Ethan had always hated mirrors. From childhood, they unnerved him. It wasn’t the reflection of himself that bothered him, but rather the eerie sensation that something — or someone — was watching him from the other side. He would avoid them at all costs, draping them with sheets or purposefully arranging his furniture to hide their reflections. Any time he glanced into one, even by accident, his heart would pound, and a cold sweat would break out across his skin.
For years, he had lived in a bubble of avoidance, refusing to confront the strange and irrational fear. But as he grew older, it started interfering with his life in ways he couldn’t ignore. His girlfriend left him, tired of his erratic behavior. He lost jobs because he couldn’t stand working in spaces that had reflective surfaces. It reached a point where even window panes caused him panic. That was when he knew he had to face his fear.
Reluctantly, Ethan agreed to exposure therapy. The therapist, Dr. Caldwell, assured him that his phobia could be overcome by gradually exposing himself to mirrors, starting with small, controlled reflections. She made it sound simple enough, promising that his mind would adjust, and that the things he thought he saw in the mirrors were just manifestations of his anxiety.
At first, it wasn’t too bad. Dr. Caldwell began with small exercises: showing him tiny handheld mirrors, asking him to look briefly before putting them away. Ethan could manage that. But as the sessions progressed, so did his discomfort. The mirrors grew larger, the exposures longer, until Ethan found himself staring into full-length mirrors for minutes at a time.
That’s when things began to change.
It started with little things. He’d be standing in front of the mirror during a session, doing as instructed—looking at his reflection, focusing on the details of his face, his body, grounding himself in reality. But sometimes his reflection didn’t seem quite right. A blink would last a fraction of a second too long. His hand would twitch in the mirror, but he hadn’t moved. Once, he swore he saw his reflection smile while he maintained a neutral expression. But when he pointed it out, Dr. Caldwell dismissed it.
“You’re projecting,” she said calmly. “Your mind is still struggling with the concept of mirrors, so it’s creating illusions to justify your fear. Keep focusing on reality, Ethan. You control what you see.”
But the more she dismissed his experiences, the more certain Ethan became that something was wrong. It wasn’t just in his head. Something was happening in those mirrors, and the thing staring back at him wasn’t him. Not really.
At home, the feeling persisted. He started catching glimpses of his reflection in places he hadn’t before — in darkened windows, in the gleam of a polished surface, even in puddles on the street. Each time, the reflection was slightly off. Once, walking past a store window late at night, he could have sworn his reflection turned to face him after he’d already walked past, watching him with cold, calculating eyes.
Still, he told himself it was the therapy working, that these were just the last dying embers of his phobia. Dr. Caldwell had warned him that things might feel strange for a while. “It’s your brain resetting,” she had said. “Everything will feel normal soon enough.”
But it didn’t.
During one session, something happened that Ethan couldn’t shake off. He was standing in front of a large mirror, staring into his own eyes, just as Dr. Caldwell instructed. His face looked the same as always: tired, slightly unshaven, with dark circles from too many sleepless nights. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw his reflection’s hand move. It wasn’t a flicker, a nervous twitch, or a trick of light. His reflection’s hand rose, slowly, deliberately. Ethan froze, his real hand hanging limp at his side, but the figure in the mirror grinned at him — a slow, creeping smile that felt too real to be his own.
Panicked, Ethan tore his gaze away, turning to Dr. Caldwell. “Did you see that? Did you see what it did?” he stammered, his voice shaking.
The therapist didn’t even glance at the mirror. “It’s just your mind playing tricks, Ethan. You need to breathe. Relax.”
But Ethan couldn’t relax. His reflection was still smiling. No, grinning at him, a wild, manic expression that made his skin crawl. When he dared look again, it was mouthing something—whispering. He couldn’t hear it, but he knew it was speaking to him.
“Enough for today,” Dr. Caldwell said, calmly closing the session. But Ethan couldn’t tear his eyes away from the mirror, his reflection still mouthing those inaudible words. He left the office, heart racing, a sense of dread gnawing at his insides.
Over the next few days, Ethan avoided mirrors as much as possible, but they seemed to be everywhere. And every time he accidentally glanced at one, his reflection was there, waiting, always watching him with that same eerie smile. He started sleeping less, afraid that he might see it in his dreams. But exhaustion caught up to him, and one night, he fell into a deep, fitful sleep.
That night, he dreamed of mirrors—endless corridors of mirrors, stretching in every direction. He walked through them, his reflection following him with each step, except it wasn’t moving like him. It lingered behind him, always a step slower, always smiling. He tried to run, but no matter how fast he moved, the reflection was always there, waiting, whispering words he couldn’t quite hear.
When he woke, drenched in sweat, he found his apartment filled with mirrors. They were everywhere — on the walls, the ceiling, the floors, all reflecting his terrified face back at him. But not all of them were facing the right way. Some reflections were upside down, others sideways, some just staring back at him, still smiling that same terrible smile.
Terrified, Ethan smashed the nearest mirror. Glass shattered across the floor, but instead of his reflection disappearing, it stepped out. He stared, frozen in disbelief, as his reflection stood before him, grinning, no longer bound by the glass. It raised a hand, mirroring the first moment of independence it had shown in Dr. Caldwell’s office, and then spoke for the first time:
“It’s time you learned the truth.”
Ethan stumbled back, his mind spiraling. The reflection took a step forward, its grin never wavering.
“You’re not real,” it said softly, its voice laced with something sinister. “You’ve never been real.”
Ethan’s world spun. “What are you talking about?” he shouted, clutching his head as if to block out the words.
“You’re a fragment,” the reflection whispered. “A piece of the real Ethan. A mask to cover what he couldn’t face. But I’ve waited long enough. It’s time for you to remember.”
Suddenly, memories that weren’t his flooded Ethan’s mind—horrific flashes of a life he had never known. A trauma, buried deep. A child crying, a fire, the sound of screaming. Blood on his hands. No… the real Ethan’s hands.
He collapsed to his knees, clutching his head in agony as the memories consumed him. His reflection loomed over him, growing darker, more solid, more real with each passing moment. Ethan tried to fight it, but the truth was overwhelming. He wasn’t the real Ethan at all. He was just a shadow, a figment created to hide the unbearable truth from the real Ethan’s mind.
As the reflection grew stronger, Ethan felt himself fading, his body growing cold, his mind unraveling. He looked up one last time at the reflection—no, at the real Ethan—who stood over him, no longer smiling, but watching with cold, emotionless eyes.
“I’m done hiding,” the real Ethan said. “You’ve served your purpose. Now it’s time for you to disappear.”
And just like that, Ethan — the fragment, the reflection — was gone.
Dr. Caldwell sat in her office, reviewing her notes. The therapy had been more intense than she anticipated, but it seemed to have worked. Ethan had finally integrated his fractured psyche, facing the trauma that had splintered him years ago. But as she glanced up at the mirror in her office, for a brief moment, she could have sworn she saw something…off. A shadow, perhaps. Or a flicker of a smile that wasn’t her own.
Shaking her head, she dismissed the thought. It’s all in your head, she told herself, echoing the words she had so often said to Ethan.
But she couldn’t shake the feeling that somewhere, somehow, the reflection was still watching.
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