©2008 Sayword Eller

The Bathroom

 

It was early in the morning when she heard the bang. Scrambling out of the cocoon she had created from her fluffy pink comforter, she fell to the floor and grabbed the long flashlight from beside the bed. It had been a present to her from her father when she had moved into the apartment six months before.

"If anyone breaks in on you, Abby, you can use this sucker as a bat."

As she gripped the cold steel in her hand she realized that he was right.

Sliding across the floor, trying her best to keep quiet, she peeked out into the hall. A soft glowing was coming from the crack under the bathroom door only about ten feet away. She backed up, sitting flat against the wall with her flashlight grasped between her breasts.

Why would someone break in to use her bathroom?

Her breathing quickened as she tried to remember whether or not her bathroom window was locked. Did it even open? It wasn't something she had ever contemplated before. Living in a third floor apartment, she never thought she would need to.

Closing her bedroom door as quietly as she could, she locked it and slid back across the floor to her nightstand. She lifted the receiver, thinking that the dial tone was louder than usual this evening. She looked over her shoulder to the door, waiting to see if the intruder could hear it too.

She dialed nine-one-one

"Nine-one-one, what's your emergency?" A male voice answered.

"Someone is in my apartment," she whispered.
"Are you in a safe place, ma'am?" he asked.

"I'm in my bedroom with the door locked. They're in my bathroom. I think they came in through the window."

"We're dispatching someone now. Stay on the line with me until they get there, please."

She nodded.

"Ma'am,"

"Y-yes, I'll stay on the line." She still clutched the flashlight in one hand, and pressed the receiver she held hard against her head. She wouldn't know how hard until later when she looked in the mirror.

"I think I hear them," she said after endless minutes of hushed conversation with the operator.

"Can you go and let them in?"

"No, I would have to go right by the bathroom." She looks around her, searching for an answer in the air, but there's nothing. Why would there be? "I-I can't leave the room."

"I understand ma'am."

"The super!" she exclaims in a whisper. "The super lives in 1A. He can let them in."

She waits. The shuffling is still in her bathroom.

She cringes. Was that the bathroom door opening?

"Ma'am, are you still there?"

The sound that escaped her mouth was one she hadn't heard before. Did it come from her mouth? She looked to the door, her eyes making quick jerky movements. They felt like they weren't her eyes anymore, like that had become inhabited by something else.

She scratched her forearm, paying little attention to the warm trickle that followed.

"Ma'am, are you still on the line?" the man said.

"Y-yes," she said. "Please hurry."

She leaned against the wall. Her heart was beating too fast. Her lungs were closing. She could feel it.

"Help me," she said. "This was supposed to be a safe neighborhood. Why aren't they here yet?"

"They are on their way."

"Then why did it sound like they were at the door? I have to go out there."

"Please just stay where it is safe, ma'am. They are on their way."

3.

She laid the phone down on the floor. Clutching the flashlight tighter against her chest, she placed a shaking hand on the doorknob, flinching when she heard the bang in the bathroom.

Why did it sound like shattering glass?

She absently wiped at another trickle making its way down her cheek.

"Who's there?" she screamed.

The noises stopped.

"I've called the police! They're on their way!"

She slammed the door, locking it once more and scrambling to the spot where she had left the phone.

"Are you still there?" she asked, her breathing labored and shallow.

"Yes," the voice answered, but it was different now.

"Who is this? Who are you? Where is the operator?"

The laughter on the other end was deep, with a raw quality that was akin to the scratching of nails on a chalkboard.

"Who are you!"

Not waiting for an answer she threw the phone against the wall.

"They're coming!" she screamed. "They're coming! You'd better go!"

She flinched when the glass breaking started again.

"What do you want from me?"

She closed her eyes, willing her breathing to slow down. Nothing seemed real. Her arms hurt and her eyes felt as though they were bugging out. What was happening? Is this what happened to the body in a crisis?

She opened her eyes, looking over at the door, bolting upright when the last shatter pierced the night.

 

4.

She stood on shaking legs, her knees feeling as though they would give at any time and she would fall into oblivion. 

There were sounds coming from the front of her apartment, and still the glass was shattering in the bathroom. She opened her bedroom door, staring down the hall and into the black hole that was her living room. Only a sliver of light could be seen snaking its way just far enough inside for her to know that the police were not there.

She looked down at the phone, then at the bathroom door. A twin sliver peeked from underneath. For a moment she imagined that the slivers were trying to find one another, like long lost siblings or lovers. Another crash pinned her against the wall, her hand clutched to her chest.

She wanted to call her father. She needed someone to come now and help her. The police weren't coming.
"Daddy," she cried in a whisper. "There's someone here." She slid down the wall, resting on the floor. "Help me."

                                                     * * * * * * * * *

She opened her eyes and looked around the room. Darkness still covered everything and she was still against the wall. To her right was the flashlight and to the left the phone, its red eye still staring at her. She hit the power button, stood up and placed it back on the receiver beside the bed.

Twenty-five minutes had passed.

Her bedroom door stood open, exposing the gaping hole that was the rest of her apartment. Only two slivers could be seen, one on the far end of the hole and one only a few feet away.

She walked back to the door, "Hello," she said.

For a moment there was nothing. Relaxing slightly, she contemplated entering the bathroom to survey the destruction, imagining the window wide open and the room deserted: the intruder having run out in a panic at the prospect of the police showing up.

But this was the second floor. No one could just RUN out.

Then she heard it, footsteps on glass.

She slammed her bedroom door, making sure to turn the lock, and ran over to the bed. Grabbing the phone she dialed 9-1-1.

5.

"9-1-1, what's your emergency."

"I, um, called earlier. There is someone in my bathroom. They're breaking things. I'm scared. Please come."

"Okay, ma'am, are you injured?"

"No, they're in the bathroom. Please come!"

"Are you in a safe place?"

"I'm in my bedroom. Please... please come." She wiped the trail of snot running from her nose, sniffling and sobbing once more. "Please come."

"Are you in a safe place?" they asked again, only this time it was that strange voice again, the voice with the strange laughter.

"Who is this? I need help! Stop laughing! HELP ME!"

"No one can help you now."

She dropped the phone, clutching her head and rocking back and forth. Why was this happening? Why did this always happen to her? Why wouldn't they come?

"Daddy."

But no one would come. She was going to be murdered just like her brother had always told her.

“Any woman who lives alone stands the chance of some maniac breaking into the house, raping her, and killing her. Do you want that?”

"No, I don't want that," she moaned. "I don't want that."

She stood up, pushing the dampened hair away from her face. Walking over to the door she grabbed the flashlight off the floor, holding it like a weapon. Turning the lock she opened the door.

There it was, that sliver.

She took one step forward and then another, until she was at the bathroom door. She glanced at the other sliver, still unchanged, thinking it might make more sense to just go there. It offered light. It offered safety. But she turned away from it. Turned her back on the prospect of getting out unharmed, and with a shaking hand she reached out, grasped

6.

the doorknob and threw the door open.

Light flooded the apartment and she was sucked inside.

 

                                                    * * * * * * * * * *

The door to the apartment was thrown open and four police officers walked inside, their guns drawn. Behind them was a short balding man, holding a large ring of keys.

"The neighbors downstairs heard all the commotion and called yous guys," he said, his Brooklyn accent thick. "They says she's always quiet. I've neva had any prolems wit her."

"Stand back, sir," the officer in front said.

They moved through the apartment, like moths to the light streaming out of the bathroom. The officer in front flanked the door and looked inside, then motioned to the others that it was alright.

Stepping back, he grasped the radio on his left shoulder and began to call out numbers that the super had no knowledge of their meaning.

The balding man joined the remaining three officers in the door. The bathroom was wrecked. Glass from the large mirror above the sink peppered the washbasin and the floor. Only a crescent-shaped piece held on, just enough to fit the smeared handprint.

On the floor, covered in glass and blood was his tenant. She was delirious.

Her normally perfect hair was disheveled and matted, the honey blond color stained with blood and her oval face was almost unrecognizable from the many scratches. Her pajamas, originally a robins egg blue, judging from the small spot on the cuff on her shirt, was now tattered and the color of dead roses.

"Ma'am, can you hear me," the fourth officer said, bending close to her ear. "Can you tell us what happened?"

"They're here," she moaned. "They came through the window. They want to kill me."

The super looked at the window. It was closed, as it always had been. None of the bathroom windows on this side of the building opened. They had been painted shut by some ignorant son of a bitch and he had never rectified the problem.

"Who's here?" the officer asked. "Ma'am, can you open your eyes?"

She did, focusing on the officer above her. The look of horror on her face was unlike anything the super had ever seen before. It was worse than in one of those slasher flicks. This young girl lying in a pool of blood looked as though her heart had just stopped.

"NO!" she screamed. "NO! Don't kill me!"

 

 

"Ma'am, calm down, we are here to help." The fourth officer glanced back at her counterparts.

They all stood in silence, watching as this quiet girl fell into a tortured oblivion.

"The ambulance is on its way," the first officer said.

The second officer came from the bedroom holding the remains of a hot pink cordless telephone. "There are some numbers beside the bed," he said. "One says Dad."

"Anything else?"

"No."

The five watched as the paramedics struggled and fought with the girl to get her on a gurney, and then tie her arms down.

"She's going to need stitches," one said.

"She needs a hell of a lot more than that," the other replied.

"Help me," the girl screamed as they rolled her down the hall. "Don't let them kill me!"