**THE DOCTOR SAID I WAS CLEARED, THEN I SAW MY OWN GHOST IN THE MIRROR**
The scan was clear. No tumor, no sign of the illness that almost took me. Relief washed over me as I headed home.
I stopped in the bathroom, wanting to splash water on my face. Exhaustion clung to me like a second skin.
But it wasn’t my reflection staring back.
It was me, but… faded. Like a photograph bleached by the sun, a ghost of myself lingered in the glass. It stared with hollow eyes.
Then, the ghost pointed past me, into the hallway, and mouthed a single word: “Run.” ⬇️
Terror, cold and sharp, pierced the relief. My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs. I spun around, but the hallway was empty, the muted afternoon light casting long, eerie shadows. The ghost in the mirror remained, its spectral hand still outstretched, the word “run” a silent, accusing scream.
I stumbled back, my mind reeling. Was this some bizarre hallucination, a cruel trick of a still-recovering mind? But the fear was visceral, a primal instinct screaming for action. I grabbed my phone, my hand trembling so violently I almost dropped it. No signal. Panic clawed at my throat.
I fled the bathroom, my bare feet slapping against the hardwood floor. I bolted down the stairs, heart pounding a deafening rhythm, a frantic search for an explanation, a reason, a way out. As I reached the front door, I heard a low, guttural growl. It emanated not from the house, but from within me, a deep, resonating sound that shook my bones.
Suddenly, I understood. The “ghost” wasn’t a ghost. It was *me*. A part of me, separated, a shadow self that was somehow… alive. This illness, the one they said I’d conquered, hadn’t been defeated; it had splintered.
The growl intensified, and a searing pain erupted in my chest, like a hot brand being pressed against my skin. The world swam, a dizzying kaleidoscope of blurry colors. I collapsed, the front door only inches from my reach.
When I awoke, I was strapped to a hospital bed. A doctor, his face etched with concern, was leaning over me. “You had a serious relapse,” he said gently, his voice laced with exhaustion. “But you’re lucky. We caught it in time.”
He explained that a rare anomaly had occurred. The illness hadn’t been completely eradicated; a fragment had remained dormant, growing a shadow self, feeding off my energy, manifesting as the ghostly apparition. The growling had been the manifestation of this shadow self fighting for dominance.
“We managed to suppress it,” the doctor continued. “But… there’s a chance it could return. We’ll need to run more extensive tests.”
That night, staring at my reflection, truly my reflection this time, the exhaustion etched deeply into my face, I saw a faint shimmer at the edge of the mirror. A ghost of a ghost. A tiny flicker, barely perceptible, a silent warning. The battle, it seemed, was far from over. The relief was temporary, laced with a deep, chilling dread. The shadow, while suppressed, still lingered, a constant reminder of the fight that remained, a war fought not against an illness, but against myself. The ending felt complete, not with a neat resolution, but with the heavy weight of a precarious peace, a quiet battle still simmering beneath the surface.