I Found a Mirror That Shows the Version of Me That Never Survived

I didn’t know the thrift shop even existed until I walked into it.

It was tucked between a boarded-up bakery and a hardware store that smelled like rust and wet cardboard. The bell above the door didn’t ring when I walked in. No music. No people. Just silence — the kind of silence that felt like it was waiting for you.

I wasn’t looking for anything.

But it found me.

A tall mirror in the back corner, covered with a gray sheet and a yellow sticky note that read:

“Don’t look too long.”

Which, of course, I did.

I pulled the cover off slowly. The glass was old, foggy at the edges, but clear in the center. I expected to see my tired, hollow-eyed self. I’d been through a breakup, a panic attack, and a two-day spiral that involved no sleep and four bowls of instant noodles.

But I didn’t see me.

Not exactly.

The person in the mirror looked like me. Same hair. Same body. Same clothes.

But they were thinner. Pale. Eyes sunken. Their wrists were bruised. Their smile — twisted in a way I’d never smiled before. It looked like the version of me I left behind in college, after a bottle of pills and a cry for help no one heard in time.

I blinked.

They didn’t.

They just stared. And then mouthed something I couldn’t hear but felt in my chest:

“You forgot me.”

I stepped back.

But they didn’t move.

Then the mirror began to shift. The reflection changed.

Now, I saw myself at 14 — hiding under my bed during one of my dad’s screaming fits.

Then 17 — shaking in the school bathroom, trying to breathe.

Then 21 — holding a goodbye letter, unfinished.

Each time the reflection changed, the version of me in the mirror grew darker — more distant. Like the more I stared, the more pieces of me it absorbed.

And then, I saw a version of me hanging by a thread — literally.

Neck bruised. Feet just inches above the ground. Eyes wide open.

Dead.

I fell back.

The mirror stayed still.

And for a brief second, the reflection smiled again and whispered:

“I’m still here. You just stopped looking.”

I ran. Left the mirror. Left the store. Didn’t look back.

I returned the next day, desperate to convince myself it was a hallucination. A dream. A trauma echo.

But the thrift shop wasn’t there.

Just an empty lot.

Not even a footprint in the dust.

Now?

Now every time I walk by a mirror, I check too long.

Just in case.

Sometimes I catch a glimpse of that other me — out of the corner of my eye.

Still watching.

Still smiling.

Still waiting for me to give up again.