The House of Broken Reflections

Time fractures differently in every mirror.

Each shard keeps a version of you,

one screaming, one still bleeding,

one gnawing through its own reflection to escape.

The glass remembers every wound you’ve hidden,

it festers there, a mouth that never heals.

Reflections rot slower than flesh,

their eyes drip mercury, their smiles split wide,

and when the room goes dark,

they crawl out, dragging time by its torn veins.

Listen,

that ticking beneath the glass isn’t a clock.

It’s you, still dying, beautifully, forever,

as the light cuts through,

like a knife through old skin.

You told yourself it wasn’t real—

that glass doesn’t breathe, that silver doesn’t whisper.

But the mirror learned your voice

from every apology you never said aloud.

Now it hums it back to you in fractured tones,

each syllable a splinter in your throat.

You press your palm to the surface,

it’s cold, and wet, and trembling,

like something alive just beneath it.

For a second, you can’t tell

if the reflection is trying to crawl out

or pull you in.

The walls watch, patient and hungry.

Every version of you that ever looked away

waits there, smiling with your teeth.

And somewhere between heartbeat and shatter,

you realize,

the mirror was never showing you anything.

It was remembering you.

Now, the glass opens like a wound.

You step forward and the world folds inward,

a scream caught in mercury.

Hands — your hands — reach from within,

softly, tenderly,

as if welcoming you home.

Time curls at the edges like burning film,

your name melts into the silence,

and all that’s left

is the sound of breathing

on both sides of the glass.