THE MIRROR THAT TELLS THE FUTURE

I like going to thrift stores, swap meets, and yard sales to look for vintage items to decorate my home. I have purchased old books and antique pictures with wooden carved frames. Beautiful antique wooden furniture is also a nice find to take home. My home is a look back in time. Nothing modern at all is in it. I always go on to yard sales and swap meets on the weekends and thrift stores during the week. I am always trying to find treasures for my home.

On a Wednesday afternoon, I stopped at a thrift store owned by a very old Hungarian lady with a heavy accent. There were so many old items in that store. Some items even had dust on them. I believe that woman was not in good health and could not keep her store in good shape. It even smelled musty. As I walked around, she asked me in her heavy accent, "Is there anything special you are looking for." I said, "No, I am just looking." She kept watching me, making me uneasy.

I was there for about 20 minutes when I noticed a mirror. It was such a beautiful mirror. It was eighteen inches tall and twenty-four inches wide. The wooden frame was carved with what appeared to be angels and birds in flight and looked very old. I couldn't take my eyes off it. I asked the old lady, "How much is the wooden framed mirror you have here" She replied, “One hundred and twenty-five dollars." she added that the mirror came from Hungary and was over a hundred years old. I said I would take it, paid her the money, and went home.

I hung the mirror in the hallway between my bedroom and the bathroom. It was a perfect spot for it. You could also see it from my small living room. As time passed, I had many compliments on how beautiful the mirror was from visitors to my home. One night I woke up at midnight. I walked out of my bedroom to the bathroom. I walked past the mirror and expected to see my reflection. But it was not my reflection. It was an earthquake event played like a video in the mirror. I was shocked and thought I must be dreaming, but I wasn't. And as quickly as I saw it, it returned to being a regular mirror. About two weeks later, a devastating earthquake destroyed an island in the Pacific. I was so terrified, knowing that it was the island in the mirror. That mirror showed future events. I could not view anything during the day. It just showed the future events at midnight. I stayed up until midnight every night to see what it would show me. The mirror did not show events every night. A week later, it showed a terrible flood in a United States city with many dead and heavy rains. A week later, a hurricane hit Louisiana with the same results. It was getting hard to sleep, wondering what tragedy would be next.

After several months of viewing tragedies I could do nothing about, I viewed an event that shook me. It was a famous rock star shot and killed by a crazed sniper on a hill outside the concert area. The concert will take place the following week. Maybe I could prevent this event from happening. I searched the rock stars' managers' information and tried calling several times. Since he never answered, I left messages and left my number for him to call me back. After several days and nothing, I was getting worried. So I decided to go to the concert and try to do something.

At the concert, I couldn't help looking at the hills around the concert area but could see no one. The concert was loud, and the music was blasting. Now I could see movement on one of the hills and knew what would happen. I tried to rush the stage, yelling get off the stage, get off the stage. Security stopped me, and I said someone on the hill would shoot him and get him off the stage. But they kept holding me down, and I kept yelling, and as they held me, I heard three shots, all three striking the rock star. He was dead, and the crowd went wild, trying to escape safely. I could only cry, knowing I could have saved his life if they had listened. The mirror was again right in telling the future, but I could not take it anymore. I took the mirror and made a bonfire. As the fire got more vigorous, I tossed the mirror into the fire. I just stood there watching it burn, never wanting to see another future event again.

Written by: Alvin Rivera