by Vivian Sheperis
You remember what it was like, being four feet tall, looking into the mirror, wanting to see?…Is that me?
You squint and lean closer to your five-year-old face: two eyes, two ears, a mouth, a nose. Tilting your head backwards, you peer up the nostrils into those black holes. Two pinky fingers stretch the corners of your lips wide, baring teeth. You thrust your tongue forward to open an internal cave. The mirror is the only way you can look back at yourself, and you examine the moving reflection.
You stare long and hard, deeper into your image, and refuse to blink until yourself-looking-back begins to waver. Edges grow hazy, shadowy. It is then you recall whispered stories and fearful tales you have dared half listen to, of spooks and spirits, demons and dragons, which lurk behind a person gazing long into a looking glass.
And now, for sure, ghostly forms take shape, reflecting to the right of your shoulder, then to the left. Sometimes two or more pop up or take turns coming forward and receding. The fuzzier your own face becomes, the stronger the figures around you grow. Wrapped in formless garments, they stare with black eyes, close, bone-chilling. You can not resist staring back, spellbound in some timeless space. It will not do to turn and check behind you, for you have learned that mirrors are true reflections of reality. They do not lie. After all, when you bend forward, you meet yourself in reverse and clunk heads. Stick out your tongue and you get it right back.
This phenomenon has conjured up a bizarre and frightening realm which scares the living Jesus out of you. Silently, you call out. Oh God. Please don’t let these things be real. I know they’re not, but I can’t take a chance! You swallow deeply. This is a true plea of faith beyond the five senses and the smoky glass. At the peak of alarm, your eyes slam shut, and you squeeze the lids.
Finally, in the silence, you find the courage to open them, and you see just yourself in all your clarity, a shiny red-cheeked face, a little sweaty. The only things reflected behind you are the exceedingly boring bed and chest of drawers.