The Past Becomes Present

The mirror showed a reflection that wasn’t my own. I turned, foolishly thinking that someone else was in the room. I turned, again, toward what should have been an image of me. “What’s going on? Who are you?” I yelled at the unfamiliar face. Its lips moved with mine. Its finger extended toward me as mine did to it. Horrified, I gazed around my room and back to the thing on the wall. The woman was frighteningly old and gray. She reminded me of the evil witch I read about in childhood fairy tales. Her sagging jowls and piercing, blue eyes sent a shiver up my spine. The room behind her was filthy and gloomy; its furnishings tattered and worn with age. “Who are you?” I screeched.

I shook with anger and fear. The faded, tinted frame was the only thing I recognized of my recent antique find. The shop owner had neglected to tell me that it would be transformed by the time I got it home. Demonized was more like it. “I’m taking you back,” I announced to the haunting figure within the glass.

As I released the wire from the nail on the wall, the mirror slipped through my hands and onto the floor. It lay face down on the carpet. A small white label, toward the bottom of the paper backing, caught my eye. Funny, I hadn’t noticed it before.

3rd to 3rd

Then to now

The past becomes present

The present becomes past

That was a rather odd thing to have on the back of a mirror, I thought. Not a scratch, however, not a crack; the thing was just as I bought it. Instead of being intriguing, however, it was frightening. I wanted it out of my sight.

Thank goodness, the shop was still open. Most small businesses close at 5:00 p.m. around here. The sign read: “Open 10:00 a.m. to 7 p.m. except for Sundays.” The old man behind the counter approached me as he had done before.

“Can I help you?”

“Yes, I was here earlier today and bought this mirror.”

I presented it to him, and he stepped back.

“Why did you bring it back here?”

“I want to return it,” I said as politely, and soothingly, as I could muster.

“No returns,” he said as he turned around and tapped his cane on the desk bringing my attention to the dingy white poster hanging there. Sure enough, that’s what it said.

“But this is different. It’s not a mirror at all. There’s someone else’s face in it.”

“Someone else? That’s ridiculous.”

“Look,” I said as I turned it toward him.

He stood there for a moment, still, quiet; then let out an irritating laugh.

“I see me,” he scoffed, then turning back toward me, “I see you.”

“That can’t be…” I began.

“Look. See for yourself.”

He was right. When I looked, there I was. There he was.

I left the shop. All my hopes of freeing myself from this wretched mirror had been dashed.

The drive home was interrupted by my glances to the backseat from the rearview mirror. I kept expecting the damn thing to move, talk, anything…Nothing happened. I carted it back into the house and up the stairs to my bedroom.

By then it was dark. The glow of the streetlight guided me to the lamp on my nightstand. I pulled the cord and leaned the front of the mirror against the wall. I couldn’t bear the thought of not seeing me again.

After cleaning in the kitchen and showering, I climbed into bed hoping for a good night’s rest. Perhaps that was all I needed, I told myself, a good night’s sleep. It didn’t come easy, but it came, until…

From somewhere in the room, I heard a low, deep whisper.

“What’s your name?”

Naturally, I thought that I had dreamt it. And so, after rolling over, I shut my eyes and drifted back into a light slumber.

“What’s your name?” I heard the voice ask again, only louder this time.

I sprang up in bed, looked over at the mirror, and gasped. It had spun toward the room. The old hag was looking at me!

“What’s your name?” she bellowed.

“Mary Waters!” I cried. “Leave me alone!”

My last words sounded like a wolf howling at the moon rather than a desperate person ready to run. The bed began to shake. The pillows and sheets flew onto the floor. My feet hit the carpet. I leapt across the room and clung to the opposite wall. An evil grin appeared on the figure’s face in the mirror as my bed slowly aged and decayed. Suddenly it grew four enormous, wooden pillars on each corner. A velvet quilt lay crumpled on the mattress along with a dented and tarnished bed pan.

Through the mirror I could see my bed appear behind the old woman.

“Stop!” I screamed in horror. “What are you doing?”

Next, the dresser disappeared. In its place stood an old, worn, wooden writing table. My lamps turned to candles. The carpet to wooden planks.

Soon everything in my room was in the mirror before me. Speechless, I slowly slumped to a fetal position, arms around my knees.

Sobbing, I looked at the old woman, and asked: “Why? Why are you doing this to me?”

She pointed her finger at me, sneered; then cackled. Right before my eyes, an arm disappeared, then the other; a leg, both legs!

I was in the mirror.

She was in my room.

“3rd generation to 3rd generation,” she said. “Then to now. I have waited so long to be free of the curse that began with my great grandmother. A gypsy cast it upon her after learning of an indiscretion she’d committed with her husband. My great grandmother laughed at her, mocked her…humiliated her. There’s no cure, deary. No potion to drink. No Prince Charming to save you. There’s only waiting, waiting, and more waiting for your third generation to be born, grow up, and find this mirror.

She covered the mirror with the same old rag that I had used earlier. I could hear her crossing the room, and the door opening and closing as she left.

“Nooooooo!” I cried. But no one heard my muffled plea.

Somewhere in the distance, I heard a slow, melodic tune from a violin.