Part 1One morning, Lily notices something different about her reflection. AI illustrated.
The city was already alive with the cacophony of speeding cars and blaring sirens when Lily rolled out of bed, still feeling tired from the previous day. She shuffled to the bathroom and looked at her reflection in the mirror. It looked back at her, squinty-eyed, messy-haired, and... naked? Strange, she hadn't remembered sleeping naked. Lily's hand dropped to her side, and she felt rough flannel. She glanced down at herself, confirming the presence of her flannel pajamas, top and bottom. She glanced back up at her reflection. Completely naked, from her pink nipples down to where the mirror met the sink just below her belly. Standing on tiptoes, she confirmed that she was naked below there too, naked and smooth from her depilation efforts the night before.
She blinked a few times, then ran the faucet and splashed some water on her face. Her reflection remained the same, albeit now with a slightly reddened, dripping face. She tugged at her pajama top, and her reflection mirrored the motion, grasping at empty air. It had also taken on a puzzled expression.
"Am I dreaming?" she asked herself. She closed her eyes, counted to ten, and reopened them. Her reflection remained bare as before.
Her eyes wandered to the mirror's ornate gold frame, which had been defiled with odd symbols carved in at irregular intervals. Lily's small studio apartment lacked many things—one of the most basic was a built-in bathroom mirror. She had thus counted herself quite lucky to have found, shortly after moving in, a mirror of the correct size and shape—and in pristine condition—abandoned on the sidewalk. It didn't really match her decor, but she figured it would be temporary. However, over the past months, she had found many more urgent needs for her salary than a new bathroom mirror.
Was this some kind of trick? No one but her had been in her apartment for the last few days, so it didn't seem likely. And how could such a thing be possible? Had someone replaced her mirror with a display rigged to show deepfakes? Why would anyone do that? Lily shuddered, glancing around the bathroom for hidden cameras. Her landlord was a bit of a creep, but this was... something else.
Lily could feel her heart racing in her chest, could see her frightened expression in her naked reflection. She grabbed a towel from the rail and hung it over the mirror, having no better immediate solution. Breathing a sigh of relief, she pulled off her flannels and hopped in the shower.
Sometime later, Lily emerged from the bathroom in a cloud of steam, body and hair firmly wrapped in two towels. The warm water had calmed her nerves, but she had not yet been brave enough to remove the towel from the mirror. She pulled the day's outfit from her dresser and laid it out on the bed, then quickly dressed. Feeling a little exposed, she pulled on a baggy black hoodie. From the bedside table, her phone buzzed.
Still wrapped up in the towel, Lily grabbed her phone, but froze before the blank display. The black screen showed a reflection of her face and chest—sans hoodie. Though she felt the fabric on her skin, saw it on her sleeve, the tops of her breasts stared back at her from the black screen.
Lily flung the phone on the bed, screen down. What the hell was going on? Her pulse raced and her hands felt clammy. Her hoodie came up to her neck—she could feel it there. Was she having a mental break?
If she was, there was no time to address it—any more dallying and she would risk being late for work, where she was still new on the job and at the bottom of the totem pole. But the reflection in her phone screen had confirmed that whatever was happening was not confined to her bathroom mirror. The city was all glass and steel, a place of infinite reflections. She would see her reflection everywhere. How could she go out like this? What if others could see it too? Her stomach twisted at the thought.
There was no way of knowing. Not until it was too late. Maybe it was all in her head. A stress reaction of some kind, brought on by too many late nights hunched in front of Photoshop. That had to be it. That was the only thing that made sense.
Lily tightened the hoodie at the neck, but it was a futile gesture. When she glanced at her phone, her reflection stared back naked as before. She stuffed it in the pocket of her hoodie, grabbed her bag from where she'd dumped it the night before, and walked straight out of the apartment and down the building's creaking stairs, trying to not glance at any windows, forcing herself to ignore the flashes of skin in the corners of her vision, forcing herself not to think about the reflection of the hunched-over naked girl trudging down through the lobby.
On the street, Lily pulled her hood up over her head and stared at her shoes as she navigated the crowds. Her head was pounding. She needed a coffee. Maybe that would cure her psychosis. She grimaced at the brief sight of her bare skin in the glass entrance door, but pushed past it and took her place in line.
At the counter, a barista whose face was hardly visible between his curly beard and overgrown hair took her order and payment. As he was ringing her up, his eyes went wide, staring at something behind her. "Thank you for your... uh, woah... ma'am... are you... do you know that... um, are you feeling a bit of a draft?"
The color drained from Lily's face as she looked over her shoulder. Her bare ass was reflected in the polished glass of the coffee shop window. The image was indistinct and blurred at the edges, but clear enough to be unmistakable. A couple of people in the line behind her whispered to each other.
"Huh," said the barista. "I thought you... ugh, maybe I need to get my eyes checked. Sorry, ma'am, your coffee will be ready soon."
"Th-thank you," Lily said, battling to hide any reaction on her face.
That confirmed it—others could see it too. Lily hurriedly shuffled to the collection spot, placing a pillar between her and the shop window. She grabbed her plastic cup before the startled barista had even finished saying her name and hurried out back onto the street, taking burning gulps.
The horrible reality was starting to sink in—everyone else could see her naked reflection. All she could hope for was that, like the barista, most would probably think it a trick of the light, or a figment of their imagination. Lily had thought she was going crazy when she first saw herself in the mirror—others probably would too. In some ways, this was worse than going crazy.
Short glimpses of her reflection in shop windows indicated that coffee was not the cure to her condition. She pulled her hood further down her face, but it did nothing to stop the enthusiastic chorus of wolf whistles from the construction site two blocks from her office, though that was quite normal. What was less normal was how much attention the construction workers appeared to be paying to the glass window Lily was just about sprinting past.
By the time she finally reached the Sphinx offices, an airy open-plan on the 20th floor of another shiny glass tower, her nerves were shredded. She hurried to her desk, took one look at the computer monitor, and then hastily adjusted the blinds on the window behind it before sitting down.
Her colleague Maya arrived fifteen minutes later and plopped down on the seat beside her. "What's gotten into you this morning, hiding in this dark corner?" she asked, pointing at the blinds.
"It's for the glare," Lily said quickly. "Can't see a thing with the sun shining on my screen all the time."
Maya raised an eyebrow. "It's never bothered you before."
Lily shrugged, continuing her deep etching.
"Seriously, it's way too gloomy in here with the blinds drawn," said Maya, striding purposefully to the window.
"Don't!" Lily blurted out, her tone more shrill than intended.
But it was too late. The blinds shifted up, allowing the morning light to stream into the office. The glare was, indeed, particularly bad today, and Lily's screen was at once awash with light, obscuring its contents and replacing them with her reflected face, shoulders, and chest.
"Whoa, what the hell?!" Maya whispered harshly, leaning in to confirm what she thought she'd seen. "Lily, the office is no place to touch up your sexy selfies!"
Lily bit her lip, heat rising to her cheeks.
"Wait, what's going on?" Maya asked, her eyes squinting behind the round lenses of her glasses. Her reflection appeared beside Lily's, normally clad. "Is this, like, an AI thing? Are you streaming right now?! I don't want to be in your camshow!"
Lily wanted to scream in frustration, but knew it would be better to remain calm and avoid drawing anyone else's attention to her reflection. She felt hurt that Maya would start assuming all these wild things about her, but tried to put herself in Maya's (reflected) shoes. She took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of her nose to calm herself down. "I can explain," she said, taking Maya's wrist. "Lady's room. Now."
Moments later, Maya and Lily were standing at the row of sinks in the office ladies' room, in front of the large, clear mirror on the wall. Behind the sinks stood two women, a curly-haired brunette in a green skirt and a redhead in jeans and a baggy hoodie. Their reflections, however, showed a woman in a green dress standing next to a woman who was completely nude.
"Whoa," said Maya. "So you said it's been like this since this morning?" Not for the first time, she took off her glasses, cleaned them on her dress, and put them back on. "This is really weird."
Lily blushed profusely on both sides of the mirror. The reflections in the windows and her computer screen were partial, indistinct, and fuzzy at the edges, but the restroom mirror offered no such comforts. Her entire upper body was bared to the scrutiny of Maya, a woman barely more than an acquaintance.
Behind them, the restroom door creaked. Lily's eyes went wide with fear, and she dashed into a stall, slamming the door behind her, just in time to hear a distinct pair of heels click across the restroom tiles.
"Good morning, Laura," said Maya, confirming that their manager had just entered the ladies' room.
"Morning, Maya," said Laura. "Who was that who just slammed the stall door?"
"Uh, Lily," said Maya, after a brief pause. "Her, uh, time of the month. You know how it is sometimes."
"Yes," Laura replied, after a long pause. "That can do crazy things to a girl's mind. Crazy things. In fact, I thought I saw... no, I can see her shoes now, and the bottoms of her jeans. But I could have sworn..." Laura trailed off into an indistinct mutter.
"Could have sworn what?" Maya asked.
"Oh, never mind," Laura replied with a short chuckle. "I've just been working too hard, that's all."
After what felt like hours, Lily heard a knock on her stall door. "She's gone," Maya said. "You can come out now."
Lily stepped out of the stall and grabbed Maya's arm, pulling her out of the ladies' room. Now that she'd proven her strange condition, there was no reason to hang around in a place where her reflection was so clearly visible.
Most of the Sphinx staff had filtered into the office by now. Some were sitting at their computers, others making coffee, but a significant and growing cohort was gathered around Derek's desk, staring intently at his screen and murmuring to each other.
"What do you think all that's about?" asked Maya.
Just then, Priya turned and caught Lily's eye. Her eyes widened, and she gasped and nudged the coworkers on either side of her, Tom and Sadie. Suddenly, the whole office went quiet, and all eyes descended on Lily.
A chorus of giggles broke the silence, and Lily felt a wave of nausea. She leaned on Maya for support.
"What are you all looking at?" Maya asked, pulling Lily towards Derek's computer.
The crowd stepped aside, and Derek pushed the chair back from his desk. Security camera footage was playing on both of his monitors, showing different angles of the office. The footage was recent, recorded less than an hour before.
Lily watched with horror as her naked body appeared on both screens, captured from the front and back, rushing towards her desk. As she reached up to draw the blinds, there was a chorus of oohs and aahs from the spectating crowd. After she sat down to start working, Derek fast-forwarded the footage to when Maya appeared, slowing it down and pausing judiciously as Lily rose from her chair to stop the blinds from being opened.
"Was it a dare?" whispered Priya.
"Hey, Lil," asked Tom, cocking an eyebrow, "how much is a monthly sub?"
Lily's face was burning up. She had no response. Her whole body was shaking, and she couldn't even bring herself to look her coworkers in the eye. She felt Maya place a comforting hand on her back.
"You people are sick!" Maya snapped. "Sadie, Derek, you were both here early. You saw Lily walk into the office with your own eyes!" Then she whispered to Lily, "Don't worry, I've got an idea."
Just then, a distinctive set of heels clicked behind them. "What are we all so focused on?" asked Laura. "Is that—is that Lily?!"
"Yes, it is," Maya said confidently. "That is definitely Lily in the video."
Lily looked at Maya with pleading eyes, her face white as a sheet. She dared not make eye contact with Laura.
"In that case, I think someone has some explaining to do," Laura continued.
"Indeed," Maya added. "Derek has a lot of explaining to do."
"Me?!" asked Derek. "I just noticed the video!"
"A likely story," said Maya. "This footage is from less than an hour ago. Most of you were already here at that time. You saw Lily come into the office, just as I did. And you saw that she was wearing clothes, like she is now." Maya tugged at the sleeve of Lily's baggy hoodie. "She's positively overdressed!"
"Then how do you explain the video?" asked Priya.
Maya's face fell into a scowl. "It's on Derek's computer, isn't it? He must have doctored it. You can do all sorts of things with AI these days. And you know how men are. I don't know why you're doing this sort of thing at work, Derek! And to an unconsenting colleague! Revenge porn is a crime, you know."
Now it was Derek's turn to look panicked. "—I found it like this, I swear!"
"These are some serious allegations, Maya," Laura said. Then she turned to Lily. "I saw you in the office earlier, dressed as you are now, just as Maya said. But when I entered the ladies' room, you rushed into a stall very quickly. I just saw the reflection of your back in the mirror. You didn't appear to have your hoodie on then."
"But you saw her jeans and shoes under the stall!" Maya stammered.
"Caught halfway," Tom added.
Laura looked from Maya to Lisa to Derek. "I don't want to jump to conclusions here. At minimum, we have a serious incident on our hands. Nudity is not acceptable under the dress code, and office equipment must not be used to view pornography, much less create it. I don't know which of you is at fault, and frankly I don't have time to deal with it today. Tammy's on leave until next week, so we're operating without an HR department. In light of that, Lily and Derek are both suspended. I'll see you both in Tammy's office on Monday. Until then, go home, and think about what you're going to say."
"But I did nothing wrong!" Lily and Derek shouted in unison.
"Save it," Laura scowled. "Out, both of you, before I call security."
Lily's shoulders slumped, defeated, and she trudged towards her desk to pick up her bag. In a way, this was a relief—she had no desire to stick around in the office today.
"I tried," Maya said, shrugging. "At least Derek's in trouble too. Always thought he was a creep."
"That... doesn't mean you should lie about him," Lily said.
"Lily, he showed the whole office that security footage!" Maya hissed, grabbing her shoulders and staring her in the eye. "You and I know he didn't make it, but he deserves whatever he gets for embarrassing you like that."
"Yeah, I guess."
Outside the office, Lily thought about ordering a rideshare, but changed her mind when she contemplated the possibility of the driver looking at her through the car mirrors the whole way. She chose to walk home, moving fast and avoiding reflective surfaces as best as she could. People shouted at her and stopped her a few times before shaking their heads and apologizing. It was bad enough knowing that the reflection of her naked body had caught their eyes, even if they'd written it off as a hallucination.
At last, Lily reached her apartment building. She hurried up the stairs and slammed the door behind her, panting heavily from exertion. The warm hoodie didn't help matters—it had been completely useless all day. Lily pulled them off angrily and hurled both across the room.
She drew the curtains over the apartment's sole window and covered every mirror she owned with a towel or piece of clothing. Without looking at it, she placed her phone face down on the table next to her bed, and then slammed her body down on the bed and shut her eyes tight. If she couldn't see any reflections, perhaps she could pretend, at least for a little while, that none of this was happening.
But it wasn't just reflections. As Derek's little stunt had shown, she also appeared naked on video footage. Her body was now a permanent feature of the office's security footage, stored on that pervert's computer, and undoubtedly shared far and wide. How many other security cameras had she walked past today? How many people were filming or taking videos with their phones? She shuddered at the thought.
Eyes still shut, Lily tossed and turned on her bed, trying to put these and other thoughts out of her mind. Eventually, it must have worked, for she woke up groggy, with a dry throat, drenched in sweat. She wasn't sure how long she had slept for, not that it mattered.
With a groan, Lily drew herself up from the bed, rubbing her eyes. Feeling sticky and gross, she pulled off her top and jeans and headed for the shower, discarding her bra and panties as she walked.
The towel she'd hung over the mirror had fallen into the sink. Lily caught a glimpse of her reflection and instinctively turned away. There was something different about it. She looked back and gasped.
The Lily in the mirror wore a long white dress, covering her from her neck to her ankles.
Lily placed a hand on the mirror, awestruck. For the first time that day, she saw clothes in her reflection. Not her clothes, she had never owned a dress like that, but it was a welcome change. What could have caused it? She placed a hand against her belly and felt bare skin.
Of course. She was naked, so now her reflection was clothed. It made about as much sense as the opposite.
Feeling experimental, Lily picked up her panties from the bathroom doorway and stepped into them. She looked at her reflection again. The white dress had disappeared, and, standing on tiptoe, she confirmed that her panties were not visible in the mirror. Keeping her eyes on her reflection, she slowly slid the panties down her legs. As soon as she released the fabric, the white dress reappeared.
"Hmm." She walked out of the bathroom and picked up her phone. The white dress was reflected on the black screen. She turned the phone on and opened the selfie camera. The dress was there too. She snapped a picture and took a short video, moving her phone around. Both included the dress.
The rules seemed to be thus: when she was dressed, her reflection and camera image would be naked. When she was naked, both would be clothed in a strange white dress that she had never seen before, much less worn.
The phone buzzed in her hand. It was her mother requesting a video call. She always said she liked to see Lily's face, now that she was so far from home.
Phone still buzzing, Lily instinctively reached for her discarded top, then stopped herself. Hadn't she just discovered that, while naked, she would show up on camera with a white dress? If she put on her top now, her mother would see her nude!
Steeling herself, Lily answered the call. Her mother's smiling face appeared on the screen.
"Hello, dear, that's a nice dress," said her mother. "Are you at home? Why's it so dark in there?"
"Hi Mom, I was, uh, just about to turn on the lights." Holding the phone out in front of her, Lily walked to the light switch. Being naked and knowing she was on camera made her whole body tense up, even though her mother couldn't see it.
Once the lights were on, Lily sat down and angled her phone such that only her face was visible. She wasn't taking any chances with this reflected dress. But it held all the way through her long conversation with her mother, during which she managed to avoid mentioning either her suspension or her reflection. There was no point in worrying her mother, who could do nothing about either. Hadn't Lily come to the city to be independent?
Eventually, Lily said her goodbyes and put the phone down. It was early evening—she had been asleep for longer than she'd thought. Lily prepared a quick meal and sat down in front of the television. She hadn't put on any clothes—it comforted her that the glimpses she caught of her reflection wore the white dress.
There was nothing on the news about naked reflections, either hers or anyone else's. Lily was grateful not to be the subject of a local color story, at least not yet. But how long could she avoid that? As soon as she went out in public, people would notice her reflection. She couldn't be in photos or videos, unless, well... unless she was actually naked, which was hardly a solution to the problem.
Lily glanced down at her body. She supposed she could stay like this, hiding in her room. Perhaps she could get a remote job—video calls would be no problem, so long as she took them here, alone, in her tiny apartment.
There had to be a better solution than that. Lily was tired now, but she had the rest of the week off work to figure it out. Yawning, she shut off the television. Her reflection in the white dress yawned back at her from the darkened screen.
The next morning, Lily woke late to the sound of her buzzing phone. It was Maya.
"Hey Maya, what's up?" she asked groggily, putting the phone to her ear.
"Whoa," Maya replied. "This is crazy."
"What's crazy?"
"Lily, where are you right now?" There was a note of urgency in her voice.
"At home. I just got up."
"Well, you're not going to believe this, but you're at the office too."
"What?"
"I'm looking at you right now, sitting at your desk. You've been ignoring me, though, and you're not doing anything other than sitting there, staring blankly into space, like you're sleepwalking."
"What are you on about? I'm at home!"
"I believe that, but you're also here. At least, someone who looks just like you is. She sleepwalked into the office like a zombie, wearing this flowy white dress."
Lily's heart skipped a beat. "A white dress?" She threw off the covers and rushed to the bathroom to look in the mirror.
The bathroom wall stared back at her. Her reflection was gone.
"Lily, you should get over here so we can figure this out," said Maya. "You're already in trouble with Laura for breaching your suspension anyway."
"But I didn't!"
"That's not what it looks like."
"Right, okay, I'll be right there."
Lily dressed hurriedly and stuffed her phone in the pocket of her black hoodie. She didn't have a naked reflection anymore—or any reflection at all. While this could prove a boon to her shoplifting career, it might also result in her being run out of town for suspected vampirism.
A more immediate concern was that someone who looked just like her was wandering around town and had already gotten her into even more trouble at work. By the insane logic her life seemed to operate on now, that someone must be her reflection.
As Lily speedwalked to the Sphinx office, her phone began buzzing incessantly. She ignored it, keeping her eyes forward. Unlike yesterday, nobody seemed to take any notice of her—an absent reflection was far less remarkable than a naked one.
Her phone didn't stop buzzing even as she reached the office lobby and punched in the number for Sphinx's floor at the elevator. The elevator, all the way at the top of the building, began to make its slow descent. Lily pulled out her phone.
Maya and several of her other colleagues had sent her several photos and videos. But before she could open any of them, the door to the staircase beside the elevator burst open and a pink streak collided with her, sending her phone flying as she lost balance and fell to the floor.
Lily looked up at her own eyes. At her own face. At her own body. Her own naked body.
The other Lily had a crazed look in her eyes as she quickly scrambled off Lily and back onto her feet. The two locked eyes for an instant, neither daring to make the first move.
Just then, Maya burst through the staircase door, panting heavily. "Lily!" she cried. "She's crazy!"
"Woohoo!" the other Lily screamed, pumping her fist in the air. "Yeah, I am! Girls just wanna have fun!" She danced across the lobby, jiggling her boobs.
Maya helped Lily to her feet.
"I... thought you said she was sleepwalking," said Lily, watching with horror as her double leaped and sprang all around the lobby.
"She was, up until about twenty minutes ago," Maya replied. "Then her dress disappeared, and she went totally crazy. Did you see any of my messages?"
"She was, up until about twenty minutes ago," Maya replied. "Then her dress disappeared, and she went totally crazy. Did you see any of my messages?"
"I was rushing here so I didn't look," said Lily.
"Maybe don't. You, uh, get the gist from that." Maya pointed at the other Lily, who was now shaking her ass in front of the clear glass that made up the building's exterior wall, to a growing crowd of spectators.
The security guard at the front desk, who had been asleep, was roused to life by the commotion. "What the—ma'am!" he shouted. "Ma'am, you can't just—you need to cover up! I'm—I'm calling the police!"
"Call them!" the other Lily shrieked, laughing. "Everyone's invited!"
The crowd of spectators at the window was growing larger, and Lily pulled her hoodie over her head.
"Get away from the glass!" the security guard yelled, stepping cautiously towards the other Lily. His hands were raised and he approached her slowly, hesitant to make physical contact. "Ma'am, please, don't make me grab you. Just sit down."
The other Lily ignored him, too busy blowing kisses to the onlookers.
"Th-that's enough!" the guard shouted. He closed in on her and reached for her arm.
But the moment his fingers grazed her skin, the other Lily snapped. "Don't," she said coldly.
"Ma'am, please—"
The other Lily backhanded him, as if swatting a fly.
The blow connected with impossible force, and the guard flew backward, yelling with surprise.
Lily winced as the guard's back smacked into the front of the reception desk, still feeling winded herself from her own collision with the other Lily. He crumpled to the floor, groaning and clutching his chest.
Cackling maniacally, the other Lily drew herself up to her tiptoes and twirled around a few times, beaming for the growing crowd on the other side of the glass. "My adoring public awaits!" And with three skips, she was out of the lobby.
"We have to catch her!" said Maya. "Otherwise, you're going to be arrested for indecent exposure! And assault, and who knows what else!"
Lily whimpered, but quickly followed Maya out into the street. Besides being embarrassing, her reflection was dangerous.
The other Lily was posing and blowing kisses to an increasingly large crowd. Most watched her with wide, disbelieving eyes, many taking out their phones to record.
"Shake it, baby!"
"What's she protesting?"
"Work, probably. Or maybe it's an art thing."
One older woman near the back of the crowd, however, had her phone pressed to her ear and was loudly speaking to a police officer. "Yes, please send someone at once. The woman is naked! No clothes at all! And some very suggestive dancing!"
As Lily and Maya approached the scene, the other Lily froze, locking eyes with them for a moment before taking off at a sprint down the sidewalk, much to the disappointment of the onlookers. With a shout, Maya and Lily started after her.
They chased her two blocks before Maya stumbled to a walk. "Can't—keep up—why'd you have to be so fit?" she asked between enormous pants.
"I'm—not!" Lily said, also unable to continue sprinting. "She's a demon! Or something like that!"
Lily and Maya watched helplessly as the other Lily's white ass disappeared into the distance.
"That your sister?" a passerby asked Lily.
"Yes," Maya answered for her. "She... has some problems."
"Want me to call someone?"
"That's okay, we'll figure it out."
The passer-by shrugged and continued walking.
Having recovered slightly, Lily and Maya cast each other desperate glances. "What are we going to do now?" asked Maya. "She didn't seem to be getting tired."
Lily shivered as she imagined all the trouble her reflection would be getting into. With the speed she was going at, there wouldn't be many people in the city left who hadn't seen Lily's body before long. And the possibility of arrest was very real.
"It's really strange, you know," said Maya, cradling her chin in her hand. "One minute, she was completely docile, just sitting there at your desk, typing mindlessly on the keyboard. But then she went completely crazy! And the dress she was wearing... it just disappeared!"
A switch flicked in Lily's mind. "When, exactly, did this happen? Her dress disappearing, I mean."
Maya thought for a moment. "It was right after I got off the phone with you."
"That would have been when I started for the office." Gears were turning in Lily's mind. "Maya, did you drive to the office?"
Maya nodded.
"Take me to your car. I have an idea."
About an hour later, Maya returned to her car, leading a docile red-haired woman in a white dress by the shoulder. "We're back," she said, knocking on the window. "You were right."
Maya opened the back door of the car to reveal Lily huddling between the backseat and the passenger-side backrest. She was completely naked, but looked very relieved. "Finally! I was sure someone was going to see me!"
"I found her wandering around the park," said Maya, gently helping the other Lily into the backseat and strapping her in. "I guess we were quick enough to stop her from getting arrested."
"Awesome. Now let's get out of here."
Maya shut the back door and climbed in behind the steering wheel. Lily stayed in her spot between the seat and the backrest, curling up as tight and small as she could as the engine roared to life. The other Lily remained motionless and impassive as the car drove out of the parking garage and onto the city street.
"Where should I park?" Maya asked. "Once we get to your place, I mean."
"It'll have to be out front," Lily said. "I don't have a parking space at the back."
"On the street?"
"Yes."
"Do you think we can restrain her?" Maya asked. "On the way upstairs, I mean."
"Not after what she did to that guard." Lily took in a sharp breath.
"But that means—"
"I know. Look, one of us is going to have to be naked, so it may as well be the one we can control," Lily said, sounding a lot braver than she felt. "It's... unavoidable."
"Should I give you my coat?"
"Too dangerous."
"Alright then. I'm turning into your street now, be ready."
Lily recalled the shock on Maya's face when she'd taken off all of her clothes behind her car. "Please put them in the trunk," she'd told Maya, huddling down chest-to-thighs. "I'll be tempted to cover up if you don't."
Maya had done as instructed, and Lily had watched with horror as her neatly folded clothes were placed in the trunk, which was then firmly shut. The worst part was that she'd asked for it. "Quick, open the door!" she'd said then. "Before someone comes!"
Maya had opened the door for her, allowing Lily to scramble into the car and take up her huddled position. "I hope you're right about this," she'd said. "What are you going to say if someone sees you? I'm going to leave the keys with you so people don't start thinking I get my kicks by locking naked women in my car."
"I'll... think of something. Just... hurry!"
Waiting for Maya gave Lily an opportunity to go through her phone. There were a lot of photos and videos from Maya and other colleagues. The first few showed the other Lily walking and sitting in her white dress. But most of them had been taken after the change. After the real Lily had gotten dressed.
Lily had to stop herself from screaming as she watched video after video of herself dancing on tables, kicking laptops and screens, and giving each of her colleagues a personal lap dance. She decided not to read the messages she'd received from Tom and Derek.
When she could no longer stand the videos and photos, she put her phone down and listened for signs that someone might be in the parking garage with her. A couple of times, she heard footsteps, but no one came close to Maya's car or peeked through the windows.
Not that it mattered much, as all of her colleagues were already intimately familiar with her appearance sans clothes. And now she was about to streak from Maya's car to her apartment.
The car came to a stop in front of the apartment building. It was mid-morning and the street was quiet, but not free of people. Lily took in a deep breath as Maya pulled up the handbrake and killed the engine. "Ready?" she asked, her face etched with a look of deep sympathy.
"No," Lily said bluntly. "But I'm going to have to do it anyway, aren't I?"
Maya repeated her offer of a coat, but Lily shook her head firmly. As soon as she put anything on, the other Lily's white dress would disappear, and she would go from a docile zombie to a sex-crazed maniac with demonic strength, easily able to overpower them both and escape into the city. Lily had turned it over and over in her mind, and she knew that, ridiculous as it sounded, streaking from the car to her apartment would actually minimize her humiliation and exposure.
Knowing that did not stop her heart from pounding against her ribs as Maya opened the car door and leaned over the other Lily to undo her seatbelt. It came out with a click, and the other Lily slipped from the car, leaving the way open for Lily's exit.
"Walk between us," said Maya, holding the other Lily's shoulder at arm's length.
Slowly, cautiously, Lily crawled out of the car, keeping low. Once she was out, she drew herself up straight, standing between Maya and the other Lily, using their bodies to shield hers from either end of the road. Her back faced the car, and her front faced the front wall of the apartment. No one had noticed her yet.
But here she was, standing naked in front of her apartment, bare feet on hot asphalt, the breeze touching every part of her. She remembered how mortified she'd been by glimpses of her naked reflection, of her video image. Well, this was a thousand times worse.
The door shut behind her, and the car locked. No going back now, only forward. Arms crossed tightly over her chest, she took small, shaky steps across the sidewalk, trying in vain to keep her thighs pressed together. She stared straight at the door of her apartment building, which quickly became the only thing she could see.
As they stepped through the door, a car horn blared, making Lily jump. The horn blared twice more in quick succession, clearly appreciative. Maya shouted something at the driver and hurried the group along.
The lobby was thankfully empty, and the three made their way up the stairs.
"S-stop, it's this one," Lily said, preventing Maya from taking her up an extra flight of stairs. They hurried down the hall towards Lily's apartment, which was in the middle of the hallway. After what felt like an eternity, they finally reached her door.
"Th-this is my place," Lily said.
For a moment, the three of them stood in front of the door.
"Well?" asked Maya. "Unlock the door, let's go inside!"
"Yes, of course," Lily tapped the sides of her bare thighs and immediately suppressed a scream. "I don't have the key!"
"Where is it?" Maya hissed.
"In... in my hoodie."
The hoodie in question was still in the trunk of Maya's car. Maya and Lily realized this with one desperate look at each other.
"W-wait here," Maya said. "I'll go fetch it."
"Hurry!" Lily pleaded, indicating her body.
Maya took off at a run, leaving Lily standing outside the apartment with her strangely solid reflection. As soon as she was out of sight, a lock clicked in the apartment next door. Someone was coming out!
Lily pressed her back against her door, which was very slightly recessed from the wall, and grabbed her reflection in an aggressive, tight hug from behind.
The door swung open and out stepped Bob, the elderly widower who lived next door. "Hi neighb... oh, wow, I must be seeing double. I didn't know you had a twin sister, Lily."
Lily smiled weakly. "This is... uh... Lila." It wasn't the most creative choice, but Lily had a lot else on her mind just then.
The other Lily stared impassively, her face plastered with a dreamlike smile.
"Pleased to meet you, Lila," Bob said. "That's an awfully pretty dress you have on."
"Th-thank you," said Lily, grateful that he seemingly had not yet noticed what she was wearing. Or rather, not wearing.
Bob's brows furrowed, and he scratched his head. "I think there must be something the matter with my eyes after all, I can't seem to make out which one of you is speaking. The doctor's been hounding me to have my eyes tested for weeks. Maybe he has a point."
"M-maybe he does," Lily stammered, hugging "Lila" tighter.
"I think you're right," said Bob. "I reckon I'll head to the optometrist right this moment, get fitted for some glasses. Meredith always did say I was blind as a bat, you know."
Lily laughed politely.
"You have a good day now, girls. Nice to meet you, Lila."
"You too!" Lily lifted her reflection's arm up and waved it as Bob shambled past them and down the hallway towards the elevator. She was careful to angle Lila so that she blocked any view of her body.
Just as the elevator left, Maya appeared at the end of the hallway, clutching Lily's black hoodie in front of herself and breathing heavily. "Whew, not as fit as I thought I was," she said, offering Lily her key ring.
Lily grabbed the keys and had the apartment unlocked in seconds. She practically shoved Maya and her reflection inside before slamming the door and collapsing against it, the unsanded wood jabbing her bare back.
"It's really dark in here," Maya said, flicking on a lamp, the light casting long shadows across their faces.
"I didn't want to see anything," Lily replied. "Especially not my reflection."
The other Lily stood motionless in the center of the room, smiling serenely.
"We're safe for now," Maya said, eyeing the reflection warily. "But we can't keep her here forever. And you can't stay like that forever." Her cheeks flushed as she gestured at Lily's nudity.
"One streak was enough," Lily said, hugging her knees to her chest. "But if I put anything on, she'll go crazy again. We need to figure out what's causing this. How to send her back... inside the mirror."
A light seemed to come on behind Lily's eyes. She stood up at once and darted into the bathroom. "Uh, Maya, you should see this."
Maya stepped into the bathroom behind her. "Whoa."
The mirror had changed. Now leaned up against the sink, it had grown to full length. The runes on the frame were glowing with sickly green light, and the surface no longer reflected the bathroom wall. Instead, it showed a swirling, rippling blue vortex, producing a slight wind that ruffled the women's hair.
Lily and Maya stared at it, agape. "It's a portal," Maya said at last. "That must be how she got out."
"How does that make any sense?" Lily asked.
Maya shrugged. "We're way past sense at this point, girl. But the good news is if that's how she got out, we know how to send her back in."
"This is all too weird." Lily's shoulders slumped. "But I see your logic. Let's try it."
Lily and Maya returned to the apartment's main room, where the reflection still stood motionless in her white dress. Standing on either side of her, they each took one of her hands and gently ushered her forward, into the bathroom. She did not resist.
Inside the bathroom, she gave no indication of having noticed the mirror-portal, though she stared directly at it.
"I guess we just... push her in?" Maya said.
"I guess. Do you think that'll solve the, uh, nudity problem as well?" Lily twitched in her skin, impatient to put this all behind her and get dressed again.
Maya shrugged. "We'll have to see."
Slowly, carefully, they led the reflection forward, towards the surface of the mirror-portal. The wind from the swirling vortex seemed to intensify with each small step they took, until it was blowing their hair all over their faces and making Lily shiver with cold. "It's resisting!" she cried.
"Now! Push!" Maya commanded.
With a synchronized grunt of effort, Lily and Maya pushed the reflection into the swirling vortex. As she made contact, the mirror's surface pulsed violently, and the lights on the runes flared. Lily felt her reflection stiffen under her grip, starting to resist her. She kept pushing.
"It's working!" Maya shouted. "She's going through!"
And indeed, the other Lily was entering the mirror's surface, disappearing into the vortex. But she was also becoming aware of what was happening and had started to struggle.
"Hold her tight!" Lily screamed.
There was a sound of tearing, and a scrap of white fabric came off in Lily's hand. The sleeve of the dress. Lily dropped it and pushed against her reflection's upper arm, now bare. The dress was tearing apart before her eyes!
"Just a little more!" Maya shouted.
As Lily made her final push, she felt something hook around her ankle and push her back. She struggled against her reflection, tried to dig her heels into the slippery tiled floor. But her reflection was strong—inhumanly strong. A scuffle ensued, and they spun around and around, tearing at each other's skin, pushing each one in turn into the swirling surface of the vortex.
"Lily!" Maya screamed.
Lily struggled against her reflection, but she was too weak. The mirror vortex felt like water against her face, her chest, her legs...
Panicking, she twisted her body around, only managing to immerse herself further in the mirror. She saw the look of horror on Maya's face and a small, triumphant smile on the face of her reflection. Then she was falling, falling, falling...
To be concluded...
