Date posted: Oct. 31. 2010

 

My parents told me that sometimes when there are little to no people out and about in the streets, one would see a teen girl walking briskly along the sidewalk, her hands shoved in her pockets and her hood flipped up just enough to keep her face hidden in the shadows the fabric cast on her face.  

 

At first glance this girl may seem normal to most people.  She was of average height and carried herself with such confidence that one would think she was just another girl.  That is, until they look a bit closer and they’ll see the faint scar on her left cheek and the edges of a bandage peeking out from under the collar of her dark purple coat.  If they looked even more closely, they would see that her skin is pale, almost grey.  It didn’t happen often, but sometimes one would also see strands of pale blue-green hair sticking out from under her hood.  Then they’ll blink and she will look like a normal girl again.  No blue-green hair, no pale skin, no scars and bandages.  They will walk on, thinking it was a trick of the mind and fail to notice the edges of her lips curving up ever so slightly into a smile.  Not a sweet smile, but a cunning and devious one.

 

Those people would mysteriously disappear a few days or even hours after this “strange encounter”.

 

No one would be able to find them.  Any record of those people would be erased.  It was as if they never existed.  But the strange thing was, those “missing persons” would show up perfectly fine after the cases had been closed.  They had the same name, appearance and height and they would seem surprised when people asked them where they’ve been.  They would then reply with the name and address of the exact place they were at before they “disappeared”.

 

“It must’ve been my doppelgänger that went missing.” they always say with a short laugh.  And the people they were conversing with would laugh along with them, thinking that their friend really was OK and they were just paranoid about something that didn’t happen.  They wouldn’t be able to see that their “friend” hasn’t escaped the worst and that their stroke of bad luck was not actually over, but would instead get worse.

 

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July. 7. 2000

 

“So that’s why you shouldn’t go out after it’s dark.  You should always walk with a friend or two even in the day time.” my father said, putting his big, leather bound book away on a high shelf.  

 

“It’s for your own good, sweetie.” my mother added.

 

“Yes, mummy and daddy.” my obedient and naive ten year old self said.  “I won’t and I promise to not do that ever.”

 

Who knew that I was going to break that promise seven years later?

 

Seven is supposed to be a lucky number right?  Isn’t it ironic that the unluckiest day of my life happened on the supposedly luckiest day of the year?

 

I feel really bad for these people. I thought at the time.  But I know that’ll never happen to me because I’m too smart to go wandering around the neighbourhood in the middle of the night.  If I could travel back in time, I would go to my stupid 10 year old self and slap her in the face, saying “You’re such an idiot for thinking that.”

 

The events from that day were forever implanted in my mind.  Even as I’m writing this down now, I could feel the temperature dropping slightly and that a presence, or whatever it was, lurking in the dark corners of my house, waiting to pounce out as soon as my guard is down.  Well, I guess I better start my story now, best get it over with so I can go to sleep with this burden lifted off my shoulders.

 

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July. 7. 2007 

 

I was seventeen years old.  I was what most people considered to be “normal”.  I had a loving family, lots of friends and an adorable puppy named Shadow.  I got good grades in school and did not get into trouble for any reason at all.  I was an obedient daughter and a diligent student.  Little did I know that that was going to change in the near future.

 

It was a normal, summer day for me.  I got up, brushed out my long dirty blond hair, and did my morning routine.  I hung out with my friends at a coffee shop, laughing and joking around about some silly story that described my friend’s failed attempt at cooking scrambled eggs.  We also talked about my birthday party tonight.  I’ll “officially” be seventeen after that, according to my mother.  

There was going to be a two-tier cake, and the house was going to be decorated with silver and blue decorations.  I was also going to have my curfew extended to 10:00pm.  I know that some kids stay up later, but that story about the pale girl with blue-green hair and the abducted people has made me more paranoid about staying up late.  

 

I headed home, not knowing the terrifying events that will soon happen in the next few hours.  I walked home with my friends.  The group got smaller and smaller as they all lived closer to the cafe than I did.  Fifteen minutes haven’t even passed before it was just me and my best friend Emily walking together in the slightly windy summer afternoon.

 

“Oh, look.  There’s my house.” Emily said.  “I’ll see you tonight for the party!”

 

“Yeah!” I waved and smiled before continuing along the sidewalk.  The moment Emily went inside her house, I got a weird feeling.  I shook it off as the wind blowing and kept walking.  

 

I could see my house in the distance.  A three storey tall building constructed entirely out of wooden planks.  I was almost home!!

 

I started thinking about what I should wear to my party, and wondered if my parents will get me anything as a gift.  I was so immersed in my thoughts that I didn’t notice the person walking my way.  I looked up too late and crashed into someone.

 

That someone turned out to be a girl.  She had on a purple coat, despite the warm weather, and her hood was up.  How was she not dying from the heat?  I could faintly see the outline of a scar on her left cheek and wisps of blue-green hair.

 

“Sorry.” I mumbled before quickly speed walking away.

 

She seemed familiar, but I couldn’t quite identify why.  I’ve never even seen her before in my life.

 

As I reached my house, it hit me like a ton of bricks.  She must’ve been that that girl from the story dad told me when I was younger!!!  But I always thought that she was just some fictional character made up by my father to scare me into staying home at night.  If that girl was real, does that mean that the abductions and missing persons cases were real as well?

 

This better not happen to me on my birthday.  I thought as I opened the door to my home and went in.  I shut the door, but didn’t lock it.  That was a big mistake.

 

“Mom, Dad!  I’m back!” I called, but got no response.  I thought they were going to stay at home today?  They don’t normally work on Saturdays.

 

I went to my room on the third floor to relax.  The special twilight light bulbs that were installed gave me a sense of security and calmness.  The fear of actually encountering the girl was washed away as soon as I stepped into the room.  I laid on my bed, closed my eyes and dozed off, thinking that my mom or dad will wake me up in time for the party.  Oh, how wrong I was to assume that.  Before I entered the dreamland, I could’ve sworn I heard the sound of my door opening and a voice saying “Shhhh…it’ll be over soon.”  

 

A loud crash jarred me from my slumber.  I sat up groggily, and felt around the hard, cool surface of the------wait, a hard, cool surface?  Didn’t I fall asleep on my bed?  Now fully aware of the fact that I wasn’t in my own house, but rather in some dark room, my breathing sped up.  My heart beat rapidly and I could hear the blood roaring in my ears.

 

Wobbling slightly, I stood up and felt around.  My hand came into contact with something slightly soft and stone cold.  Freaked out, I pulled my hand back and ran it along the walls for some sort of light switch.  I found one and flicked it.  A dim glow emitted from a single bulb on the ceiling, which I could see was only a foot above my head.  I looked around in the dim lighting and saw something straight out of a horror movie.  

 

There was bodies everywhere.  They were all dead, and were all teens and young adults.  Dried blood covered the corpses and stained the walls and ground.  I almost threw up at the sight of something so horrifying and sad.  

 

I looked at the faces and realized that all these people were the ones from the “missing persons” case.  The one that no one could ever solve.  Judging by the………smell of the bodies, they had all died quite some time ago.  But why and who would keep a bunch of dead people in some dark room with no windows?

 

The sound of a door opening caused my heart to skip a beat and my breathing to become even faster if that was possible.  I heard the click of heels on the floor.  Judging by the sound and pace of the footsteps, I’d say that whoever it was was coming down a flight of stairs.  They stopped just before the light could illuminate their features and stayed in the shadows.

 

“I see you’re awake.” they said.  It was a female speaking.  “And you seem to be panicking, like the others.”  She let out a soft chuckle, as if seeing me cornered and helpless was amusing.

 

“Who--?  What?” I stuttered out.  My rapidly beating heart and panicky state did not help at all with my ability to form words in a situation such as this.  

 

“Don’t worry, take your time.” the girl said.  Her voice sounded exactly like mine.  It didn’t sound like that before.  How was she doing that?

 

“C-come int-to the l-light.” I managed to say in a semi-calm tone, despite freaking out internally.

 

The girl let out another laugh before doing what I asked.  I came face to face with someone with dirty blond hair like mine and wearing the same clothes that I was wearing at that moment.  She was the same height as me and her face was covered by a mask.  The left half of it was red and had a happy actor face while the right half was blue and had a sad face.  It was creepy looking, but I couldn’t seem to look away.

 

“Show me your face.” I demanded.  I sounded a lot more confident than I actually was.

 

The girl raised a hand to the mask and lifted it away, while the other was behind her back.  I stared into the face of the girl.  She looked exactly like me.  The same hazel eyes, nose shape and pale lips.  Heck, she even got the small scar under her right eye, which is identical to the one on my face.  Her face mirrored mine.  I blinked in surprise and suddenly she was gone.  In her place was an old mirror.  The edges rusted and the glass cracked.  I stared at my fractured reflection in confusion.  Wasn’t that girl just there?  

 

I sat down, facing the mirror, and rested my head on my hands.  Obviously my reflection mirrored my actions, but after what happened with the girl, I’ll call her the Doppelgänger, I don’t think that I’ll ever look at a reflective surface the same way again.

 

Some time had passed since my encounter with the Doppelgänger.  I don’t know how long I’ve been kept here.  I had my phone, but it was dead, rendering it completely useless.  I sighed, shoving it into my pocket as I walked around the room.  It was getting stuffy, and harder to breath as each minute passed.  I let out short, ragged breaths and my hands tugged at my hair, threatening to tear it out of my scalp.  The occasional pain reminded me that this was no dream.  Not to mention all the mangled corpses in the room.  It seemed too real, too vivid to seem like a nightmare.

 

I wondered how my parents reacted to me being missing from the house.  What did my friends think?  Did they have the party?  Or were they searching for me, but to no avail?

 

Tears started to leak out of my eyes, dripping to the ground in an uneven pattern.  Why did this happen to me?

 

As I drowned myself in my tears and misery, I heard the door open again.  The click-click of heels told me that it was the Doppelgänger.  What did she want?  Was she here to gloat?  Or was she here for another reason?

 

“I’m surprised you haven’t tried to escape.” she said.  This time she sounded like my father.  What?  Is that even possible?

 

“You try escaping from a room with no windows with nothing but a dead phone.” I said sarcastically.  That surprised me.  I was able to be sarcastic in a situation like this.

 

If the Doppelgänger was fazed by my sarcastic comment, she didn’t show it.  I couldn’t see her face anyways.  She had that creepy mask on again.  Her hands were at her side, in a relaxed position, but seemed to be gripping something with a handle.  Her arm moved and I saw a metallic glint in the dim lighting.

 

A knife.

 

She had a freaking knife.

 

That thought alone was enough to send me scrambling backwards only for my back to hit the wall.  I was trapped.

 

She advanced slowly, the gleam of the blade getting brighter and more clearer as she got closer.  I froze on the spot.  It was like my feet were rooted to the ground by some invisible force that refused to let me go.

 

The Doppelgänger stopped a foot away from me.  Her silhouette was faintly outlined in the poor lighting.  She held the knife up.  The blade was now inches away from my chest.  I held my breath as she stopped moving altogether. 

 

I’m gonna die.

 

I’m gonna die.

 

I’M GONNA DIE!!!

 

My brain repeated that over and over and over again.  The masked girl in front of me seemed to enjoy my hyperventilating and distress.  The thought disgusted me.  

 

“Y-you c-c-can’t hurt me…….” I mumbled mostly to myself.  “Y-you’re n-not r-real…..only an illusion.  Trick of the light.  Reflection...”

 

“Oh, but I can hurt you.” Her voice now sounded like Emily’s.  “And I’m not just a reflection.  I’m your worst nightmare.”

 

Immediately after she said that, I felt a sharp sting on my right shoulder.  My hand instinctively clutched at it, only to pull away when it came in contact with a wet substance.  A slightly metallic smell filled my nose and I started to panic even more.  Wincing in pain, I managed to stumble/walk into a more lit area in the room.  I was scared to see what the Doppelgänger did to me, but I needed to know how bad the damage was.  I was not prepared at all for what I saw.

 

My shoulder was torn and blood was flowing steadily from the wound.  Did she do that with a single cut?  I wasted no time in ripping off a strip of fabric from the bottom of my shirt and wrapping it around my wound.  The blood soaked through, but the flow seemed to be slowing down slightly.  I groaned, ripping away another strip of fabric and tying that around the previous strip.  It seemed to stop the blood flow for now, but I knew that the slightest movement could cause the wound to open up again.  

 

Now that my wound was sort of taken care of, my next main concern was to escape this room.  I felt around with my left hand and it closed around a small cylindrical object.  I walked back to the lit area and examined the object I grabbed.  It was a pocket knife, with a dull blade.  I’m not going to question why I didn’t see that before, but right now, I could care less.  I had something that could get me out of here.  

 

My left hand held the knife weakly, as it was my non dominant hand.  I felt around, looking for the stairs that the Doppelgänger always used.  My fingertips hit a raised section of wood?  Or was it concrete?  My mind didn’t focus on the material of the stairs, only on the fact that I found them.  If the Doppelgänger could use this to get in and out, then so can I!  I actually had a chance of escaping!

 

As silently as I could, I crept up the steps.  It was surprisingly easy, even though I had a stab wound on my shoulder and my feet felt like blocks of lead.  I made it to what looked like a dead end after an eternity.  I groaned.  All that work for nothing?  I rested my palm on the “wall”, taking a rest when it moved ever so slightly.  I noticed the movement and perked up.  With hope in my heart, I tried pushing it again and it swung away, revealing a room.  It looked like my bedroom…..

 

It is my bedroom!  I recognized the twilight light bulbs and the dim lighting it cast in the room.

 

How did I get here?

 

I thought I was trapped in the creepy room with corpses.  Everything was so messed up.  I was shook from my thoughts by the door slamming shut behind me.

 

I jumped and turned around, coming face to face with………Emily?

 

No, that can’t be her!  She’s at her own house.  Even if it was her, she isn’t supposed to be here until the party.

 

“You ok?” Emily asked.

 

I nodded mutely, not fully grasping how serious and how wrong the situation was.

 

My friend gestured for me to follow her.  I did as I was told, or tried to.  I only took one step before my vision faded to black.

 

My eyes snapped open and I felt around.  My hands touched something soft.  It was my blanket.  I was back on my bed.  Wasn’t I just here, but in front of the door……

 

The door!  

 

I ran to the wall and felt around for anything.  A tiny crevice, indent, anything to show that there was a door hidden behind the wall.

 

Nothing was there.  

 

I suddenly thought of something else.  Didn’t I get stabbed?  I checked my shoulder and found nothing.  There wasn’t any bloodied strips of cloth and there definitely wasn’t any gaping wound.  What?

 

Was everything that happened just a nightmare?

 

The rest of the day continued on as normal.  It was as if I never got kidnapped by some crazy, masked girl with a knife.

 

I never knew why she did that and I guess I’ll never know.

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Posted by: Anonymous User

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The twenty year old sighed as she closed her laptop.  The feeling she felt from earlier only seemed to grow worse.  She was on edge, her eyes darting around and lingering in the dark corners.  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a figure.  She screamed in surprise before realizing that it was just her reflection in her vanity mirror.  She laughed before she turned away.

 

“Stop being paranoid.” she scolded herself.  “It’s just my reflection.  There’s no one here…right?”

 

She proceeded to clear up her work area, which was littered with papers.  As she cleaned, she felt the sensation of someone breathing down her neck.  Her eyes widened as she realized that she was not alone in her room.  The papers slipped from her hands and fell in a pile on the ground.

 

“Are you sure?” a voice whispered softly.  It was barely audible, but it was loud enough to send goosebumps down her arms.

 

She turned around slowly and came face to face with the one person she hoped would never encounter again.

 

Pale skin, blue-green hair and that creepy red-blue mask.

 

“You see, that wasn’t your reflection.  That was me.” the Doppelgänger said.  “And I’m sure you remember what I told you three years ago.  I’m not just a reflection, I’m your worst nightmare.”

 

That night, an ear-piercing scream echoed through the quiet neighbourhood.  When the police arrived at the girl’s house, they found nothing but a trashed house, some bloodstains on the wall and a note that said:

 

Be careful who you trust,

Looks can deceive.

You’ll never know if

It’s a reflection

Or me.

~S.H.

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