In the small wizarding village of Appleby, located in North Lincolnshire, England, there lived a little old wizard by the name of Absolon Tristram. Absolon was a junk peddler by trade, who scoured the countryside looking for anything he could find, refurbish, and sell at a profit, whether it be a magical object or not. In most cases he would enchant any ordinary items he found in some way before selling them to other wizards and witches, but he also sold unenchanted items to muggles as well, and therefore was well liked by pretty much everyone in the village and its surrounding areas.

One day, while riding over a hill in his wooden cart full of old odds and ends, his mule, Bertrand, pulling him along at a steady pace, Absolon saw something glinting in the valley down below. He steered toward the object and as he approached it he saw that it was a full length mirror with an ornate, golden frame. The frame looked worn and tarnished and the glass was all dusty and blurry, as if the mirror had been sitting out in the valley for some time now, exposed to the elements. Absolon gave it a once over and decided that after a good polishing it would look as good as new, so he hopped down from his cart and lifted the mirror into the back. He was surprised at how light it was considering it was made of gold. He just shrugged and climbed back up to the drivers seat and urged Bertrand onward. As he rode home he smiled a big smile at the wonderful new acquisition he'd made. It would certainly fetch a good price soon enough.

About one hour later, Absolon and Bertrand pulled up to the small cottage with the hay roof that they called home. Absolon dismounted the cart and began to unload his day's haul, which only consisted of the mirror, a couple crates full of empty, glass, milk bottles, and a few broken garden tools, and bring them into his house. He brought the mirror in last. As he picked it up to carry it in, he looked into the dust covered glass and for a moment he thought he saw something odd about the hazy reflection looking back at him. He just shrugged the eerie feeling off, though, and carried the mirror inside. He placed it in one corner of his small living room and then went about getting things ready for the evening. First he went out and unhitched Bertrand from the cart and put him safely away in the barn next to the house and gave him some hay and water for dinner, then he went to the well out back and fetched a pale of water to use to make soup for his own dinner. After he had filled a large cauldron on the stove with the water, he pulled his wand out from the pocket of the old, tattered robe he wore and, using magic, he made a knife on a nearby counter start chopping some vegetables which had levitated out of a cupboard. As the knife cut, the pieces of food glided smoothly through the air and into the cauldron. Then Absolon pointed his wand at the wood in the stove and said, "Incendio!" and a fire started beneath the large cauldron.

While the soup began to cook, Absolon went and sat down in his favorite old chair in the living room and took his pointy shoes off revealing holey, stripped socks. He sighed comfortably as he sat back and relaxed while the stove heated his dinner and the cottage all at the same time. It wasn't anything spectacular, but it was a good life, he thought. Absently, Absolon looked over to the new mirror. There was something very unique about it, but Absolon couldn't quite put his finger on what that was. Something about it made you look at it, drew you to it. Sure enough, Absolon got up right then and walked over to it. Using the sleeve of his robe he began to wipe at the surface of the mirror's foggy glass. Once there was a small, clean spot showing, Absolon looked into the mirror expecting to see his own reflection, but he was astonished to instead see the face of a young woman.

"Aislin?" he said, in the quietest, saddest voice you can imagine.

The woman in the mirror didn't move or speak, but Absolon would know her anywhere. Aislin was a girl he had known when he was younger, before he lived alone, before he became a junk man, back when he was a promising student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He and Aislin had dated from their second year there, right up until their final seventh year, but right before graduation, when Absolon told her that he wanted to marry her, move to the countryside, and work in his father's hat shop, Aislin informed him that she intended to do no such thing. She wanted to go work for the Ministry of Magic and stay near her family in London. She told him that her career came first and she had no plans to get married so young. They had had a huge fight about it, at the end of which, Absolon had finally decided to compromise and move with Aislin to London. That's when she informed him that he just wasn't part of the picture that she had envisioned for her own future. She broke up with him and they each went their separate ways. She did join the Ministry of Magic as a low level bookkeeper and only one year after that married an auror who also worked there. She quickly forgot all about Absolon and their relationship together, but he never forgot her. Absolon was not someone who fell in love easily, and after Aislin, the one person he felt he could truly give himself to and who would never betray him, did, he never opened up to another human being again, not in that way. But now here she was again, right in front of him, her brown eyes shone the way they always did and her young face looked just as it had the last time he saw her. She looked so real he thought he could reach out and touch her, but when he actually tried to, all he felt was the flat, cold glass of the mirror.

Reality came flooding back to him quickly and he realized this mirror was a magical mirror. He just wasn't sure what the trick was exactly. Was he seeing Aislin through another mirror on her end? If so, why wasn't she doing anything like combing her hair, or admiring her reflection? She seemed to be looking at him, but if she could see him, why wasn't she waving, or smiling, or doing something to show she could? Quickly Absolon grabbed an old rag from the kitchen and began to clean off the rest of the mirror's surface. Sure enough, as soon as he'd finished, Aislin's whole figure was standing there in the full length mirror. Absolon walked around the mirror several times to make sure it really was just a flat mirror, because the space behind Aislin in the glass looked like a whole other room than the one he was standing in. There was nothing behind the mirror, but maybe, Absolon thought, there might be something written on the frame, so he began to polish that. Eventually he could make out the words ERISED STRA EHRU OYT UBE CAFRU OYT ON WOHSI.

"Must be Latin," he said to himself.

On the other side of the mirror, in Despair's dimension, where it was a window, her and her twin watched the old wizard with relish. Desire even giggled.

"Well, I'll be hornswoggled," Absolon said, finally. He just couldn't figure out what the mirror was about, or why it was showing him Aislin of all people, or why she didn't do anything but stand there and stare, but he decided he didn't care. At least he was able to see her again after all these years. He pulled the mirror over to his chair so it was facing him and then he sat down. He sat there and stared at his long lost love for twenty minutes straight until the sound of the water boiling over in the cauldron snapped him out of his nostalgic stupor. He ran into the kitchen and waved his wand to extinguish the flames. Then he scooped some vegetable soup into a small wooden bowl, grabbed a spoon, and took it back into the living room so he could eat it in his chair where he would still be able to watch Aislin. An hour later his empty bowl sat on the table next to him while he continued to sit and watch his beautiful Aislin. Though she never left the glass or made any grand gestures, she did occasionally blink, or twitch her fingers, and for one moment Absolon thought he almost saw her smile. It didn't matter what she did, though. He hung on every blink. Eventually the sun outside began to set and Bertrand's head suddenly appeared through an open window in the living room, looking in to see why his master hadn't come to put his blanket on him. Absolon didn't notice him there. He was too entranced by the mirror, so eventually the mule just turned around, sadly, and went back to the barn.

The next morning Absolon awoke in his chair. He looked around the empty living room. He looked at the bowl still sitting next to him, at the open window where a bird had perched upon the sill and was singing, and then at the mirror.

"Oh, thank goodness, I thought it had been a dream," Absolon said to himself.

He sat up quickly and stared into the mirror. Aislin stared back.

"You're still there," he said to the image. "I was afraid I'd lose you again."

There was no response, just a quiet look that he could read anything he wanted into.

"Why did you leave me?" Absolon asked with pain in his voice. It was more to himself than to the image in the mirror.

Aislin gave no response anyway.

"You're sorry, aren't you?" said Absolon. "I forgive you."

Two weeks later and Absolon still sat in his chair. His usually trim beard was beginning to grow out of control and he was developing bed sores on his thighs from sitting in his chair for so many hours a day. But still he sat there and stared at Aislin staring back. He hadn't gone out to collect or sell any junk since the day he found the mirror. In fact, the only reason he even left his chair anymore at all was to use the bathroom or feed Bertrand. He used his wand to do everything else, like levitate things to him, including food, although he really didn't eat that much these days anyway. He was too sad to have an appetite, because as nice as being able to see Aislin everyday was, there were many times when reality would come flooding back and Absolon would realize that all he was looking at was an illusion. At those times he would begin to cry uncontrollably.

To cheer himself up after these horrible times, Absolon would need only to look into the mirror again. Sometimes he would sit for hours, unblinking, just staring at her and thinking about what was and what could have been. Aislin's image seemed to indulge him in whatever it was he was thinking. Sometimes he'd begin to slip into a comfortable little hallucination brought on by a mix of euphoria and hunger. In these delusions it would be as if he and Aislin had actually married and had had several children the way Absolon had always wanted. They all lived together in his cottage and the children would laugh as they rode Bertrand around the yard.

"Bertrand!"

Absolon snapped out of his delirium when he realized he'd forgotten to feed his mule today. He ran outside to the barn, the foreign sunlight stinging his eyes. As soon as he entered, he saw something that made him stop in his tracks. Bertrand lay there in the hay, dead. His skin was rotting and melting away. Absolon could see the bones showing through, as flies and maggots ate away at the rancid carcass. Absolon covered his mouth in horror and also because of the smell. Then he backed out of the barn.

"How long has it been since I fed him?" he asked himself out loud. He was trying to get his thoughts together, but he just couldn't remember. He ran inside the house to check his wizard clock, which not only kept track of hours and minutes but also of days and months.

"It hasn't been a month, has it?" Absolon said when he saw the clock. He began to stroke his bushy beard with worry. Suddenly he began to feel disoriented and hungry. Sweat beaded at his temples.

"I haven't been away from the house in a month. Why hasn't anyone come to see if I'm okay?" he said.

Absolon considered himself to be a popular man. After all, he was well liked by all the people in the village and its surrounding areas that he sold his wares to, but as he contemplated the question he had just asked himself, he realized the truth.

"No one care," he said, sadly. "No one really cares about an old junk man."

He staggered over to his chair and sat down. He laid his head back and closed his eyes, but all he could picture was his mule's corpse. All he could think about was Bertrand, his one and only friend. He began to sob. Deeply and violently.

From their vantage point on the other side of the mirror, Despair and Desire watched him cry with satisfaction. Desire put its hand on its sisters clammy shoulder and squeezed. Despair was enjoying Absolon's pain like a fine wine. Desire glanced down at its sister and smiled, then turned its golden eyes back to the broken wizard.

Absolon suddenly stopped crying and looked up and into the mirror. Aislin was still there. Beautiful Aislin. He still had her. Bertrand left his thoughts as Aislin slowly filled them up. Absolon closed his eyes again and slipped back into the world where they were together, where fish flew through the sky and the grass was the color of sapphires. His stomach began to growl, but rather than eat, Absolon fell asleep instead. When he did, he dreamed only of Aislin.

He awoke several days later still in his chair. His hair was dirty, the table at his side was loaded with dirty, moldy dishes and his finger nails were so long he could barely hold his wand properly. He looked down at his bare chest. He had forgotten to get dressed again after taking off the sweat stained robe he'd been wearing for weeks. His stomach looked bloated and his ribs showed through his skin. For a second it almost reminded him of something, but then he forgot. He tried not to look at the mirror, because he knew if he did he'd forget to eat again, so he closed his eyes and reached for his wand. He pointed it towards the window and tried to will some vegetables out of the garden and into the house, but no matter what spell he used, nothing happened. He had no more will.

"Blast it," he said. He tried to stand up to go into the kitchen and check the pantry, but his legs were too weak and covered in sores. It hurt to move. Absolon sighed and laid back in his chair. Oh well, he thought, might as well give in. He looked at the mirror, at Aislin, and all his pain went away. He breathed in a deep breath and then exhaled. For the last time.

Absolon suddenly felt no pain, no longing, no hunger, nothing at all; just sort of fuzzy.

He instinctively looked at the mirror, and for the first time since he had owned it, he saw only his own reflection in it. He no longer looked emaciated and unkempt, he looked how he always thought he did, like a lovable old junk man.

Suddenly from behind the mirror stepped a beautiful young woman wearing a cloak as black as night. She had the hood up, but Absolon could still see some of her long, raven hair underneath as it framed her impossibly pale, round face. Her eyes were deep and dark, as were her lips, and around one eye was drawn a swirly black design that looked like something Absolon had seen as a student at Hogwarts in an old book about Egyptian mythology.

"Oh dear," said Absolon, as he realized who this woman was.

"I know," said Death.

"I wasted it, didn't I? I wasted it all," said Absolon.

"Don't blame yourself," said Death, in a comforting tone.

"Can't I have another chance?" pleaded Absolon. "Can't I give it another go?"

"Not this life," said Death. "Not in this world." She held out her hand.

"I wanted her back so much," said Absolon, about to cry.

"I know," said Death, "But it does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live."

"I'm afraid," said Absolon. He would not leave his chair.

"It's really okay," said Death, in a kind manner. "Someone's waiting for you on the other side."

"Aislin?" asked Absolon, hopefully.

"No, I was referring to Bertrand, your mule," said Death. "Aislin is still alive and well. Living happily with her husband and children."

Absolon sat for a full minute, thinking over whatever it is he had to think about at this point.

"Alright," he said, and took Death's hand.

She helped him up out of the chair and led him away from the mirror and his cottage and the land of the living.