Ethereal Page

“Every secret has a shadow. Every shadow hides a world.”

Fourteen-year-old Lila moves to the lonely coastal town of Seabrook after her grandmother vanishes without a trace. The only clue left behind is a tarnished silver locket hidden in the attic, its inside etched with the words: “Find the door, save the light.” The townspeople whisper about storms and curses, but Lila brushes it off—until she explores the abandoned lighthouse on the cliff. There, she meets Ethan, a boy her age with shadowed eyes, who mutters, “You shouldn’t be here,” before disappearing like smoke.

The locket’s clasp hides a tiny key. Late that night, Lila returns to the lighthouse and unlocks a rusted door beneath the spiral stairs. A dusty mirror glows faintly, reflecting a sunlit version of Seabrook—no storms, no crumbling buildings. Heart racing, she touches the glass… and falls through. The mirror cracks behind her, sealing her in this strange, silent world. But the “perfect” Seabrook is a lie. The grass crumbles to ash under her feet, and the smiling townsfolk in the distance are hollow-eyed ghosts, repeating the same chores like broken clocks.

A flickering figure appears—her grandmother, transparent and weary. “They tricked us,” she says. Decades ago, Seabrook’s leaders made a pact with this mirrored realm to stop time, to never age or suffer. But the bargain backfired. Both worlds are now fraying, kept alive only by the lighthouse beacon, which Lila’s grandmother tended until she was pulled into the mirror. To relight the beacon, Lila must find three crystal lenses hidden in the real Seabrook. “But hurry,” her grandmother warns. “The longer you stay here, the more the darkness claims you.”

Back in the real world, Ethan finds Lila shivering on the lighthouse floor. He confesses his family has guarded the lighthouse for generations, but the townspeople stole the lenses, fearing the beacon’s power. Together, they retrieve the first lens from the mayor’s office, only to be cornered. The mayor, his face gaunt and desperate, hisses, “The light will burn us all. Your grandmother knew that.”

As days pass, Ethan grows paler, his hands trembling. Lila notices cracks spreading across his skin like porcelain. He avoids her questions until she catches him vanishing into thin air for a heartbeat. “I’m tied to the mirror world,” he admits. “If the beacon dies… I do too.”

Lila’s best friend Mia, who’d helped her search, suddenly betrays her, stealing the second lens. “The mayor said the light will poison us!” Mia cries, clutching the crystal. Her younger brother lies bedridden, skin gray—a sickness spreading as the lighthouse dims. Lila realizes the mayor has twisted the truth: the sickness isn’t from the beacon, but from its absence.

The final lens lies in the mirror-world lighthouse, now a skeletal ruin. Lila and Ethan climb its collapsing stairs, the air thick with whispers. As Lila grabs the lens, Ethan’s arm turns to mist. “Light the beacon,” he urges. “Even if it means I’m not… here anymore.”

In the stormy real world, Lila fits the lenses into the beacon. Light erupts, piercing the clouds. Seabrook’s sickness lifts, and the mirror world fades; its ghosts are finally at peace. But Ethan is gone—until dawn breaks, and Lila finds him on the beach, solid and whole. The lighthouse’s glow, it seems, rewrote the rules. Yet the mayor’s final warning lingers: “Some doors shouldn’t stay closed.” In the lighthouse, the cracked mirror still glows… faintly.

(Ends with a question: Is the mirror world truly gone, or waiting?)