The Marcson Merger

In the office bathroom mirror, I saw it for the first time—a shadow rippling the surface. When I blinked, it was gone.

I shook my hands under the dryer, its hum drowning a faint crash. My eyes darted to the door, but the sound vanished beneath the dryer.

The fluorescent lights flickered as I left the bathroom, stepping back into the narrow hallway that led to the cubicles. The cold tiles echoed beneath my shoes.

I met James on the way back. His thinning hairline, thick mustache, and bumpy nose stood out, with blackheads resembling freckles. A scar ran across his eyebrow from a failed trust fall at an after-work party. I was the supposed catcher.

“Hey man, doing good? Bathroom break, huh?” he asked, a tired smile pulling at his lips. He shifted his weight, clearly in need of his own trip.

“Yeah, had one cup too many,” I replied, “You prepared for an all-nighter?” I chuckled.

“Are you ever?” He laughed. “I also had one too many… But more coffee, more productivity, right?” He gave a small laugh before continuing, “Right, by the way, can you get those papers for the Marcson deal on my desk?”

“Sure, I’ll get them to you in thirty.” I paused, my mind wandering back to the mirror. “By the way, James—did anything seem off to you in the bathroom, at any time today?”

“Off? What do you mean?”

I opened my mouth, then closed it again. “No, never mind. It’s nothing.

He raised an eyebrow but didn’t press. “Nothing off from what I can recall, but hey man, bathroom calls. It’s a bad one.” He brushed past me, heading toward the door.

Half an hour later, I knocked on the metal edge of his cubicle.

“James—uh, hmm.” I paused. Was that his name? Who was he? His face—it was too smooth, too pale. No blackheads, no hairs, just a scar on his eyebrow. Why couldn’t I remember?

“I’m here with the Marcson deal,” I said.

The man didn’t respond, just stared at his screen, eyes unmoving, fixed on a single point. Then he jolted to life. “How long have you been standing there? Just leave it on the desk and go.”

As I turned to leave, I heard a giggle behind me. I spun on my heel, but the man was already back to staring at his screen, face blurry. I rubbed my temples. Was I that stressed?

Back at my desk, Clara from accounting was talking about some meeting. She sat on my desk, playing with one of my Rubik’s cubes. She was as cute as ever, although I no longer felt that odd feeling in my heart whenever she looked at me. Her yellow sun dress caressed her body and my gaze subconsciously danced its way along her curves. I nodded, my gaze wandering to the window, where the skyline distorted in the afternoon sun.

I blinked. There was a face in the window—mine, or at least it should have been. But it wasn’t. The reflection was hollow, blurry, my features smooth and flat.

I froze, my breath catching in my throat. Clara kept talking. I glanced at her, my heart pounding. She didn’t notice anything wrong. Her eyes were on me, but the reflection—my reflection—was blurry, smudged.

“You okay?” Clara’s worried voice cut through the fog in my mind, and I forced a nod. But her face wasn’t right. Something shifted beneath her skin, a subtle ripple. A wave moving beneath the surface.

I tried to speak, but my voice was a strained whisper. “Your face…”

She frowned. “What about it?”

The reflection twitched, and with a sickening lurch, that feeling from the bathroom crashed back over me again.

The woman angrily left towards the—towards the cafeteria? I think so.

Someone hurried past. Who was it? I looked into the hallway, but it was empty.

A tingling spread across my scalp and down my face. I massaged my temples, feeling the skin tighten. My temples felt smooth. I scratched my nose. Was it smaller?

I left for the coffee machine. It was getting late, and we were nowhere close to done with— hmm. I needed another cup.

I bumped into someone at the machine, a woman in a tight yellow sundress. “What department do you work in?” I asked.

They turned, but their face was blank—no eyes, no nose, just smooth skin.

I turned back to the coffee machine which had stopped whirring. The figure grabbed their cup and sat at a table, staring into the distance.

A giggle echoed in the hallway, growing closer. Another person stepped into the cafeteria. Their face was blank, like the other’s. Just a thinning hairline and a scar on its eyebrow. They giggled wildly before sitting down opposite the other figure.

The room was too quiet. I tried to speak, but no words came. I couldn’t. I moved my hand up to feel my lips, but there was nothing. Just smooth skin where they should have been. I ran my hand across my face—nothing. I needed to see.

I stumbled toward the glass doors, heart pounding. My reflection waited. I hesitated, but couldn’t stop myself. Slowly, I leaned in, breath shallow.

There I was. Or… some version of me.

The face in the glass was blank, just like the others. A pale, empty canvas. No eyes, no mouth, no expression. A faceless figure staring back, hollow and lifeless.

I swallowed, or tried to—my throat tightened. The reflection grinned.

It shouldn’t have been able to grin.

But it did. Slowly, impossibly, the featureless face grinned.

A scream welled up, but I had no mouth to release it. The blank reflection tilted its head, watching me struggle, mocking me with that empty, impossible grin.

And then, in the silence, I heard it. My own voice, inside my head, whispering in a tone I didn’t recognize.

“You were never real to begin with.”