A Crack In The Mirror

• Annabelle Duncan, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2016

Every night before I go to bed, I read to Mum in the mirror. She pulls a brush through my hair as she listens to the children's stories she's heard so many times before.

My favourite is the one about garden gnomes that come to life! Every night they come and cause havoc and nobody knows it’s them because they’re just garden gnomes. I’m reading this story now.

“Wait a sec.” I say as I put the book down and try to grab the brush so I can bring the hair strands out of my eyes. I grab the brush a little too forcefully and it flies past me and hits the mirror. A small crack has now appeared in the top right hand corner. “Oops! Sorry.” I say as I hear Mum sigh. Even I’m disappointed. I like the misty mirror with speckles on the glass.

“Ok. Time for bed.” Mum exclaims as she hustled me into bed. “We’ll fix it in the morning.”

I hear a twinkling sound and a chink, chink, chink. My eyes snap open as little shadows dash across the room. I don’t manage to make out what they are because they’ve gone out the window before I can see. I rush to the open window and I’m hit with a cold breeze. I look down but the shadows aren’t there. Only a smashed flower pot and some dug up flowers. I check the crack in the mirror and it’s bigger. Big enough to fit 6 garden gnomes through it. The book is also wide open on the page where the garden gnomes come to life.

I run down stairs and go outside to the garden. I’ve grabbed the book and hairbrush to bring with me the little ‘shadows’ are now climbing up the vine on the brick wall separating our yard from the neighbours’. I suddenly notice there are only 3 gnomes on the vines. As soon as I notice this, the book and brush are yanked from my hands. 3 little gnomes are running into the house with my things- and I’m chasing after.

All the way up the stairs into my room and onto my dressing table where the mirror is. They jump into the mirror as soon as I leap and grab at the book. The other gnomes have followed me and they push me through the mirror.

I’m in a neighbourhood identical to the one in the Gnome Story. I can’t jump back through the mirror until I get my possessions back!

I took my hair tie out and flicked it at the gnomes with my possessions. They dropped my things and I swooped in to grab them. I brushed my hair and opened the book towards the gnomes. I shut my eyes as light sucked up the gnomes. In a flash I was reading my book in my bedroom with Mum running a brush through my hair. No crack was in the mirror.