The Mirror

Jennifer changed into her pajamas. It was midnight, and she and Genesis had just finished watching the late-night Discovery Channel show on Ancient Egypt. The mirror still seemed strange in her room. The mirror. Something was different about it. Jennifer looked at it again. The cracked glass was no longer cracked and the gold looked as if it was newly-made, not 3000 years old.

Jennifer approached the mirror. That's strange. She thought and touched the glass. Her hand went right through the reflecting glass. It sent ripples up the glass as if she were touching water. She yanked it out again. Oh my God She thought, Just like that book Through the Looking Glass by that guy. She touched the glass again with one finger. It went through the mirror as it had the first time.

Jennifer bravely stood up and put one foot through the mirror. Then she stepped through. She fell out of the mirror, and into a golden room. She was still in her pajamas.

Jennifer looked around the room. A beautiful vase held some tender iris lilies, there was a small wooden bed with the curling ends of Egyptian style, with curtains of thin satin covering it. The walls had flat colorful Egyptian-looking pictures of hunting expeditions and rivers. There were torches and candles burning sweet incense.

The room was decorated with mahogany tables, on which perched beautiful artifacts made of gold. A small window stood at the far end of the room. Jennifer walked to it and looked out into the night. The sight made her gape. A billion or more stars illuminated a trillion, and defiantly more, grains of white sand.

She saw beds of innocent lilies flow into more sand, then into papyrus reeds, then into a clear river. The Nile. In the distance she saw breathtaking stone pyramids, their tops covered in gold. They looked almost new. A warm wind that smelled of spices blew past her face and she inhaled deeply, taking in the heavenly scent.

Down on the other side of the river, bathed in light from the crescent moon, there were small mud houses with straw roofs. Laundry was hanging up to dry on small wooden poles, and small children were chasing goats around bonfires, laughing and screaming. Jennifer smiled and sighed, seeing how happy they looked.

Oh my God, She thought, the prospect just now coming to her, Am I in Ancient Egypt?

Suddenly a pair of tall golden doors on the other side of the room Jennifer had failed to notice burst open and a few maids rushed in. "Jendai! There you are!" One of the maids said in Ancient Egyptian. Surprisingly, Jennifer could understand it. Jendai? She thought.

The maids started laughing when they saw what she was wearing. "Jendai, where did you get those?" One maid said, and Jennifer remembered that she was wearing pajamas, which didn't exist in Ancient Egypt.

"Uhh, I don't know." Jennifer said in Ancient Egyptian, which now seemed strangely familiar to her.

The maids laughed again. "Well, hurry up and change. Pharaoh wants you."

Jennifer looked confused, so a young maid about her age said, "I'll stay here and help her." The other maids looked at her oddly but let her stay.

The girl walked up to Jennifer. "Jennifer, what are you doing here?" She said in plain English. Jennifer was taken aback, then she recognized the girl. It was Vanessa, a girl that had supposedly moved away to another country two months ago, who used to live on Jennifer's block.

Vanessa had straight shoulder-length brown-black hair and chocolate brown eyes. They weren't very Egyptian-looking or almond-shaped, but she used black eyeliner to make them look that way. She had olive skin that stretched very tightly over her sharp cheekbones. She was normally thin and about 5"6, also nineteen years old. She had always been the serious one, and the disapproving crinkles on her forehead now showed her usual irritation for Jennifer when she didn't know what she was doing.

"Vanessa?!" Jennifer breathed.

"Yes, but its Anura now."

"I thought you moved to another country!"

"I did. I moved to Egypt. I just didn't say what time period." She smiled.

"Wow. How'd you get here?"

"Same way you did."

"The mirror?"

"Yeah."

There was a loud banging on the door. "Jendai! Hurry up!" One of the maids called.

"Am I Jendai?" Jennifer asked.

"Yeah."

"And, what do I do?"

"Well, right now you have to get changed."

"Into what?"

Vanessa pointed to a brown loincloth draped over a chair. Jennifer raised an eyebrow.

"Uhh, no."

"Uhh, yes."

"Why, though?"

"Just do it. It's better than getting your head chopped off."

Jennifer raised both of her eyebrows.

"And, uhh, what do I wear for a top?"

"Nothing."

"I'm not doing this."

"Don't worry, your body'll be covered with paint."

"Paint?!"

"Body paint. Black and gold. On nearly every inch of your skin."

"No way."

"Just do it. All the concubines do."

"Concubines?!"

"Well, yeah."

"Am I a...?"

"Yeah."

"No. I'm not doing this. I'm a virgin and I would like to keep it that way, thank you very much."

"Jennifer!"

"No."

"Jendai! The Pharaoh does not like to be kept waiting!" Shouted one of the maids from behind the doors.

"Jennifer, please!" Her eyes begged, "If I let you go back through the mirror I'll be killed for letting you escape."

Jennifer sighed, "All right, fine. I'll do it for you, k?"

"Thank you."

"Turn around while I change."

"Sure."

Ten minutes later Jennifer walked into the Pharaoh's bedchamber. Her body was covered from head to toe with black and gold paint. Her stomach was a bundle of nerves. I can't believe I'm doing this. She thought. She had been going over various plans in her head to get out of this, but none would work. She would just have to do it.