Cecelia Ahern: Girl in the Mirror

She went next door to the room Grellie never allowed her into; it had the best mirror in the house. A free-standing, full-length mirror. Lila had been in plenty of times but never looked in the mirror. She respected Grellie’s wishes. But today was her wedding day and for the first time in twenty-eight years she was going to disobey her. If Grellie ever found out, though there was no reason why she would, then she would just explain. The most important day of her life to date. Grellie would understand. And if she didn’t under stand, she would forgive.

The spare bedroom had the damp smell of a room never aired, the mustiness of a room never cleaned and the iciness of a room not heated in over thirty years.

Lila felt like a naughty school girl as she pulled back the black sheet, half expecting a monster to jump out. Her heart was in her mouth. But as the fabric fell away, she was taken aback by the sight. Her. Just her. A pretty her. A beautiful her. Looking so grown up in the dress. Her eyes teared up and she felt ridiculous over such vanity. She took a step backward to get the full view. It was perfect. She felt perfect. She thought of her childhood, well and truly over now, her parents, the loss of so many things but the joy of what was to come. Silly. All over a dress.

She welled up again, laughed at herself and tried to waft air at her eyes so that the tears wouldn’t fall and ruin her make-up. But it was too late. A tear ran down her cheek.

‘Damn it.’ She moved closer to the mirror to inspect the damage done to her eye make-up.

Smudged a little.

She did her best with her fingertips to smooth it out again. This would be her only opportunity, no more mirrors until after the church and then it would be too late.

Close up, she saw her forehead suddenly crease. A sudden movement. Unusual because she didn’t feel like she was frowning. Lines appearing on her wedding day. Great.

She moved her fingers to her forehead to feel for the bumps but, bizarrely, her fingers did not comply in her reflection. Warning bells went off in her head.

‘Lila,’ she heard Grellie call.

She couldn’t answer, she didn’t want Grellie to hear her voice come from the spare bedroom. Suddenly she didn’t want to explain anything. She’d made a mistake, she knew it. She’d always known Grellie was a rational woman, that her fears must have been for a reason. She’d always respected that, trusted it, however only then truly acknowledged it.

Startled, she stood upright. Her reflection was in sync then. She laughed, realising her imagination was playing up. She reached her hand out to touch the mirror.

‘Lila, is everything okay up there?’

Suddenly the hand in the mirror turned, grabbed. She felt flesh, cold cold flesh, then she was pulled forcefully through the glass mirror, which felt like an icy blast of air on her skin. She was faced with herself, in a wedding dress. She looked to her right, the room was displayed back to her like a TV screen. The stark bed, with brass headboard, the dark, unworn floorboards. The white walls, the dusty bedside tables. A chair against the wall. That was it. An empty space where she had been standing. The door closed.

‘Well, well, we finally meet in the flesh,’ the girl opposite her said. She didn’t sound like Lila and on further inspection didn’t look exactly like her either. There was something missing behind the eyes.

They were dead, cold.

Lila looked around. The room in which she was standing was the exact reflection of the spare bedroom. Everything reversed. The picture the bed, the nightstands, the door.

‘Lila!’ she heard Grellie again.

‘I’m here!’ she heard her voice scream out. Desperation. Panic.

‘She can’t hear you,’ the voice sang.

Lila turned to go back out of the mirror but she bumped against cold. Cold nothingness. A wall of cold.

‘And you can’t get out,’ the sing-song voice continued.

‘Who are you?’ Lila finally spoke, anger and fear causing her voice to tremble.

‘Well today,’ she looked down, ‘it looks like I’m the bride. Da - da - da - da,’ she sang and laughed.

‘Who the hell are you?’

‘Oh now, really, that upsets me. You look at me everyday and you don’t see me?’

Lila’s mouth opened, then closed, no idea what to say, her mind moving at the speed of light as she tried to figure it all out. Was it a hoax? Some cruel joke played by her friends on the morning of her wedding? But she knew it was not. It felt too real, she was not imagining this. Her natural instincts were telling her she was in serious danger.

‘Well I see you everyday,’ the girl continued. ‘I look back at you everyday. You’re not as perfect as you make yourself out to be, are you?’ She smiled slyly.

‘I want to get out of here,’ Lila said, coldly now. ‘Get me the hell out of here. Or else.’

‘Or else what?’ The girl smiled, happy with the challenge. ‘Will you hurt me?’

Lila looked around the reversed room, her eyes scanning for weapons. She was well able to defend herself. You don’t have a grandmother with no eyes, who is afraid of mirrors and hasn’t left her home in over thirty years, living in a wild house on the tip of the headland, without learning how to defend yourself. Well she could and she would.

She looked around.

Her eyes fell upon one of the bedside lockers, and she remembered hiding a letter opener there after playing a game with a friend. She had been too afraid to bring it back downstairs in case Grellie knew she had the letter opener in her posession. So she had left it there, all those years. Lila headed straight for the locker, her trail sweeping the reflected dust along the floor, but none of it moved. She opened the drawer.

The girl threw her head back and laughed. ‘What on earth are you doing?’

The drawer was empty. Inside was just a black hole, not even a bottom in the drawer.

‘Don’t you get it? They’re just props. Nothing here is real. It’s a reflection . It’s not real.’

‘Then you’re not real,’ Lila snapped back. ‘That means that you are just a reflection, that you are nothing, that you are not real.’

‘Lila, I’m the realest thing in here right now. I’m the only one who can get out of here.’

Lila swallowed.

‘Lila!’ Grellie called. Her voice was louder now, not just through urgency but because she was getting closer. Lila heard her footsteps on the stairs. She couldn’t make up her mind whether she wanted Grellie to enter the room or not. She wouldn’t though, she wouldn’t know the sheet had been moved. Unless she felt her way, and she did not want Grellie to touch the glass.

‘Here she is,’ the girl said, raising an eyebrow, looking as though she were about to eat a banquet of food after a lifetime of starvation. ‘I haven’t seen that bitch for a long time. But I suppose she hasn’t seen me either.’ She giggled. ‘You know you did well to listen to the old cow. You never looked in any of the mirrors ever. Twenty-eight years Lila. Why? Were you afraid?’

She didn’t allow Lila to answer.

‘But of all the days to disobey her.’ She tutted as though Lila were a naughty child. ‘The most important day of your life? Looks like I’ll be the one sleeping with Jeremy tonight. I’ll enjoy that.’

Lila couldn’t help it. She reached out and slapped the girl hard across the cheek. The icy coldness of her cheek stung Lila’s hand. The girl’s head whipped to the side then back again. She held her hand to her cheek, then she started laughing.