Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN IN THE MIRRORThe knocking continued.
Three times.
Then silence.
David couldn't breathe.
“Stella,” he whispered, “what is in that wardrobe?”
She shook her head.
“Don't open it.”
“I asked what is inside.”
“David, please.”
Their mother stood suddenly.
“Everyone out.”
David stared at her.
“What?”
“Leave the house.”
Linda's voice was trembling.
“Now.”
The lights suddenly returned.
The staircase was empty.
Nobody was there.
David ran upstairs.
The bedroom door was still open.
The wardrobe stood exactly where it had been.
But one of the cash bundles was missing.
David stepped closer.
“What is happening?”
Stella grabbed him.
“We have to burn it.”
“What?”
“The money.”
“You're insane.”
She pulled him toward the wardrobe.
“Look.”
David opened the door.
One bundle was lying on the floor.
But something was written across it.
In black ink.
A single word.
STELLA.
David stared.
“How could someone write that?”
Stella began crying.
“I told you I didn't want this.”
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“What did you agree to?”
She wiped her tears.
“I didn't agree to anything.”
“Then where did the money come from?”
She hesitated.
Finally she whispered:
“A man offered me everything.”
David said nothing.
“He said our family had suffered long enough. He said there was a way to change our lives overnight.”
“And you believed him?”
“No.”
“Then why did you take it?”
Stella looked toward the mirror.
“Because he knew about Mom.”
David followed her gaze.
The old mirror reflected the room.
But David noticed something strange.
Their reflections were not moving.
He stared.
Stella wasn't blinking in the reflection.
Neither was Linda.
Then the reflection of Linda slowly turned its head toward him.
David stumbled backward.
“Did you see that?”
Stella looked.
“What?”
The mirror was normal.
David's heart hammered.
Maybe exhaustion had finally broken his mind.
Then Linda screamed.
She pointed at the mirror.
Behind their reflections stood a fourth person.
A woman.
Pale.
Long black hair.
Her throat bruised as though someone had strangled her.
David turned.
Nobody.
He looked back.
The woman was closer.
Her face appeared directly behind Stella's reflection.
Then the mirror cracked.
A single black line spread from the center to the edges.
Linda collapsed.
David rushed to catch her.
His mother grabbed his shirt.
“Listen to me.”
Her eyes were terrified.
“The money isn't money.”
“What?”
“It's payment.”
“For what?”
She looked at Stella.
Then at David.
“For us.”
That night, they locked every door.
They burned one bundle of cash in the backyard.
But the fire behaved strangely.
The notes didn't burn.
They screamed.
A high, terrible sound filled the yard.
David covered his ears.
Stella fell to her knees.
Linda whispered:
“We're too late.”
At dawn, they found another package on the front porch.
No address.
No name.
Only a photograph.
David picked it up.
His hands shook.
The photograph showed the three of them standing beside the house.
But the picture had been taken that morning.
And in the background, behind the upstairs window...
stood the dead woman from the mirror.
On the back of the photograph, five words were written.
ONE OF YOU ALREADY DIED.
David slowly looked at his mother.
Linda's face had become completely white.
May you like
Stella began sobbing.
Because she knew exactly what those words meant.
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