The Do Over
The air inside the house was thick with silence, the kind that presses in on your skin and makes your breath catch in your throat. Abigail stood in the foyer of the mansion, staring at the cracked mirrors that lined the walls. Her reflection—fractured and ghostly—stared back at her, but something about it felt wrong. The reflection didn't move the way it should have, didn't feel like her. She blinked, hoping the unease would pass, but it only deepened.
The old woman had warned her about this place.
"It's not safe in there, dear," she had said, her voice shaky, raspy, "Not for someone like you."
Abigail had ignored her. She had needed to get away, needed a break from the suffocating routine of her life, and this mansion, long abandoned and rumored to be haunted, had called to her. A curiosity she couldn’t shake. Now, standing inside its darkened halls, she wondered if the old woman had been right. The air was cold, the walls seemed to pulse with a life of their own, and every creak of the floorboards felt like a heartbeat beneath her feet.
It wasn’t long after she arrived that the strange occurrences began. A door slammed shut when she had been certain she left it open. The breakfast she had prepared was gone when she returned to the kitchen. At first, she assumed her mind was playing tricks on her, that the isolation was starting to mess with her thoughts. But now, standing in front of the mirror, seeing her fractured reflection staring back at her, something clicked in her chest.
She wasn’t alone.
The shadows shifted in the hallway behind her, twisting unnaturally. She tried to tell herself it was just a trick of the light, but the pit in her stomach said otherwise. Slowly, she stepped back, her breath shallow, her heart racing.
"Get out," a voice whispered, but it wasn’t from the hallway. It came from the mirror.
Abigail's reflection opened its mouth, but her own lips remained sealed. The voice echoed again, faint but insistent.
"Get out while you can."
She stumbled back from the mirror, her hands shaking. Her mind raced, trying to make sense of what was happening, but every thought felt tangled, like a knot she couldn’t untie.
The old woman had told her to leave. She had said it wasn't safe, and now Abigail knew why. But leaving wasn’t as simple as opening the door. She had tried. When she reached the front door and pulled, it wouldn’t budge. The windows wouldn’t break, and the rooms shifted, leading her in circles. Each door she opened brought her back to this same room, with the same cracked mirrors.
She was trapped.
But why?
She turned back to the mirror, her reflection still staring at her, still wrong. The reflection’s eyes were darker, more hollow, as though it had been there much longer than she had. Slowly, she reached out to touch the glass, hoping to find some crack, some clue to explain what was happening. As her fingers grazed the surface, a ripple spread across the mirror, warping her reflection into something unrecognizable. She gasped and pulled back.
Behind her reflection, a figure moved. Not a shadow this time—something more tangible, more real. A woman, older, hunched, with wild gray hair. She appeared for only a moment, just long enough for Abigail to see her crooked smile before she vanished into the darkness.
She turned around quickly, but the hallway was empty. Panic gripped her chest, tightening with every breath. She needed to find a way out. She couldn’t stay here—couldn’t be trapped in this strange, twisted version of reality. But the house seemed to have other plans.
The whispers grew louder, no longer just in the mirror but in the walls, the floors, the very air she breathed. They called to her, pulling her deeper into the mansion, promising answers, but hiding something far more sinister.
She didn’t have much time. She could feel it. Every second in this place was erasing her, stripping away pieces of her identity, her sense of self. If she stayed here too long, she would become like the reflections in the mirror—trapped, forgotten, lost.
The mansion wasn’t just a place. It was a dimension in itself, one that twisted time and reality. Time moved differently here. Sometimes faster, sometimes slower. Days could pass in minutes, or years could stretch on in silence. She had crossed over into a realm that existed between the cracks of her world, a dimension that fed on the people who stumbled into it, trapping them in a never-ending loop.
She walked down the hallway, her steps echoing unnaturally in the empty space. The door at the end creaked open as she approached, as though it had been waiting for her. With a deep breath, she stepped through.
The room beyond was small, a sitting room, with a single chair facing a fireplace. The fire burned low, casting flickering shadows on the walls. And there, sitting in the chair, was the old woman.
She hadn’t seen her since that morning, since she had made breakfast and tried to find a way out. The woman had been there, silently watching, her eyes filled with an unsettling calm.
“Why are you here?” Abigail asked, her voice barely a whisper.
The old woman didn’t answer right away. She simply stared into the fire, the shadows dancing across her face.
“You think this place is a prison,” the woman finally said, her voice low, almost a growl. “But it’s not. Not for everyone.”
Abigail took a step closer, her heart pounding in her chest. “What do you mean?”
The woman turned her head slowly, her eyes locking onto Abigail’s. “It’s only a prison if you refuse to see what’s in front of you.”
Abigail frowned. “I don’t understand.”
The woman smiled, but there was no warmth in it. “You’re here for a reason. You came here running from something, didn’t you?”
Abigail swallowed hard. The memories were foggy, like fragments of a dream she couldn’t fully grasp. She had come here to escape, to get away from the life she no longer recognized. But now, she couldn’t even remember what that life had been.
The old woman stood, her bones creaking with the movement. “You can leave,” she said, her voice sharp now, cutting through the haze in Abigail’s mind. “But only if you’re willing to face what brought you here in the first place.”
“What does that mean?” Abigail asked, panic rising in her chest again.
The woman pointed to the mirror. “Look,” she commanded.
Abigail turned, her eyes meeting her reflection again. But this time, it wasn’t just her face staring back. Behind her, she saw flashes of moments from her past—arguments, decisions, choices she had made but never faced. Regret filled her as she watched, the weight of those choices crashing down on her.
She had come here to escape her mistakes, to forget the life she had ruined. But the house wouldn’t let her forget. It had trapped her here to force her to remember, to confront the reality she had been running from for so long.
“I can’t go back,” Abigail whispered, tears welling in her eyes.
The old woman’s smile faded, replaced by something darker. “Then you’ll stay here. Forever.”
The reflection in the mirror began to warp again, the image of Abigail twisting into something monstrous, something broken. The whispers grew louder, more insistent, wrapping around her mind, pulling her deeper into the house’s grip.
“No!” Abigail screamed, stepping back from the mirror. “I won’t stay here!”
The old woman watched in silence, her eyes gleaming in the firelight.
Abigail turned toward the door, but it was gone. The walls began to close in, the room shrinking, suffocating her. Her breath came in short gasps, her heart racing.
There was no way out.
Or was there?
The words echoed in her mind again. You can leave, but only if you face what brought you here.
Abigail closed her eyes, forcing herself to breathe. She couldn’t run from her past anymore. She couldn’t hide from the choices she had made.
Slowly, she turned back to the mirror. Her reflection stared at her, eyes wide with fear, but this time, it was just her. No monsters, no warping images. Just Abigail.
“I’m ready,” she whispered.
The mirror cracked, a single line running down the center, and then, with a shattering sound, it broke apart, pieces falling to the floor. The air shifted, the suffocating pressure lifting.
When she opened her eyes again, she was standing in the foyer, the front door wide open, sunlight streaming through.
She was free.
But something was different. The air outside felt…changed. She stepped out onto the porch, her eyes scanning the familiar landscape, but the town looked different—larger, angrier. As she walked down the path, she noticed the people on the street. They were dressed in odd, somehow more “advanced” clothing, their hairstyles more homogenous, their faces unfamiliar.
She stopped in her tracks, her heart sinking.
Taking in the scenery, she realized it wasn’t really over. The world had moved on without her, years–maybe decades ahead –from the look of the vehicles and architectural shifts.
So, the house hadn’t let her go after all. It was playing a game.
She stood in the middle of the street, the weight of her decision pressing down on her. She had faced her past, but now she had to face the future, in a world that no longer remembered her.
And as she turned to look back at the mansion, she saw the old woman standing in the doorway, her smile still cold, her eyes gleaming with something Abigail couldn’t quite place.
Yes, the house had given her a second chance, but with conditions. It had also taken everything she had known– everyone she had ever known.
She had been given a do-over– of sorts–and this time, she knew it was for keeps. She would either succeed, or the house would take her back– forever. Abigail took a deep breath and walked into the unknown. In a moment of reflection, she stopped and whispered. “Game on!”
Back on the porch, the old lady took a sip of her tea and mused that maybe, just perhaps, this would be the time!
As quickly as hope arrived, it diminished. “Oh, you’re just being silly, Abigail” she said aloud to herself: “You’ve been watching yourself restart like that for eons. What on earth makes you think you’re going to get it right this time? The house,” she said with resign “always wins.”