ I screamed, and Elias burst into the room. He saw the face and froze. ‘No,’ he whispered. ‘It’s him. He’s come back.’

Elias ran to the front door, threw it open, and rushed out onto the lake. I followed, shouting for him to stop, but he was already at the dark hole in the center. He knelt down, and the face in the water rose, looking exactly like him, but younger. It reached out a hand, and Elias reached back. They touched, and for a moment, there was a flash of light. Then the ice cracked, and Elias fell through. He didn’t struggle; he simply disappeared beneath the surface, leaving only his ripples.

I stood there, stunned, as the twins and Cora behind me began to cry. I looked at the hole, expecting Elias to surface, but instead, a figure rose—Elias, or something that looked like him. He smiled, and it was not his smile. ‘I’m back,’ he said. ‘And this time, I have a family.’ I grabbed the kids and ran back to the cabin, locking the door. But through the window, I saw the figure walking towards us, and behind him, two more figures rose from the ice—one like him, and one like me. They stood there, watching us, as the lake froze over again, sealing them in a perpetual mirror.

We never left. Weeks later, a search party arrived, but they found only our belongings, and the cabin empty. I don’t know what happened to us. But sometimes, if you look at Glass Lake on a cold winter night, you can see four figures standing on the ice, waving at you, as if inviting you to join them. And if you listen closely, you can hear a child’s hum, floating across the frozen water. But you’d be wise not to answer.