Locked in a room with no doors, no windows, and no clocks—A sudden helplessness ran course through my body. I wasn't exactly sure what to think or how to feel, or if I could believe what I was seeing had actually been real. When someone’s trapped like this, it takes all of their willpower not to destroy themselves.
To look, to truly see the person on the other side of the reflective glass, it would allow more people to see exactly who they are. After all, the reflection in a mirror is often lost or tainted by the human ego, and we’re all guilty of succumbing to such a monstrosity as the ego itself. It’s just a matter of admitting it and realizing that everyone suffers from their own form of ego… but not everyone suffers from what I’ve been suffering for all these years. I’m not entirely sure that anyone is suffering in the way that I am.
I eyed the table as I placed a hand on its rugged surface, with a single finger pointed outward as if I was pointing at something in front of me. When I stopped, another finger was pointing back at me, nearly mirroring the position of my own. I traced from where the finger was—up the wrist, and then the arm, and then I looked further up to see a pair of stiff shoulders, a tensed neck, and a rather heated head. I realized then that this person looking back at me had actually been myself.
There, in the middle of the table, was the mirror—And my reflection had been staring back at me. I couldn’t possibly say he was my own flesh and blood, but then again… I brushed the thought from one of my shoulders, though only metaphorically. However, the reflection staring back at me formed only the hint of a sinister grin, which is when I realized that whoever had been staring through the mirror… wasn’t me, or at least not anymore.
Then the hand began to move. Slowly my mirrored self ran his hand across his arm, up his shoulder, and then his neck… not stopping until it touched the middle of his forehead. My own arm was still where it was, at my side, so I wondered how the mirrored version of myself could be doing this.
He tapped his forehead a few times, and to my surprise a pulsing sensation spurred throughout my own forehead. I couldn’t figure out why, or for what reason. All I knew was that this couldn’t be happening. However, it was.
“Knock knock.” my mirrored self spat out, “Anybody home?”
“What?—What is this?” I stuttered. I had no idea what was happening, or why there was another version of me in that mirror, or why I sat in an empty room with no doors or windows, and just a mirror in the middle of a table.
“This?” asked my mirrored self, “This is your Cell.”
“My Cell…?”
“Your prison.”
“I-I don’t understand,” I said, “Prison?”
“Your mind is held within the cells of your body.” my mirrored self proclaimed, “Think about it. Your body is a prison, and your mind is a prisoner. Open your mind and you will be released from your sentence.”
“But why am I here?” I asked, now intrigued.
“Everyone has a purp—”
“No,” I interrupted abruptly, “Why am I sitting here? This isn’t real.”
“Oh, this is very real.” my mirrored self replied, “All of this is real, though there is more to reality than just the ‘real’. There is more than you know altogether.”
“You’re not answering my question.” I exclaimed, “Why am I in this room in front of you?”
“Different question,” said my mirrored self, “but I will answer it all the same. I am you, though I am also not you. I am your thought, but not your body. I live inside you, think for you, make decisions for you, and live alongside you. I correct you when you’re wrong, fix what you have broken, and heal what you have harmed. And without you, I would cease to exist, therefore I need you. I mean no harm, truly.”
“So, I’m in my head right now?” I asked.
“Metaphorically speaking. — You’re catching on quickly.”
“Why am I here and not in the world outside my head?”
“I can not answer that for you,” he said, “because I am you.”
“What can you do, then?”
“I can answer any questions about what is within you. However, only you, yourself, can experience the ‘without’ while I experience your ‘within’.”
“Why are you grinning at me like that, then?” I asked my mirrored self as he was still looking at me with that same sinister smile.
“You’ve opened up, and now we can speak. This excites me.”
“But do you have to look so evil?”
“This is not ‘evil’ on my side of the mirror. Everything here is in reverse. Everything is the opposite of what you know and what you experience. Everything is nothing, and nothing is everything.”
“Am I evil to you?” I asked.
“You are, but you are not. You are not a threat because I know more than you do. I am aware of things your mind could not even fathom if you were to try to comprehend even an ounce of what I know.”
“But why are you here? Why are we here?” I persisted with questions that I never even knew I had. — “What is the point in us existing at the exact same time? Why do mirrors project a parallel reality that seemingly copies Earth, but is completely backwards? What is the purpose?”
“Why this, why that… What’s the purpose? What does it all mean?” said my mirrored self.
The face in the mirror looked like he was mocking me, repeating what I said, though in a way that threw all of my questions back at me, like I was supposed to know them already. In fact, I knew less now than I did before. And I wasn’t sure where to go from there.
“Why do you mock me?” I calmly asked.
“Because you are not asking the right questions, or any that I would actually care about—if I could care.”
He threw in that last comment at the last moment. Had he given away one of his weaknesses just then? Did the world inside the mirror not develop emotions like ours had? It would make sense as everything in my reality was built upon emotion, and art. I wondered if his world didn’t have art as well.
“What questions should I be asking?” I said.
“That’s a start.” said my mirrored self, “You begin by asking which questions you should be asking, and then you question everything else. There is a difference between asking and questioning. One represents a means of respect, and the other represents force.”
“What do you want from me?” I said, “I’m asking you, I’m not demanding anything from you.”
“Your intent is that of the demanding kind.” said my mirrored self in response.
“Although you are claiming to be asking, you are still questioning me, my purpose, and what I am here for. I am here to help you understand. Do not take me for a fool, for I am you and you are me.”
I was left stunned, speechless, and I simply wanted to get away from this room, from this mirror, and the entity inside the mirror who I’d originally mistaken for a reflection of me. I’d come to the conclusion that this was something else; a creature of some sorts trying to trick me into believing that we were the same.
My physical body moved separately from the mirrored image, signifying that we were two entirely different beings. Knowing this allowed me to plan an escape, to find a way out of this “prison”, as he called it.
Unless…Yes! That’s it!
I wasn’t the one inside the prison. He only wanted me to believe that, but for what reason? Why had he tried so hard to trick me, convince me that we were the same?
“You’re not me.” I said after a long breath of silence filled the air.
“Excuse me?” said the mirrored entity, “Not you?”
“No,” I began, “I created you, but we are not the same. Far from it.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I am allowed to experience emotion, while something is preventing you from doing so… And you wanted to switch places with me.”
His grin grew deeper.
“Very good.” said the entity, “You saw right through me… What will you do now?”
“I’m leaving.” I said.
“What?” asked the entity in confusion, “You can’t leave.”
“Yes I can.” I said, “There’s a door right over there.”
I pointed to an empty wall, to where a wooden door manifested by sheer thought. I stood up, kicked the chair back, and walked over towards it.
“Wait, where are you going?” demanded the entity.
“I’m leaving, I’m going home. And by the way, it seems like you’re the one who’s questioning things, now. It seems like you’re the one panicking, and making a ruckus about me leaving. If you had me in your best interest, you’d let me leave and I would return from time to time to chat.”
“Do not walk out on me.” said the mirrored entity, “We are meant to exist together.”
“No,” I said, “You’re everything I wouldn't want to be around. You’re toxic.”
“Then, so are you.” croaked the entity, “We are the same! You are toxic, too!”
His calm demeanor quickly turned to hostility. It was as though by simply willing myself to leave, I was killing him, whatever it was.
“I need to let this go.” I said, “I created you from my own underlying sorrows. I can live without you, and exist without you. And I can banish you to the pits of my psyche and not feel a thing. I am leaving. That’s it.”
I placed my hand on the doorknob and turned it while a bright fluorescent light shined through the cracks of the door. When I opened the door, I looked back at the mirror. The entity inside the mirror had been set on fire from the light beaming on the glass. Eventually the entire mirror was set aflame, slowly melting and eroding away.
I turned back towards the door and walked into the light-filled room. As I shut the door, I was immediately jolted out of bed.
“A dream…” I said to myself, “What else could that’ve been?”
I pulled the bedsheets off of me, wiped the tiredness from my eyes and stumbled my way to the bathroom. I turned on the light, and there in the mirror was a reflection of me, but with a slightly sinister grin in the corner of my mouth. It looked familiar for a moment, but it was then that I realized that grinning like that was a good thing. Here, a sinister grin meant the exact opposite of what I thought it meant.
It meant excitement.
Add comment
Comments