Days blurred.Nights stretched into endless loops of silence and shadows.
I'd stopped keeping track of time — the hours melted together like wax, dripping into nothing. Work didn't feel real anymore. People's voices sounded like echoes from underwater. My world had shrunk down to the space between my heartbeat and my guilt.
The worst part? No one suspected me.Not her. Not our friends. Not even the vultures online.
I should've felt safe. Victorious. Untouchable.But instead, I felt hunted — by myself.
Every time I walked past the mirror, I caught myself staring too long. The man staring back… wasn't me. His eyes were too still. His smile too empty. His face looked like someone wearing a mask — a stranger's calm stretched over something screaming underneath.
I started talking to myself.Quietly at first — just whispers. Then full conversations.
"You did what you had to.""She deserved it.""No, you went too far.""Shut up, she ruined you first."
It became a cycle.The rational voice defending me, the conscience tearing me apart.
Sometimes, I swore I could hear laughter in the silence — her laughter, from the past, mocking me. I'd turn sharply, half-expecting her to be standing there, holding her phone, smiling like she used to when I came home.
But it was always just me. Alone.
Her life was in ruins now. She'd lost her job. Her friends stopped visiting. Even her own family had distanced themselves, telling her to "lay low." I'd watched her fade day by day — from anger, to denial, to this quiet emptiness.
She barely looked at me anymore. Maybe she sensed something — some shift in the air. Sometimes she'd just stare for too long, like she was trying to solve a puzzle she didn't know she was part of.
One evening, she asked,"Do you ever think people get what they deserve?"
I froze."What do you mean?"
She gave a dry laugh. "Just wondering. About karma, fate… all that bullshit."
I shrugged, forcing a smirk. "Yeah. Sometimes."
Her eyes flicked up, sharp for a moment, like she caught something in my tone. Then she just looked away again. "If that's true, I must've done something awful in my last life."
Her words lingered long after she went to bed.
That night, I dreamt of the day I'd seen her with him — the bed, the sounds, the shock. But this time, it was reversed.I was the one on the bed.And she was standing at the door, watching. Silent. Smiling.
When I woke, I was drenched in sweat. The clock read 3:47 AM. The mirror on the wall seemed to shimmer faintly in the dark, reflecting only half of my face.
I got up and smashed it.
The sound shattered the silence, echoing through the room like thunder. She woke up screaming my name, running toward the noise.
"Dhruve! What the hell—what happened?!"
I just stood there, breathing heavily, glass at my feet."I saw something," I muttered. "In the mirror."
Her voice trembled. "You're scaring me."
"I'm scaring myself," I whispered.
After that, things got worse.I started hearing footsteps in empty rooms, whispers behind closed doors. At work, people's faces blurred together, and I'd catch them glancing at me — too often, too knowingly.
Once, a colleague said, "Hey, that story online, it's insane, right? You know the woman kinda looks like your wife?"
I laughed — too loudly. Too forced. "Yeah, wild coincidence."
But inside, my stomach twisted.Was it? Could someone have noticed something I missed?
I started checking my email obsessively, making sure there was no digital trail, no mistake. The blogger's message still sat there in my deleted folder, like a ghost waiting to be found.
Every ding of my phone made my heart stop.
Then one night, I got an email.No sender name. No subject.Just one line:
"You think you're the only one who knows the truth?"
My blood went cold.
I stared at the screen for what felt like hours, waiting for more. None came.
It could've been spam. Could've been random.But my mind didn't care about logic anymore — it went straight to paranoia.
Who sent it? Did the blogger know? Did she find out?
I deleted it instantly. But the damage was done. The seed was planted.
That night, I barely breathed. I sat by the window until dawn, eyes wide open, watching the city wake up — every shadow looked like a threat, every sound like a clue.
The mirror was gone, but the reflection still haunted me — not of her, but of the man I'd become.
And for the first time, I realized something terrifying:I hadn't just destroyed her life.I'd started erasing my own.