DON'T TURN - A SHORT STORY

 Hey! I'm Henry Matthews, you must have heard my name as I became insanely popular about 6 years ago. I was in a coma and trust me when I say that a state of prolonged unconsciousness is far better than witnessing a havoc. One day is all that it takes to turn a glib life into something ominous that changes everything. People often used to call me a curious genius as if I were a prodigy but that one sleepless night made me a retard who lost all his senses.

What I went through is still an unraveled mystery for me as I fail to classify the events of that day as reality. Was it my imagination? If yes then I don't reckon how could it be so vivid that reminiscing about it still haunts me. And if it were all real then one shall not consider whatever I reveal as something superficial.

Covid-19 was at its peak, death and sanitizers were everywhere but I was locked up in my room, sleeping while I attended my online classes and later blamed the teacher for not working hard enough because I had a bunch of doubts. Still, I was working hard for my SAT exams and as far I remember I worked hard enough that even after studying for 7-8 hours that I had time to binge-watch a Netflix series and brainstorm about random shit on the internet.

One day, while surfing through the web I came across a decade old news of my own city. Curious I was, so I clicked on it. The headline popped up as soon as the website loaded. “Woman mysteriously disappears after neighbors claimed she committed suicide”

The article stated that the woman was found dead, lying on the floor with blood dripping from her skull. A neighbor claimed that moments before the woman died, she was yelling something like “Don't turn” loudly while bashing her head back and forth on a dressing table mirror. The woman died maybe from serious head injury, but the mirror she banged her head on just had spiderweb like cracks, and surprisingly it wasn't in pieces. The neighbor who first came in, ran back in shock and terror and next time when people came back then the corpse vanished. All that was there was the mirror with stains of fresh red blood on it. The article also stated some people think that the mirror might be cursed while others said it was just a failed suicide attempt that made her run out of shame. It was all too creepy for me and before, I could close the tab I saw my address at the bottom of the page. I rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn't hallucinating, but it was there, which meant that the house I was living in was the place where this accident took place. 

I was scared gutless, and so I tried to check all the stuff that was there in the house before I came in to settle in as a permanent tenant. There was a dining table, a closet, a bed and a refrigerator. Gratefully, at the first try I wasn't able to find anything, specifically I came across no mirror. Human nature is quite complex and the urge to do something again and again is dangerous. It just grows on you, drives you insane and then slaps you with a touch of reality. I spent my all day re-reading that article and searching for that mirror. It was hard for me to believe that something paranormal could really exist in the form of a non-living object. While searching for that mirror I came across several scratched scribbles on walls and under the rug, all of them saying one thing “Don't turn”. 

That day hunger wasn't something I was concerned with, I dozed off while reading that article for the 20th time maybe, but I was helpless. How could I live in a place where somebody committed suicide, and I was completely unaware of it for the complete six months. It was three past midnight or something I guess when I woke up. The silence made me restless and then after scratching my head out of discombobulation I decided to move things a bit to find that mirror. Finally, I succeeded, but success isn't always fruitful as sometimes it just makes you repent and kills you from inside.

After an hour or two I heard sudden knocks on some glass. I check the windows and even the main door, but nobody was there. I heard it again then I was sure, it originating from somewhere near me. Then I pushed the refrigerator and behind that was the mirror. It was long and a majestic look it had. Blankets of dust rested upon it. Its beauty seemed psychogenic, and it felt as if slowly I wanted to own it. I wiped out the dust from my hand as I wasn't able to control my urge to look into the mirror but when I did my heart stopped. As I wiped the dirt from it, I saw uncleaned red blots of blood, then the web like cracks and once it was clean I saw her standing right behind me. Sweat rested upon my eyebrows and forehead and my heart raced. In the reflection I saw a woman who was weeping blood from her eyes and her skull was cracked open. Shitlessly scared I was and rather than turning I pulled out my phone and opened the front camera and what I saw was so vivid that even after six years of unconsciousness I'm still able to close my eyes and get myself haunted by that memory. The camera caught me the picture of that blood weeping lady who stood right behind me and that was when I fell head first, flat on the floor. Then It was all darkness.

 I'm not sure if it was something imaginary or real, but I'm sure that I didn't turn my head. Maybe that's why I'm alive but I haven't been as good I used to be because I still dream of her and still whenever my sleep breaks, it is because of the knocks on the glass that I hear from time to time.

- Rawwn

23rd July 2020

11:20 P.M