Ok, this is a recurring dream that I've had more times than I care to have. It scares the hell out of me every time I because I have this thing about not looking in mirrors while it's dark because the image you see of yourself is freakish and distorted...and I have far too active of an imagination to deal with that before bed time lol. The best way to describe this is as a screwed up version of "Through the Looking Glass"...kind of.
I’m sitting on the couch in my living room, nodding off and attempting to read the newest Sherrilyn Kenyon book. I finally give up the fight and decide to go to bed, rubbing my eyes and indulging in a stretch before I walk through the dining room and into the kitchen, reaching my arm back around into the dining room so I can shut off the light with out being in front of the mirror that hangs above the switch. I laugh at myself for doing so, knowing that I’m being silly, but having done "Bloody Mary" a few times as a teenager, I know what my reflection will look like in the dark and have no desire to see it.
I sigh and shake my head. Living alone is scary sometimes, especially after the kids go to bed and the house goes quiet. Every noise seems amplified and mysterious, every creak a footstep of some unknown intruder. I shudder involuntarily at the thought. God my imagination is a blessing and a burden. Seeing monsters in the shadows, feeling frightened when alone in the basement and concocting ghosts in my peripheral vision is awesome for writing, but not for my piece of mind.
Pushing those creepy thoughts away, I get in the fridge for a bottle of water and check out what I have to see if anything looks like a tasty midnight snack. Aha! Grapes! I’m reaching down to break of some and I hear a tapping, soft and barely discernible, coming from the dining room window. Fear settles in my gut, remembering those nightmares I had as a child where I look up to see a leering face glaring at me through my second story window. My heartbeat accelerates, knowing that if I look I might see something, likely my own reflection, but it will be a dark reflection with hollow eyes and sickly skin.
No. I’m not looking. I close the door with ridiculous force - leaving the grapes and water sitting on the shelf - and walk to my bathroom, reaching in to turn on the light before entering. I look at myself in the mirror and have to laugh at my appearance. My skin is pale and my eyes round, a true sign that I have been frightened horribly.
"Jeez girl, get a grip." I wash my face swiftly, brush my teeth while my ginseng and cucumber mask dries, then peel that off, leaving pieces of it hanging like skin so I can make zombie faces at myself and laugh. That gets boring quickly, so I wash the remaining bits off and moisturize, the tapping on the window nearly forgotten. As I’m leaning close to the mirror, I see something out of the corner of my eye in the hallway. I turn to look, the bones in my neck popping at such a swift movement, expecting to see one of my kids standing there. But I only see the closed door of their bedroom.
That sinking feeling is back, the prickly sensation you get when someone is watching you with intense malice. I remember the tap on the window and my heart does a brisk staccato in my breast, my stomach knotting until my entire body is tense.
"Danielle..you dumbass...there’s nothing there. You’ve read way too much Stephen King. There’s no psycho clowns coming out of toilets in the real world." Still, I glance warily at the toilet before snorting at my idiocy.
I head out of the bathroom, leaving the light on as I always do at night, and walk to my bedroom. I experience that passing moment of hesitation that I always get when walking into a dark room, especially when I have to pass a shadowed mirror. That fear is almost phobic, and I know it, but knowing that you have an unnatural fear is never reassuring. No matter how many times you tell yourself that nothing is there, there’s no twisted world on the other side of the mirror plotting against you, you just can’t seem to stop the fear from slithering in. You just have to take a deep breath and hurry through so you can jump on your bed and hide under the covers. God I am such a wuss.
As I’m walking through, I see something out of the corner of my eye again, and I almost turn to look...but I realize that I would have to look in the direction of the mirror. Goose flesh runs down my arms and makes me shudder. Telling myself that it was just my reflection, I jump in my bed to lay down. Then my heart skips a beat as I hear the tapping in the bathroom. It sounds like a fingernail drumming on glass and the only glass in there is the mirror. Breath comes in on a wheezy draw as I tell myself that my moisturizer just fell over it the cabinet.
Ok..so why is it tapping? Good question...it must have hit some of the other bottles and they in turn hit the back of the mirror. I’m still explaining it away to myself when the eerie tapping starts in my room. My body is shaking, running hot and cold, and I’m nearly paralyzed by my fear. No matter how many times I tell myself that I’m being silly, that I’m just hearing things, the insistent tapping is still there and I just KNOW that is coming from the mirror.
So do I look or don’t I? There really is no possible way that I could see my own reflection since my bed is situated at an angle, not to mention that it is a good distance below the bottom of the mirror. If I don’t look then I’ll never sleep, that paranoid feeling of being watched will steal over me until I can’t stand it anymore. I roll over, with my eyes closed, lower lip trembling, until I know that I am resting in such a way that when I gather the courage to open my eyes and see that there is nothing there that I will see the mirror.
I can do this. I’ve gone down in the basement in the dark to reset the fuse box despite my fear and I did OK. No monsters of ghosts grabbing me, even though there were a few spiders that required immediate squashing. I laugh a little hysterically, and open my eyes...icicles flow through me, freezing my scream in my throat as I lay immobile on the bed, eyes transfixed on the mirror.
I see myself, an impossibility from where I was resting, but it wasn’t really me. She is pressed against the glass, hands slightly spread, and she is smiling an evil smile that reveals sharp ragged teeth. Her eyes aren’t dark and hollow, but a glowing red and I am powerless to look away. A raspy voice runs through my mind, whispering my name over and over as my heart seems to give out and stop.
Look away! Look away! I scream at myself in my head. If you can’t see her, she isn’t real! But I can’t stop. Her raspy whispers grow in volume until it becomes maniacal laughter echoing evilly in my head. The last thing I see before her darkness swallows me is her hands pressing through the liquid glass, reaching for me.
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Reviewed by Robert Fullerton
9/14/2006
I haven't been here for a while, Danielle..I enjoyed this tale very much, and will catch up on your works as soon as possible.. Your are immensely talented, and I wiil review your writes and comment, as I go along...Bob
I am in awe of this story, something that could be a lot longer but still packs a rather heavy punch behind it. You have a very dark vision for horror, and that is something I am drawn in the most by when it comes to the genre as a practioner of it. You should send this one to Blue Lady Magazine when you flesh it out.
Reviewed by Connie Hinnen Cook
5/19/2006
Until the last 2 paragraphs, I kept thinking that it was going to be one of your kids that had gotten up in the night and was making noise. Kept me riveted to my screen. Well done!
Excellent imagery in this creepy write; geezamighty! Very well done, Danielle!
(((HUGS))) and much love, your friend in Tx., Karen Lynn. :(
Reviewed by david eisen
3/29/2006
I have a similar fear of looking in the mirror in the dark and Danielle Mundy seems to hit my feelings exactly. I read this online with the lights out and I highly recommend that so you can get the full effect of the story
Reviewed by Jerry Bolton
3/29/2006
Warm milk and rest is in your future. On the other hand, that part of me that is the Poe fan and one who likes things that go bump in the night, admit that you have every right to run screaming down the hall. RUNNNNNNNN!!!!!!
Chilly nightmare and don't blame you for being scared. You need a big old snuggle bunny killer stuffed rabbit to protect you. Good descriptive write Danielle had me hanging on each line.
Pray for the light. Pray that you last that long. The Long Hour Before Light is a classic collection of Horror tales, re-mastered by Champagne Book Group
The fortunate inherit riches, prestige, positive notoriety. Those not so lucky bear legacies filled with poverty, infamy or, worse yet, the unhinged insanity and murderous urges of their ancestors.
