CHAPTER 12:THE GIRL IN THE MIRROR
1305 Words
Elizabeth had grown used to the sounds by now—the soft creaking of her apartment settling, the slight hum of the refrigerator, the faint wind that whispered through old cracks. But tonight, every sound felt distorted. Stretched. Twisted. Wrong.
Her bathroom light flickered again.
Not unusual.
But the feeling that accompanied it—the cold, the tightening air, the sudden heaviness in her lungs—was becoming impossible to ignore. Karma was restless. The nights grew louder the closer it got to its next message.
Elizabeth stood in her bedroom doorway, staring at the bathroom mirror. It was fogged even though she hadn’t turned on any hot water. Her reflection was barely visible, just a faint silhouette in the murky glass.
A shiver crawled down her spine.
“Mara said this would happen,” she whispered to herself. “She said Karma always shows what needs to be seen.”
But knowing didn’t make it any easier.
She stepped forward, the cold tiles biting her bare feet. Her heartbeat thudded softly, echoing in the small space. She wiped the mirror with her palm, clearing a streak down the center.
Her reflection stared back at her… except something felt off. Her eyes looked a little darker. Her face a little more hollow. Her breath hitched.
Something moved behind her.
She spun, but nothing was there. The hallway remained empty, still, silent.
When she turned back to the mirror—
her reflection was no longer mimicking her movements.
Her blood froze.
The girl in the glass tilted her head slowly, mechanically, like a puppet being guided by invisible strings. Elizabeth stepped back, but the reflection stepped forward, pressing her palm against the other side of the glass.
A faint, wet streak slid down the mirror, as if the reflection itself was crying.
“No,” Elizabeth whispered. “Not this. Not tonight.”
The reflection opened her mouth, but no sound came. Instead, her lips moved silently, forming a single name.
Amara.
A violent chill ripped through Elizabeth’s chest.
The girl’s face shifted—her features softening into a younger version, a face Elizabeth had not seen in years. Brown eyes too wide, too innocent. A smile that had once lit up entire hallways. Hair tied with a simple blue ribbon.
Amara.
Elizabeth staggered back until her spine hit the wall. Her lungs stuttered, her heart thumped painfully as memories she had buried deep clawed their way up.
The shy girl in their literature class.
The girl Kian pretended to like.
The girl he used as bait to impress his friends.
The girl they bullied because she was too gentle, too trusting.
The girl who vanished after a humiliating video was spread—
and never returned.
“Mara said Karma shows imbalance,” Elizabeth whispered shakily. “Amara was the first imbalance. The one he never paid for.”
The girl in the mirror pressed her forehead to the glass as though begging to be heard.
Elizabeth slowly stepped closer, her breath trembling. “What do you want?”
A soft c***k split across the corner of the mirror. Then another. Thin fractures spiderwebbed outward, framing Amara’s reflection in harsh white lines.
As the cracks spread, the bathroom lights flickered so violently that shadows jerked across the walls like living things. Elizabeth’s pulse roared in her ears.
“Please,” she whispered, “don’t show me—”
But Karma had no interest in mercy.
The scene in the mirror darkened, the reflection shifting until Elizabeth was no longer looking at the bathroom—she was looking at a memory.
A memory she had tried to forget.
Amara stood in the school courtyard years ago, clutching her books to her chest. She smiled shyly when Kian approached her. He brushed her hair from her face, whispered something sweet. Something rehearsed.
Something cruel.
Elizabeth saw her younger self leaning against a wall with Daniel and Lucas, all of them laughing at the way Amara blushed when Kian touched her hand. Shame pierced through her chest like a knife. She hadn’t meant to be part of it. She had been trying to fit in. And Kian had been the center of everything. The boy she wanted so desperately to see her.
But trying to belong had made her cruel.
In the mirror, Amara dropped her books. Lucas snatched her notebook, reading her private notes out loud. Daniel recorded everything on his phone. Kian pretended to defend her, but he didn’t. He pushed her lightly, playfully—just enough to make her stumble.
Elizabeth’s hands shook as she watched her teenage self laugh, even though she could see the truth now: Amara’s eyes weren’t embarrassed. They were broken.
“I didn’t mean it,” Elizabeth whispered to the mirror. “I didn’t know it would go so far.”
The mirror flickered to another scene.
Amara alone.
Crying behind the old school building.
Clutching her phone.
Her face pale and devastated.
Elizabeth recognized the day.
The day the video spread.
The day Kian lied—claiming Amara had thrown herself at him.
The narration in Elizabeth’s mind broke apart when she saw something she had never known.
Amara staring into a mirror.
Holding scissors.
Cutting her hair.
Cutting the blue ribbon.
Cutting until she had nothing left to cut.
Then darkness.
A shadow wrapped around her like smoke.
Elizabeth gasped and stumbled back. “No—no, she didn’t—she didn’t—”
But the mirror showed the truth: Amara didn’t die by her own hand. She died because she was swallowed by the darkness Karma represented—destroyed by the humiliation, betrayal, and cruelty inflicted upon her.
And Kian was the root of it.
But Elizabeth…
Elizabeth had stood there too.
The lights in her bathroom snapped off entirely. She was swallowed in darkness, the air sharp with cold.
A whisper slid through the room.
“Elizabeth…”
She froze.
The voice was soft, trembling—Amara’s voice. The same voice she remembered from school, a voice that never hurt anyone.
Elizabeth’s breath trembled. “I’m sorry,” she whispered into the dark. “Amara, I’m so sorry.”
The mirror glowed faintly, outlining a thin silhouette. The girl in the glass pressed her hand against the surface again. This time, cracks formed under her palm like veins.
A single tear slid down the reflection’s cheek—dark, thick, almost like ink.
Elizabeth lifted her hand, pressing it against the cold glass. “You didn’t deserve any of it.”
The mirror groaned under pressure. The cracks widened, splitting the girl’s reflection into fragments.
Then—
everything went still.
The light flickered back on.
The mirror was whole again. Perfect. Untouched.
Her own reflection stared back at her, pale, shaking, hollow-eyed.
But on the glass—just beneath her palm—was a smeared mark. A handprint. Smaller than hers. Not hers.
A child’s handprint.
Elizabeth’s knees weakened.
Karma had shown her the past.
And the message was clear:
Amara wasn’t done.
Her story wasn’t finished.
And Elizabeth was no longer just a witness.
She was part of the imbalance.
The air shifted again—lighter, but colder. The sensation of someone standing right behind her crawled up her spine.
She didn’t dare turn around.
Because for the first time…
she knew exactly who the presence belonged to.
Not Kian.
Not Mara.
Not Karma itself.
Amara.
And she wasn’t here to attack Elizabeth.
She was here to warn her.
Elizabeth swallowed hard, whispering into the cold room:
“What is Karma going to do next?”
The lights flickered.
The shadows on the wall twisted.
And in the mirror, just for a moment, Elizabeth saw the girl’s lips move again.
“He’s lying.”
Then the presence vanished.
Leaving Elizabeth cold, breathless, and more terrified than ever.
- Writer
