The Eyes

“What I DAY!” I groaned, emphasizing the last word with a shout as I threw myself onto the sofa. I had never gone through so much stress and frustration in a single day of work in my life.

Sure my job was stressful, I was a homicide detective, that’s not the kind of job that leaves you with a warm fuzzy feeling at the end of the day. But today… Today was beyond anything id ever gone through.

I walked to the bathroom to splash my face with some cold water. After a moment I looked up at the man staring back at me.

“There’s no way she’s right, you know your clean, you didn’t do a single thing wrong and you know it!” he said to me, the same way a friend or a brother would say to me after someone had accused me of something I never did.

“I know I didn’t do anything, how could I have, he was dead long before I was anywhere near him.” I replied. It sounds strange, but at that moment I felt reassured like my fears had been washed away. So without so much as another thought, I headed off to bed.

The next day when I woke up everything that had happened the day before hit me, it was the same nightmare all over again. I lay back and closed my eyes, remembering, trying to make sense out of the senseless events.

I remember very clearly how it started, I was on my way home from the office, nothing had happened in a long time so I left early, but about the time I pulled into the familiar apartment complex my radio buzzed.

“Yes?” I sighed as I turned my car around and waited.

“Sir? I know your probably home by now, but we have a serious case and we need you there right away.” Came the voice of one of the new recruits. Her name was Suzan, I recognized her immediately because she was the only woman on the force.

I sighed again then replied “I’m on my way, ill be there in ten.”

It was a fast drive, it went by almost as if I were asleep. I pulled up to the house and got out. I remember this part very clearly because as I got out of the car, Suzan and five other officers came up to me, in front of them was Kacy, the junior detective for my department, I knew that this meant two things, first was that something out of the ordinary was going on, and second, I was in trouble some way, because it was very unusual for a second detective to get called in for something small like this.

“Right on time Doc” Sneered Kacy as the officers spread out.

“What’s going on Kacy?” I asked, wary of the situation already.

“Come over here and look at this, you wont want to miss out on it. Believe me.” He cocked his head back toward the house and turned on his heel, already heading back inside.

I followed him into the living room, which had been marked and numbered already. I walked over to the body of a middle-aged man, who was totally unremarkable except of course for his wound,... and... his eyes. I don’t know why… but they looked strangely familiar, and utterly terrifying, as if they were the eyes of a friend, in the body of a stranger.

“Do we have any witnesses or hot evidence as to the whereabouts of the killer?” I asked, still staring at the eyes of the man.

“Yes sir we do, she’s right next door, in fact, I think they are starting the questioning now if you’d like to listen in” Stated Kacy in a tone that implied that there was something important that I needed to hear from this witness.

I left the house and walked to the next house over, the door was open and there was am ancient old woman sitting in the middle of the room, two police officers were talking to her in low voices. She was pale, obviously frightened by what she had seen. I walked into the room, and she looked up…

“THAT’S HIM!” she screamed, almost in panic. She started to backpedal up the back of the sofa and the police officers rushed over to calm her.

I looked around stunned, how could I possibly be me? I had just arrived. Suzan and Kacy walked up behind me and took up positions on either side of me.

“So… What do you think?” asked Kacy.

“What do I think? God I think this old bat has confused me with a murderer!” I shouted. “I’ve had enough of this, Kacy… she’s all yours.”

I lay there for a while, mulling it all over, the eyes, the old woman who panicked at the very sight of me, the accusing manner of my fellow officers. How could this be possible? It grinded on my consciousness like sandpaper, this nightmare come fourth, tearing away at me, dragging all my thought back to it, twisting me up until I was hopelessly lost in it all.

With a Herculean effort I wrenched my thoughts away from the memory long enough to make my way to the bathroom, washing my face with cold water.

“Its not you… You’re a good man, you would never kill anyone for any reason, just let it go.” He said to me, in an effort to ease my mind.

“I know alright! It cant be me, I know, I know, I KNOW!” I shouted back to him. I was so frustrated, how could it be me, its simply wasn’t possible… But… if that were true, why? Why did it hold my fears so absolutely?

He reached out for me, grasping my shoulder and holding me firm. “It wasn’t you man, ok? Go to work and just forget about it.”

I jerked away and got ready for work as fast as possible, anger smoldering inside my mind like a pile of smoking wood, just waiting to explode into a raging bonfire.

I glided through work that day, distant, removed from reality, just… shielding myself from the memory. It was uneventful until right before I left. Suzan moved to block my exit, and I looked up at her with a mixture of malice and despair.

“Tell me, Doc” the last word was dripping with venom. “What are you so up tight about huh? You don’t have anything to hide do you? Its not like you killed anyone is it?” she studied my face for a response that would condemn me, but I just turned around and went for the stairs, feeling her gaze sear into my back like a branding iron.

I rushed home, flung open the door, and flew to my bathroom.

“Tell me its not me. Tell me I’m innocent. Tell me I didn’t DO IT!” I chocked, fighting back the sensation of drowning in the back of my head, a cold, burning sensation sparked by stress. Stress… or mounting hysteria.

“I told you already” he replied, a cold edge to his voice, “ITS NOT YOU! Give it a damn BREAK!” He exploded.

It was like a splash of cold water, like I had been slapped in the face, or kicked in the gut. I couldn’t think, I just stood there, cowering under his gaze.

I finally snuck off to my bed, exhausted…ravaged, maimed even by this horrid turn of events.

I found no rest that night. Though I was not conscious through it, every moment passed as slowly as if I were awake. Everywhere, men walked by me, all with the same strangely familiar eyes, eyes that turned my blood to ice even as it flowed through my veins. I walked through the crowd of men, all staring at me with those eyes, dread so real I could nearly drown in it, panic was my only emotion, I had to get out, I had to leave, I had to survive.

Suddenly I was alone, I wasn’t there anymore, I was standing in my bathroom, free of those eyes, indescribable in their nature, comparable even unto fear itself. My breathing slowed as I found a small isle of calm amongst the storm. I looked behind me, into the mirror, into the eyes of the only one who had not forsaken me, the only one I could trust. But wait… No… No, this isn’t right. No… This cant be him, oh god… No, please no. My mind screamed with blind terror, my eyes locked on his, heart throwing itself against my chest, like a cage to be broken. Not him too, not here. I cant breathe, please help me… I cant breathe...

The drowning cold in the back of my head is overwhelming now, clouding my vision, consuming my mind like a wildfire in a field of dry grass and leaves. I screamed for release, or death, anything but this, my very soul is cracked, the spider web growing out from the center of the mirror, out to every corner, held together by fate, ready to shatter at any time.

I cant tell what happened next, weather I fell forward, or the mirror came out to me, all I know is that the eyes of the dead man were the only thing in my world, the only thing that existed. I withered under it’s suffocating gaze, paralyzed… shattered with fear. All I knew were the eyes, staring out of the black, boring into my fractured self with unrelenting cruelty.

I snapped awake to the blaring of my alarm clock, bolt upright, drenched in cold sweat and shaking uncontrollably. I made my way to the bathroom, purposefully not looking at my mirror, the dream still all to real, all to alive for me to bear.

I showered slowly, washing away my fears in the noise and the steam and the heat, letting it wrap me up in a field of calm, a safe zone from my life.  Eventually the hot water ran out and, numbly I got out, not even bothering to open my eyes. I reached out for the towel… but its not where I left it. My eyes slip open out of reflex, a mistake that cost me dearly. For he was there, standing in front of me, arm outstretched, my towel in his hand.

I collapsed, his eyes sapping all the strength from my body. But I hear him, standing there, I feel his breath, like fire on my neck. He whispers to me. At first I don’t understand, but as my minds withdrawal lessens, his words stab into me like icy daggers.

“What’s wrong? Are you afraid of me? Are you afraid of yourself? I told you, you did not do it. But you didn’t listen to me. Look at you now. You look like a mental case that they throw into an asylum because you cannot be cured. Oh... and you can’t be cured… Look into the mirror and you’ll know what I mean”

I didn’t need to look, I knew what he meant… They were watching me, from the mirror, always watching, and always there. My mind screamed for a way out, a way to end the torture.

Finally I came to something, something that sprung up inside me, a fire that exploded in my chest. He was playing with me, feeding off of my pain and my suffering. I fumed, and with an effort, I threw myself onto my feet and spun around. There he stood, a calm look on his face, those eyes, raking into me, as if they tore my very flesh.

Without warning I lunged, rage had taken place of terror, anger had extinguished the drowning sensation and instead, replaced it with a spine tingling fury, as if it were channeling electricity or filled with needles. We rolled along the floor, fists and feet flying in a whirling torrent of frustration and pain. I rolled until I was on top of him and with a fire in my eyes I looked into his face.

It was cold, and wet, I looked around only to find myself a small cell. I was staring into the mirror, those demonic eyes staring back from that calm, taunting face. I hated them, I wanted to gouge them out. All my thought was bent on that one desire.

Then, as if out of the blue, loud clang jarred me from my fantasy. Two jail guards walked in.

“Your up next Doc” one said, he looked almost familiar, but I recognized only one set of eyes now, only one being made sense to me anymore.

The other grabbed me by my upper arm and together they led me through a labyrinth of hallways, all dark and dirty, flanked by creatures in cells that may have been human at one point, but long since driven mad by isolation in this place, it had the look of a prison, but the feel of a madhouse, where madness was sanity, and the prisoners were not men… but monsters.

I was led to a very small room, roughly the size of a bathroom it seemed, on one side was a mirror, and three people walked inside it. One female who looked at me with accusation, clear on her venomous face, one of the others was a man, the one who had called me “Doc” earlier. The third was him, the bane of my existence, who’s eyes were as the jaws of hell itself.

The room held nothing but the mirror, and a frightening looking chair, wreathed in chains and wires, shedding an aura of abject fear and prickling energy. They forced me down into the chair and chained me down. He stood there, safe in his mirror, just watching, the infuriating look of calm still on his face. Soon the base of my neck was covered with some cold thick fluid, it burned, but froze at the same time. And then suddenly, fire ignited from every corner of my body. Lights zoomed around me and before I knew it, I was gone.

I was standing there, watching him, staring back at him with fierceness in my eyes, trying to force back the power of his eyes with my own. Trying to stop the terror from taking me. I spat and dried my face, the cold water from the sink still dripping from my nose and jaw.

“I will kill you” I told him, watching him in the mirror as he returned my hostile look.

“You have already killed yourself…” He replied, sneering his response, dragging it out into five long syllables, dripping with hate and what might have been glee, if only glee were sadistic and bloodthirsty as his eyes.

His eyes took me, their force crushing my will and boring themselves into my mind.

I stood there, looking down at the man, he begged and pleaded, but I could not understand what he was saying, it was glazed over, like background noise, all that mattered was those eyes, I had to kill them. They looked up at me and I felt myself spinning, taken by a vortex, though of what I do not know.

As I stopped spinning I found myself in the same room, but it must have been hours later, as the police were all over, numbering the room for investigation. I looked down at him, his eyes were locked open in an eternal stare, directed toward the ceiling, and to the left of where I stood. I could not bare it, I stooped to close his eyes, but as I did, they snapped to me, staring at me from the head of a dead man, they watched me even now, they held a life of their own and even in death, they tortured and haunted me.

I turned to run and as I did he stood there, blocking my path, smiling that calm smile, stabbing me with those eyes.

It happened so fast, all I can remember is the feeling of falling, my vision clouded into blackness, and the last thing I saw was those haunting eyes, giving me one last look. One last prick before I would be locked away forevermore, hidden, captive behind the eyes that had killed me.

I woke to find myself in a glass chamber, completely round and suspended over a pit of eternal black. The only break from the dark were those eyes, I looked through them as if I were behind them watching from the inside, seeing what they saw. As I watched those eyes, and I looked into a mirror, my mirror. And what I saw there, through those demonic eyes, would rip away the last shred of sanity I had left. I saw…

Myself

It was me who stared back into those evil eyes from the other side of the mirror. It was me who I saw through those terrible eyes I was locked behind. It was me…