Drawn to the List

This is for Mikeydred's April Challenge. 

Ignore your voice long enough, and you lose yourself. 

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30-year-old Callie Lum tried to sit up in bed on April 17, her limbs mushy and uncooperative. She marked Blah Blah Blah day the same way each year--by ignoring it. Feigned ignorance made it easier for the overwhelmed, caffeine-fueled woman to cope. 

Years of nagging from well-intentioned friends and family birthed a crumpled list, which Callie kept locked in a drawer. It was a handwritten litany of things she'd never do---call her mother. Be positive. And her favorite: Get a real job

Advice was a recipe she never requested--or intended to cook.  The list wasn't just a to-do list--it was her survival script. 

When she tugged the drawer open that day, it wasn't there. Her eyes, bloodshot from lack of sleep, scanned the room, half-expecting it to leap out at her. 

And found it pinned on the refrigerator door. Like it belonged there.  By a magnet she didn't own---or recognize. The ink on it was fresher. The handwriting on it seemed to be hers...but more polished, with a crossed-out line, like a task had been completed. 

This was a to-do list that everyone loved--tasks disappeared from it daily, whether Callie did them or not. Then, the calls. She heard her mother's voice, crisp and matriarchal: "Next."

She opened the fridge--but it was empty. No food, no drinks. Just a new magnet, its surface etched with a cryptic instruction: "Almost there."

She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. But there was something--off about her reflection. It was shifting---with a life of its own. The mirror didn't just reflect her---it anticipated her. It stood when she sat. Walked when she ran. 

She screamed. 

She grabbed the list---the paper live, twitching, and a set of matches. She burnt it---but it reappeared, larger, this time with a faint glow that seemed to challenge the dark. 

She did cap the pen---it moved her hand. Callie bit her lip. Her fingers trembled,  but she wrote anyway. "Choose yourself." 

And the ink faded. 

Then, a whisper from the mirror. It rippled, along with Callie's reality.  "I've stayed here long enough." The  reflection stepped forward--out of the glass. 

She was no longer there. 

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This work is entirely original. Any AI tags are coincidental.