My neighbour had recently passed away. We had never really talked, but I had gotten on well with her daughter, who visited often.

 

And that was how I wound up helping her daughter clean out her attic.

 

She'd already taken out most of the things that were specifically intended for particular family members, and she told me that I was welcome to anything left that I wanted. There was a mirror that I was particularly enamoured with, but I hadn't had a chance to really get a good look at it. Over the course of the weekend of cleaning, though, it had snagged my eye every time I glanced past it.

 

"I have to get home and get the kids to bed. Feel free to stop now, or if you want to keep going, just lock up behind you."

 

I decided to stay and get a good look at the mirror.

 

There was something... I'm not sure what it was about it, but it held my attention in a way I wasn't accustomed to.

 

Alone in the attic, I gazed at my reflection in the mirror.

 

Suddenly, I felt something of a whooshing sensation, and my reflection looked... off, somehow.

 

I felt my mouth move and heard my own voice say "Thanks, I've been waiting for a sucker like you to come along," but I hadn't intended to say anything.

 

Starting to panic slightly, I walked away from the mirror.

 

Or I tried to.

 

I couldn't walk more than about a metre in any given direction, and my reflection didn't move. It only had this expression on its face that I had never seen on my own face before. Spite, maybe? A spiteful glee.

 

No matter what I did, my reflection didn't move. Only then did I notice my own face was twisted into the expression I saw in my reflection.

 

"What's going on?"

 

My voice seemed to echo around me, and my reflection once again didn't move. Finally, it spoke in my voice, my own lips involuntarily mouthing the words.

 

"Isn't it obvious? I've taken your body. I've been trapped in that mirror for ages, just waiting for someone to give me an opening. Thanks again for that! Sorry you'll be stuck in that mirror, but who knows? Maybe you'll find some hapless pleb to possess sooner than I did. But in the meantime, sayonara!"

 

It walked away, taking my body with it.

 

"Wait! Please! You can't leave me here!"

 

My body stopped just short of the door, then turned around and returned to face me in the mirror.

 

"Oh, I'm sorry. I almost forgot."

 

And it put a sheet over the mirror, obscuring it, and the rest of the attic, from my view.

 

I started pounding on the glass of my new prison, screaming at whatever had stolen my body to give it back to me.

 

The attic door clicked shut.