** originally posted to Gist App by @labellajourneys / Bella L

Basil sat in her empty room. Her parents had just moved their family to a quaint little home in a rural town beneath the mountains.

“This will be a new and exciting start for us!” Basil’s dad had said cheerfully from the front seat. Her mom had quietly nodded and continued her knitting.

Basil was quiet like her mom, but the same excitement for a new adventure that ran through her dad’s veins was coursing through hers. Her four younger brothers were too busy with their action figures and cars to pay much attention to the conversation.

Basil had watched farm after farm, cornfields, woods, and fields of horses pass by as they made their way along the winding Vermont roads. When they reached town, they passed a mechanic’s office, a country store, a post office, two dirt roads, a Catholic church, and another country store.

Their new home was a two-story red house with a black roof. The lone white garage was yellowing in spots, and the shed out back leaned to one side.

Everyone piled out of the car and stood in the driveway, looking around. The twins tussled in the grass, each trying to pin the other down.

“Well,” Basil’s mom breathed out, “let’s go inside.”

The kids ran through the house, claiming their rooms. One for Basil, one for the twins, Jack and Jerry, and one for her brothers John and Forrest. Their moving truck had been delayed a few days, so they settled in with sleeping bags and their travel luggage.

Basil sat staring into the mirror on the back of her closet door. Her freckles had spread farther across her face over the summer. She thought they made her look more grown up. She put her hair in a bun and wondered if her eleven-year-old face could pass for thirteen.

She hoped the kids at her new school would think so. She wanted to seem mature and in charge. She wanted to find a cool, mature best friend.

Eventually, her parents called lights out. Basil arranged her pillow and sleeping bag beneath the window, shouted goodnight to her brothers across the hall, and turned off the light.

Just as she was about to fall asleep, she thought she heard a murmur of voices coming from the closet. She rubbed her eyes and rolled onto her side.

The murmuring stopped.

Must be my parents, she thought, before falling fast asleep.

Basil awoke to the feeling of someone tugging at her hair.

“Go back to bed, Jerry,” she mumbled, rolling onto her stomach and burying her face in the pillow.

Again, she felt Jerry pluck at a few strands.

Basil flailed her arm, hoping to push him away, but to no avail. She pushed herself onto her knees, her long hair falling across her face.

“Jerry, please, go back to bed!”

She rubbed her eyes and looked to the left.

There was no Jerry. In fact, her bedroom door was still closed, just as she had left it.

Basil sighed. Her brothers’ tricks were getting old. She caught sight of her shadow in the moonlight and glanced toward the window.

To her horror, she was met with dark eyes and a toothy grin.

Basil screamed.

By the time she made it into the hall, her parents and brothers were already there.

“What is it?!” her dad asked in a panic.

The hallway lights flicked on, blindingly bright.

“A nightmare?” her mother asked.

Basil was shaking so hard she could barely get the words out.

“A MAN!” she screamed, tears falling down her cheeks. “There was a man smiling at me through the window!”

Her parents blinked at her and glanced at each other.

“Basil, honey,” her mom began, “we’re on the second floor. There’s no way a man could have been looking through your window.”

They assured her it was just a nightmare and even looked outside with her. Her father circled the house in the dark and jumped up and down beneath her window to prove no one could reach it.

By one in the morning, everyone had returned to bed, convinced Basil had dreamed it all.

Basil tossed and turned, trying to fall asleep. Eventually, she drifted into a fitful rest.

On the second night, Basil scared her family half to death with another bloodcurdling scream. She had seen the man standing in the yard. He wasn’t smiling this time. He was just staring at her through the window.

Once again, no one else saw him, and her father couldn’t find any footprints in the yard.

On the third night, Basil kept waking up, but the man never appeared. On the fourth, she slept a little more soundly. By the fifth, she was convinced her imagination had run away with her.

On the sixth night, the moving truck arrived. By the seventh, Basil was so exhausted from unpacking that she slept straight through the night.

On the eleventh night, however, Basil awoke to the sensation of someone pulling strands of her hair.

“It’s only a dream,” she told herself.

She opened her eyes and looked out the window. No one was there. She turned on the light. Still no one.

Basil switched off the light and climbed back into bed.

As she began drifting off again, she heard another murmur coming from the closet.

“Hello?” she called.

Nobody responded.

Just as she began to close her eyes, a loud creeeak jolted her awake.

A dark, fuzzy ball rolled out of the closet.

Whispery voices called from within.

“Basil,” they murmured, “please give us back our ball.”

The ball glitched before her eyes. It appeared to be made of… shadow?

Basil kicked it into the closet and slammed the door shut.

Then she gasped.

The mirror had come into view.

The man’s face peered out from its surface. He extended a hand, pressing a finger to his lips.

He spoke, but his mouth didn’t move.

“Hush now, dear Basil. My children only want to play.”

He retreated into the mirror, his toothy grin spreading across his face once more.

The mirror shattered.

Basil took off down the hall