Splitting Image

Chapter 2: The Mirrors

Then, as soon as it had come, the voice was gone, fading back into silence. Gabriel struggled to stand up, shaking his head to clear the haze of agony. He heard Graham's pounding footsteps as he rushed back downstairs. "Holy shit!" Graham squeaked as he saw the overturned chairs and the scattered pills. Great, Gabriel thought, just great. Explanation time. "Um," he said, forcing himself to his feet," "I, um, i'm cool Graham. Just...just a little bit of...ah...drug rage?" It came out like a question.

Graham stared at Gabriel, not totally convinced. He looked like he was about to argue with him when their mother shouted, "Graham!" With one last confused glance at Gabriel, he rushed into the living room. Gabriel sighed in relief and stumbled into the kitchen, resting his head on the cool marble counter top. He put his head down, feeling tears pricking at the ede of his vision. The front door opened and closed with a bang, and a cocky, swaggering voice boomed, "IHHHMM HERE, BITTT-CHESS." Garret was finally home.

He walked into the living room and slung his backback into the air, narrowly missing Graham's head. "Hey, ma. Hey, Graham." He threw his head back and raised his voice so that it carried throughout the house. "HEYYY, CRAZY!" Both Graham and Garret were 18 going on 19 and identical twins. But thay were as different as sun and moon. Where Graham was meek, obedient, and a little bit of a weakling, Graham was loud, obnoxious, and had almost zero empathy for other human beings. He lived for the squeaks of terror that he could get out of a person (mainly Graham) that comes from physical pain. He had always been a bully, but ever since their father had left them, he'd gotten downright horrible.

By all rights, he and Graham should've been out of the house and on their way to college. But they had decided (unfortunately) to stay home and take care of Linda and Gabriel. He strode into the kitchen and rubbed his knuckles painfully into Gabriel's hair. He hadn't gotten any more attractive since then, either. His braces were gone, but his teeth were still jacked up. His face was still pale, but now it was speckled with angry red acne, and his shaggy black hair was still as greasy as a McDonalds hamburger. "I said, hi, crazy. Hearin' any voices today? Did they tell you to kill the president? Rob a bank?" Gabriel raised his head and threw Garret's hand off his head. "Leave me alone, you prick!" He snapped.

The whispers were back, but this time Gabriel could make out what they were saying. "Him...he needs to leave us alone... show him who's boss..." Garret laughed. "Oooh, touchy." He released Gabriel's head, then grabbed his right arm and twisted it into a chicken wing. Gabriel's back bent foward over the counter. His nose was inches away from the dishrack, where a lone carving knife stood drying in the holder, blade down and glistening with water. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as Gabriel caught his reflection in the sharp blade.

In the reflection, his eyes were not brown, but dark, forrest green, and narrowed in anger. His hair looked longer, falling into those eyes and giving him a deranged look. His skin was pale and unnaturally smooth, not a freckle or a pore. His mouth was twisted into a demonic snarl. As he stared at the reflection, unable to look away, a weird fog began to fill his head, clouding his vision and surrounding his thoughts like a painkiller.

The mouth in the reflection began to move, forming silent words that echoed throughout his mind. "Grab the knife, Gabriel...get it and break free...hold it to his neck, scare the hell out of him, make him get off of us...do it..." Gabriel, transfixed by the reflection, felt his left arm move and slowly grasp the handle of the blade, pulling it from the holder. He twirled in his fingers and lined it up with the side of Garrte's head, right above his ear.

Garret, oblivious to the knife, said, "Had enough, crazy-brain? Ready to say Uncle?" "Pull it down, Gabriel..." The reflection said, it's mouth moving once more, "Pull the knife down, make him bleed... Do it, DO IT!"  At the last second, Gabriel tore his eyes away from his reflection and dropped the knife. It clattered to the floor, bounced, and skittered under the fridge. Startled, Garret released Gabriel and backed away from him. "What the..." He stared at the fride, where the knife had disapeared, and then his eyes flickered to the now-empty dish rack. "Did you..." Avoiding his questioning gaze, Gabriel sprinted for the stairs.