Broken Mirror

The mirror showed a reflection that wasn't my own that night.

Me and 3 of my friends, Monica, Chris and Kayla decided to venture to the attic of my mom's old 1842 victorian house while we all waited until we had to leave.

There was a new horror film premiering tonight at the movie theater across town and we were all exhilarated to see it.

Given the theme of the night with the new horror film out and it being the night before Halloween, we wanted to do something thrilling beforehand.

"There's an older man in the house, and sometimes when I'm home alone, I'll hear him cry "FIRE" at night" I told them.

"My mom always told me that her grandma said when we hear the older man at night, to just go to sleep and he'll disappear" I continued. "They say he's stuck in the mirror upstairs in the attic, next to my room" I finished.

All of my friends looked at each other, like they saw a ghost.

"Let's go" Monica said, with a wide grin on her face.

She was always the most adventurous one out of all of us.

Chris and Kayla looked at each other and held each other's hands. Chris hated doing this stuff, but with the 3 of us girls and him dating Kayla, he trouped it along most of the time.

Chris let out a deep sigh and scowled at me while we all walked up the creaking stairs to the old door that would enter us into a different world.

"Our old roommate used to live in here. He said he preferred to be in here because it was quieter and that he enjoyed the temperature more in here, because it was much warmer up here" I told them as I shut the door behind me.

"That makes no sense" Chris said.

"I told him it didn't make sense either, but they say heat rises I guess, right?" I responded.

Right when I finished my sentence Monica screams, petrified, holding her face. We all turn around to see what's going on.

She found an old Ouija Board laying out on the table that looked like it was just taken out recently with no dust or anything on it, and completely open.

We all surrounded the board with curiosity.

"So, the guy was a witch?" Chris asked curiously.

"No, or at least I don't think so. He was just an employee of the gas lumbar store across the street" I said.

"Where is he now?" Kayla asked intrigued.

"He told me and my mom that he had to take care of some business... I guess?" I responded.

Chills began to run down my spine when a cold breeze drifted by me.

At first it creeped me out, but in these old houses and their weak windows and insulations, it wasn't that abnormal for a cold breeze to brush by every once in awhile.

Monica grabbed the board and sat down at the table that had an oddly convenient perfect number of 4 chairs, 1 for each of us to sit down.

"How do we play?" Kayla asked.

"We'll just learn it as we go" Monica said.

Me and Kayla looked at each other and Chris rolled his eyes.

Monica grabbed the wooden planchette to begin and said, "okay let's all hold hands now."

We all grabbed the person's hand next to us to support one another before starting.

Monica asked the ouija board a question and we all placed our hands on the planchette; at first without it moving at all.

"Now what?" Chris asked.

"Be quiet, just wait" Monica said.

A few moments went by with nothing happening.

I never noticed this man was so messy, I thought to myself.

There were old soup cans laying around, some used and some not; old pizza boxes, clothes thrown around randomly in spots, spider webs, and old lamp laying on the ground too.

The most strange of all though was the old 1800s style wood oven in the corner of the room, and also the old broken mirror next to it, with "I Died - D.W." written on it.

My mom never told me about that, I thought to myself.

"Anyone notice it's getting a lot hotter in this room?" Chris asked, while sweat was dripping from his face.

Kayla gave him her water bottle to drink. "Yeah, it is..." she responded.

When this was happening I noticed a dark shadow figure moving in the corner of my eye.

The roommate is still here? I thought to myself.

"Oh I'm so sorry, I didn't know you were still here, we'll go!" I told him, but he didn't even look up to respond. Something wasn't right about him.

He threw the last few soup cans in his bag and got up to rush out.

"It's okay, you can still be here, but my mom needs to know you're here" I said.

He ran towards the direction of the mirror and the old oven to leave without looking at all.

"No, remember, the door to leave is this way" I pointed in the opposite direction towards the door we came through.

When I looked to the exit door to leave I noticed that someone had boarded up the door with 3 wood planks and old nails, like they were blocking us in from not escaping.

My head started to hurt and heart started pounding which felt like it was going to leave my body as the heat became stronger; and it was starting to smell like a campfire, with a hint of a burning body.

"Hey, did you see that guy?" I asked my friends, pointing in the direction of where the man was.

When I looked over they weren't there at the table anymore.

In fact, there was no more table at all.

There was only the broken mirror left and a boiling room.

In a distance, my friends could be seen in the mirror, still playing with the Ouija Board, and the old roommate was there still packing his bags; but this time I wasn't there with them.

I ran up to the mirror to grab their attention but every bang I added broke the glass more and I saw them less and less.

The man in the mirror was behind them now in a black coat, that looked like the grim reapers, but he was whispering something.

I stepped closer towards the mirror to hear what he was saying but all I heard was the sound of crackling wood behind me.

It was the old man again burning a fire in the old wooden oven.

"Fire... Fire... Fire..." He said.

"Hey, you can't burn that in here!" I told him as I tried to stop him.

The old man looked at me with sad eyes and an upside down smile, and his hands dripping with sweat and looked burned from an accident.

I am going to help this man be free finally, even if I have to do it again, and again, I said to myself.

"How many of you are there?" I asked him.

"Endless, in the other universes." He looks down ashamed.

"I'm doing better there... I'm the owner of the lumbar store in the other universes, unlike here... I made a mistake here" he said.

"Let's try this again, last one, I promise, we'll fix it this time now" I told him.