The House on Ashwood Lane

The second night was quieter. Almost too quiet.The Whitlocks had unpacked most of their things, though the house still felt cavernous, its long hallways swallowing every sound. Emily kept the brass key tucked under her pillow, certain it belonged to one of the doors upstairs, but none had a lock. That night, she wasn’t the only one awake. Her brother, Jason, wandered the hall around midnight. He swore he heard water dripping, though every faucet in the house was dry. The sound led him to the tall, dust-streaked mirror at the end of the corridor. It had been there when they moved in. None of them had touched it. The mirror’s frame was carved with twisting vines, the wood cracked, but what unsettled Jason most was the glass itself, dark, uneven, like it had been warped by heat. He paused. In the reflection, he could see himself standing in the hall, pale in the moonlight. But the longer he stared, the more wrong it looked. His reflection’s head tilted… before he moved. Jason blinked hard. His reflection straightened again, perfectly normal. He laughed nervously under his breath. Lack of sleep, he told himself. Too many horror movies. But when he turned to leave, the reflection didn’t. The next morning, Jason refused to walk past the mirror. His parents barely noticed, they were too busy arguing about the smell of mildew in the kitchen. Emily, though, noticed everything. She found her brother sitting on the porch, pale and silent. “What happened?” she asked. Jason shook his head. “The mirror’s wrong. Don’t look at it.”Emily glanced back through the doorway. From the hall, the mirror glimmered faintly, even though no light touched it. That night, Emily couldn’t sleep. She left her room and crept down the hallway toward the mirror. She stood before it, her small face reflected in the glass. For a long time, nothing happened. Then her reflection smiled. She didn’t. Her breath caught in her throat. The glass rippled, faintly, like water disturbed by a stone. And in the reflection, a figure stood behind her. Emily spun around. The hallway was empty. She turned back, the reflection leaned forward, pressing its hands against the inside of the glass. Her own face stared back, mouth opening wider, too wide, stretching until the glass cracked. A whisper hissed through the hallway: “The house is watching.” Emily stumbled back, clutching the brass key tight against her chest. The crack in the mirror spread like a vein across its surface, but when she blinked, it was gone. Perfectly smooth. Perfectly whole. And her reflection… was still smiling.

To be continued…