You can only see them in running water, their hazy bodies moving to and fro as if they were reflections. They walk among us unseen for the most part, choosing to hide themselves as much as possible but when the signs are there everyone finds reasons to avoid whatever street or shop they move into.
I saw my first one in a garden centre off a small junction on the A14. Since then I've heard how unusual my encounter was- apparently they don't usually try to get your attention but this one did. I was three and a half at the time and barely over two feet tall. Every fountain was eye level to me and that's where I saw them. Just the one genderless pair of hands beckoning me to come closer to the edge of the pond before they pointed down at the dark blue water.
They look fairly human, all things considered. It seems that one had gone to the centre with their family too, though all I saw of the others were enormous legs that were far taller than the pond was long. I never saw their faces, only the face of the smaller one - a child like me who wanted to trade my doll for a pouch of marbles.
When my parents found me I no longer had my doll, the damp pouch felt heavy in my pocket as they dragged me out to the car. They insisted nothing was wrong but it was "getting late" which is their way of avoiding the reflected people. I never told them about my new marbles or the fact that ever since then the same reflected child has been following me, waving at me with the doll.
The child is the reason I still carry those marbles with me in their pouch and I can proudly say that twenty years later every marble is still there. Whenever the reflected people start to gather in an area I need to go through, be it a street or a park or a building, I make sure to hold the pouch so that it's visible to them and they let me through with no problem.
Not everybody is so lucky, with some found drowned in whatever surface the reflected people were in. Others are only declared as victims by the fact that their shoes and bags are found unattended and soaking wet, sometimes with remnants of the missing person hastily stuffed inside. Usually fingers, toes and teeth. They never seem to like eating those.
I saw my first one in a garden centre off a small junction on the A14. Since then I've heard how unusual my encounter was- apparently they don't usually try to get your attention but this one did. I was three and a half at the time and barely over two feet tall. Every fountain was eye level to me and that's where I saw them. Just the one genderless pair of hands beckoning me to come closer to the edge of the pond before they pointed down at the dark blue water.
They look fairly human, all things considered. It seems that one had gone to the centre with their family too, though all I saw of the others were enormous legs that were far taller than the pond was long. I never saw their faces, only the face of the smaller one - a child like me who wanted to trade my doll for a pouch of marbles.
When my parents found me I no longer had my doll, the damp pouch felt heavy in my pocket as they dragged me out to the car. They insisted nothing was wrong but it was "getting late" which is their way of avoiding the reflected people. I never told them about my new marbles or the fact that ever since then the same reflected child has been following me, waving at me with the doll.
The child is the reason I still carry those marbles with me in their pouch and I can proudly say that twenty years later every marble is still there. Whenever the reflected people start to gather in an area I need to go through, be it a street or a park or a building, I make sure to hold the pouch so that it's visible to them and they let me through with no problem.
Not everybody is so lucky, with some found drowned in whatever surface the reflected people were in. Others are only declared as victims by the fact that their shoes and bags are found unattended and soaking wet, sometimes with remnants of the missing person hastily stuffed inside. Usually fingers, toes and teeth. They never seem to like eating those.
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