Mirror Mirror

I walk back into the kitchen from the bathroom, flicking the excess water from my hands. I can’t wait to enjoy that delicious stack of pancakes, awaiting their fate on the kitchen counter. I turn the corner into the kitchen, expecting to see the messy counter covered in meaningless junk mail addressed to either myself or my wife. So my shock is apparent when I turn the corner to see it spotless. God, this is so weird. I haven’t seen the actual counter top since we moved in.
“Hun, did you clean off the counter?” I hear my words bounce off the stairwell walls to the second floor. They echo through the house and an uneasy silence settles as soon as they do.
“Sheryl?” She must have gone to work. Thank God she cleaned the counter; it was about a week from having a hazmat crew necessary to clean it. I turn to the fridge to get an apple for breakfast, since my original feast was discarded with the rest of the counter’s contents. Apple in hand, I turn around to an unbelievable sound coming from my cat. I turn and watch as Hope is literally absorbed by the counter. What do I do? My cats, and arguably my pancakes, were just devoured by a blood thirsty counter. God I need to wake up, this is weird. I decide to try and replicate what just happened with my apple. I hold the apple over the counter and drop it; watching as it’s cardinal red skin is immersed in my soft grey granite counter top. The rock rippled, looking like a pond that had just been disturbed by a dropped pebble. I grab the curtain rod from above the kitchen window and dip its tacky plaid cloth in the counter. Instead of just colliding with the metal pole, the monstrosity yet again swallows it. I pull the rod from the stone to find that only half of it is left. Damn, I need to get help. I reach for the phone, momentarily forgetting that it’s no longer where it was 10 minutes ago on the kitchen counter. My hand is thrust through the glassy surface of it’s gaping stony mouth. My hand erupts in a fiery pain as serrated teeth grind my arm, pulling me further into the depths of the beast. I feel the fire swallow my body, as I cease my resistance, passing through and drifting into a dreamless sleep.
I awake in a different place, time, maybe even a different world. I sit up and look around, gauging my surroundings. I’m baffled by the negativity I see. No, not like cynics bashing everything fun in the world, but like a photo negative. Everything is the opposite color, almost like someone had wrapped film tape over my eyes while I was unconscious. I see that I am in a forest that slightly resembles a much darker Wonderland. Trees loom over me, swallowing up any light colors that might have escaped it’s blanketing canopy.
I see a pile of papers in a scattered mess a couple feet away from me. I stand, and grab an envelope. The ink on the front says reads “To Mr. and Mrs. Murray, or current resident” Well, this is our mail. And there’s the phone, not five feet from the papers. I run to it, and grab it from the dirt. As I pick it up it breaks into two pieces. Son of a bitch! Just as I yell, I hear a faint response. I look towards the noise and see a dot cleverly sewn into the horizon. I sprint towards it, and as I near, I see that it’s my wife.
“Sheryl! It’s me, James!” I push harder and now every footfall brings more detail to her figure. I begin to make out her black t-shirt’s floral pattern, her curly brown hair covering her shoulders. I see her tan face and blue eyes just as it contorts itself into a demonic mask. The mask flushes red as its lips curl into a snarl. I cringe as it hisses out
“Thingssss aren’t what they sssseem here, Jamessss. Forget about Earth, thisss isss your home now.”
“What’s going on? What is this place?”
“Oh Jamesss, don’t play dumb. You know why you’re here.”
I pause to think for a second. How can I possibly know what I did to get here, when I don’t know where here is?
“Jamesss, ssurely you know where thisss isss. I will not worry myssself with explaining sssuch detailss.”
“…I didn’t say that out loud. You can read my thoughts?”
“Jamess, not only can I read it, I can write it.” As it says this, it morphs again, this time into a murderer. Fresh blood drips from his newly formed blade as he begins to speak again. “You sssee Jamesss, your fate liesss entirely in my handsss.”
“Mind telling me who you are?
“Your naiveté amusssesss me. I’m you Jamesss. I’m all the partsss of you that you tried to hide away deep within. Little did you know that by tucking me away in you heart of heartsss, you gave me the ability to grow ssstronger. Every time you held back a mean word or a hurtful action, I grew. Now, look at me, and look at you”
It transforms into a mirror. I look past it’s blackened iron frame and into the smoky glass. I’m flooded with feelings of anger, despair, and hatred as I watch every wrong turn I’d ever taken on life’s path.
“Now you ssssee the evil within yourssself. You sssee what you are capable of. What I am going to assk you iss a task you are perfectly capable of doing. You will be a pawn, bringing thossse I desssire to me. I asssk that you bring your wife, missss sssheryl”
I launch myself through the glass of the mirror, hoping to smash it. The mirror laughs as he passes right through it. The glass cuts my skin, carving the mark of a blade into my arm.
“Fetch her for me! Go!” The mirror shouts as invisible arms begin to tug and pull me in different directions. I move with their pulls, as if I were a clay statue being remolded by a thousand evil hands.
I awake on my counter. Phew, it was just a dream. I sit up, noticing I feel heavier than I did before. I go to the bathroom to splash some water on my face, an old trick my dad taught me to wake myself up. I glance at my reflection in the mirror and see the same smoky glass I did before. The mask slowly forms, morphed from my face’s twin. I rub my eyes and the evil retreats. I walk out of the room, careful to leave the light on. I figure the light should at least keep the beast at bay. I walk back upstairs to my bedroom, ignoring the beautiful sunrise for fear of my own reflection in the window. I come to the door of our room. A shock of terror sprints up my arm as it makes contact with the knob. I stop and think, my hand still resting on the doorknob. She could be dead in there. God knows what I did while that THING had me in it’s clutches. I open the door and scream at the scene I’m met with. There she is, my wife dead in our bed, drowned in a sea of her own blood. I begin to weep openly, and I hear her voice from the area of her vanity behind the door.
“What’s a matter hun?”
I step inside the room to inspect the origin of the voice. I see her reflection smile at me, and notice our bed is empty. I sit in the vanity’s chair and begin to talk to her. I drift into sleep, lulled by her soft, loving voice.

Dayton County Police Department
Formal Report
July 24, 2010 8:06 A.M
Responding Officer: James Matilli
Officer responded to 23 York Drive at 6:37 A.M. James Murray was found asleep in front of a mirror in his bedroom, with his wife, Mrs. Sheryl Murray, dead behind him. She lay in a pool of her own blood, with multiple stab wounds around her body. A bloody knife was found in the top drawer of the vanity and was found to have Mr. Murray’s finger prints on it. Mr. Murray was taken into custody under charges of homicide. Mr. Murray was diagnosed with severe schizophrenia as a teenager, and had been off his medication for it for a month and a half at the time of the crime. Mr. Murray is being held without bail in Dayton County Correctional Facility awaiting arrangement Monday morning.