Ataraxia : A Short Story Collection

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

It was 11:00 pm on a November Friday.

The sky had a few patches of clouds and, the waning moon shone brightly amidst a few twinkling stars.

On this lovely Bella Notte, I wanted to be at home, watching reruns of my favorite Disney movies in my PJ's. But, my friends had different ideas.

They had decided to play a prank on me by faking the dark mirror ritual. So, they convinced me to perform the dark reflection ritual.

So, on a dark and cold night, with only a single candle burning in the center of the basement, we sat in a circle around it. There were six of us- my best friend Julia and her boyfriend Jake, Max, Laki, Sean, and myself.

We were at Julia's house. Her parents were out for the night. So, they decided to perform the ritual there.

My friends had placed tricks all around her house so that they could fall for it purposely and me, accidentally.

The main idea of the ritual was to endure bad luck for a whole night so that you had great luck for the next few days.

So, just as it struck 11:00 pm, we began the ritual.

Julia held a mirror in her hand while Laki read us the rules.

"To begin the ritual, you must look your reflection in the eyes, transferring your negative energy into the mirror. Then, you need to lean forward and breathe onto the mirror, making it fog up."

I felt a shiver run down my back. I looked at Laki and, she continued to read.

"Everyone in the group needs to repeat this step. Then, we use the candle to burn the mirror until there is a black mark. After this, the final step is to break and run. Then, we have to survive the night," she read as she turned off her phone and looked at us.

"So, we stare at our eyes, breath on it, and pass it on?" Julia asked and, Laki nodded.

Max glanced at me real quick before turning back to Julia.

If I had known their plan, their smiles were of excitement.

Excited to watch my blood curdle and listen to me scream.

Julia looked at us with an evil twinkle in her eyes and looked into the mirror for a few seconds. Then, she fogged it up with her breath and passed it on to Jake, who did the same.

Then, he passed it on to me. I looked at everyone and then into the mirror.

I looked into my hazel-colored eyes. My dilated pupils looked endless. I was left dazed, as though something within the mirror was pulling me in.

"Cassie!" Jake called me, giving me a gentle push. Hard enough to bring me back to reality.

"Sorry," I muttered and breathed on the mirror.

"You okay, Cassie?" Jake asked as he looked at me. It was as though I was in a trance. Something in that mirror felt wrong.

"Ye...Yeah," I said. I had a bad feeling but, I kept quiet.

I watched Laki breathe onto the mirror and keep it in the center next to the candle.

"Shall we burn it?" Laki asked with a slight smile on her face.

Jake looked at me once again and turned to Julia.

"Jules, I don't think we should do this," he said.

"There is no way we are backing out now... do you know how long it took me to convince Cassie to join us?" she asked.

"Cassie doesn't look too well, Julia," Jake said. But Julia completely ignored him.