CHAPTER IV - The Writing On The Glass

ILLUSTRATION II — The Mirror

She is screaming.

You cannot hear a word.

And somehow, that is the most frightening part. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDEBXifz15I

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The bathroom light stays on.

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Daylight comes through the small window, fades, and comes again. You count three mornings.

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You cannot account for the hours between them.

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At first, you try the door.

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You keep your eyes on the brass handle and take ten careful steps. The handle stays the same distance away.

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You run. The bath slides past the edge of your vision, yet when you turn your head, it is still beside you.

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You catch the sink to stop yourself. You have not left it.

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You try walking backwards. You close your eyes and feel along the wall.

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When you open them, the sink is beneath your hands.

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By the second morning, the strip of sunlight has reached the grout beside your foot.

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You watch it cross the tile. It is the only thing in the room that seems able to go anywhere.

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Somewhere outside, a neighbour drags a bin along the corridor. Keys rattle. A child protests that they will be late.

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You shout until their footsteps fade.

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Later, pipes knock inside the wall. You press your ear against the tiles and wait for the sound to return.

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You are never hungry. You try to remember your last meal, and all you can remember is the back of a spoon.

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You are never sleepy either. You sit on the edge of the bath and count your breaths, trying to lose your place.

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You do not.

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You begin to suspect that you have never really slept. You have only ever waited in the dark until the light came back.

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The sheet hangs from one corner of the mirror. Most of the glass is uncovered now.

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The reflection is gone.

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Of course it is, you tell yourself. It is out there, wearing your life.

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But it will come back.

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They always come back to check.

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And when it does, it might bring your sister. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNuuSu7gITx

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On the third morning, you open the drawer under the sink.

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A red marker lies where you remember leaving it.

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You put it down. Beyond the glass, in the empty bathroom, the drawer is still shut. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1JtMyT3AnZ

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You pick up the marker again. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjTzhrfwRw2

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This one is yours to move. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ0MuzyUQhJ

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You hold it for a long time before taking off the lid.

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You take the lid off. You stand in front of the mirror, and in big, careful capital letters, you write a warning for your sister. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJdttai3rsD

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IT'S NOT ME.

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You step back and read it. The letters are wobbly, but clear. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡntvwa03pS0

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You wait.

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On the fourth day, you hear the front door.

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Two voices. Your sister's, and your own.

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“I'll come in with you,” your sister says. “You don't have to look. Look at me instead.”

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They stop in the bathroom doorway. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWIJyKUt89Z

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Your sister looks older than you remember. Her hair is shorter.

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She is holding the arm of the person with your face, rubbing her thumb over its sleeve the way she used to rub yours when you were frightened.

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The person beside her is holding its breath. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRgaXdLQPRc

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Your sister sees the red writing. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡur8PnHdw62

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She frowns. She tilts her head to one side, the way people do when something does not make sense. Then she reads it out loud, slowly, one letter at a time. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8RsExFh9Zz

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" E... M... T... O... N... " She stops. "No. Wait. It's backwards." 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4NpH3QmGaJ

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She looks at it a while longer. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxUb8CGfG98

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" It's not me, " she reads. "It says, It's not me. But it's written backwards. Did you do this?" 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL8emuZkWIY

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The person with your face shakes its head. It has gone grey. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ16B7sskDk5

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"I didn't touch it," it whispers. "I haven't been in here since Monday." 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0aCTzMMA7s

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Your sister steps closer. She puts her fingertip against one of the red letters and rubs. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ92DyDFdnNR

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Nothing comes off. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcbcIL6b5lR

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She rubs harder. Her finger squeaks on clean glass. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡofrYS0qQ5N

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“It's not on the front,” she says. Her voice has changed. “It's on the other side. Someone wrote this from the inside.”

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She wipes her finger on her trousers, though there is no ink on it.

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Then she reaches for the person beside her and misses its hand on the first attempt.

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──── ⸸ ❦ ⸸ ────

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From the inside. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdocV6QyjYj

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You look at the red letters.

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From where you are standing, they read perfectly.

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IT'S NOT ME . You wrote them.

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You watched your own hand make every line.

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Your sister has to read them backwards.

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You can read what you wrote. Your sister is looking at the backs of the letters.

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Slowly, the way ice cracks, everything you know comes apart.

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The journeys you cannot remember, because there was no glass on the way.

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The lift wall.

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The train window.

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The back of a spoon.

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Every memory you have is a reflection.

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The voice you could never hear when your reflection's mouth moved.

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The light that switches off without your hand, and the hours that vanish in the dark.

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The message you do not remember sending, because you have never sent anything. You have never touched a phone in your life. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZvYvl8Kizz

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The reflection that was late. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7FKh4VMYAM

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It was never late. 23Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡM42Cut3up7

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You were early.

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Every time you thought it lagged behind you, you were moving on your own, and the person in front of the mirror was standing there, watching its reflection move without it.

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You reach for the memory of your sister outside the school gates. You need something that happened before this bathroom. Before you became afraid.

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You remember her mouth moving. Her hand held out.

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You try to remember taking it.

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There should be the pressure of her fingers, her impatient tug when you walked too slowly.

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You know what those things mean. You cannot find the feeling of them.

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You put your hand against the glass.

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For the first time, you understand why she has never taken it.

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You say her name. Your mouth opens around it, again and again, and she does not turn towards you.

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The person in front of the mirror looks at you now.

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Not at its reflection. At you.

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Its eyes are wide and wet, and fixed on yours, and you finally understand the stare that has frightened you all your life.

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The feeling that the face in the glass was someone else looking straight back.

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It was.

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It is the person outside the glass—the one whose life you remember. And that person is frightened of you.

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The person beside your sister steps forward.

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Your foot steps forward too.

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You did not tell it to.

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