The October Music - Day 11

Paint It Black
Mikhael had a problem. He didn’t ‘do’ mirrors. Didn’t own them. Didn’t use them. Ever since he was little, mirrors had held a strange sort of sway over him. They fascinated him with a sort of dark fury. When he was a baby, he would stare into the mirror on his mom’s dresser for hours, just looking at himself. Playing games and talking and laughing with his reflection. It was cute when he was little. It became less so when he got old enough to understand that what he was seeing was just himself, but continued on undaunted.

When his parents finally sat him down and explained that he wouldn’t be allowed to play his mirror games anymore, he cried. It felt, to him, like he was losing a part of himself. Still, he behaved himself and did what he could to move on with his life. The loss lingered, but he knew that it was for the best. After all, it was just a reflection. So, from that point on, he would use the mirror for its intended purpose. He would brush his hair and fix his clothes and ignore the pulsing desire in his heart to start another game. When he saw the disappointment on his reflection’s face, he knew that it was only the same look plastered on his own.

It was when he turned thirteen that he noticed some discrepancies in what he saw in the mirror. He was still clean-shaven, being unable to grow any facial hair, but his reflection wore a wispy blonde mustache. When playing basketball, he fell and cut his forehead, which healed into a visible, scar, though his reflection did not show it. There were enough differences to make him feel uneasy, to the point that he would stop looking into mirrors.

His reflection, though, didn’t like being ignored and made its feelings known. Late at night, he would hear banging on the glass and force himself not to look over to see his angry reflection staring at him. He would cover the mirror with a towel at night and, in the morning, it would be on the ground in shreds. He would turn it around and would find that it had been returned to its usual place when he woke up. He even broke it once, to no avail. It was whole in the morning.

Finally, he did the last thing he could imagine. He took thick, black paint and slathered on coat after coat until the glass was covered with inches of dry color. At last, he felt a kind of peace and was able to move on with his life. Until last night.

He awoke in the middle of the night to a scratching sound. It took a moment to register, but his stomach dropped when he realized what he was hearing. With horror, he looked over at the mirror and saw, right at the corner, a shiny, reflective patch that had been scraped away.
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From the inside.