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Unsettlement of the House
I went home after a full week’s road trip across the country. I was driving. I wasn’t drunk. Even if there are beer bottles littered on my backseat, I didn’t take a sip. I don’t even like beer. My friends do, but that’s why they got me, the beer-hating soberman to drive them anywhere.
As I stepped inside my home for the first time this week, that familiar sweet cedar smell filled my lungs. It seems odd how much you notice the smell of your home after being away from it so long. I breathed it in, took the smell inside me, and felt that old sense of nostalgia. And as I relaxed myself to take it in,
(BAM
BAM
BAM)
Strange, disturbing knockings, bangings and
(“HELP!”)
Unsettling screams caught me in that relaxation. I returned the yell in surprise, and as I realized that mistake, the thing yelled louder
(“HELP ME! LET ME OUT! LET ME OUT!”)
followed by that BAM-BAM banging growing more frequently.
In this utter confusion, I contemplated to call the police and report this mysterious occurrence. I reached for the cell phone in my front pocket. But when my fingers touched its smooth surface, some strange voice in my mind, some childish adventurous curiosity told me otherwise. It wanted to see the thing making those
(BAM BAM)
sounds. Though my rational mind insisted to for me to call the police, that childish adventurer’s voice was stronger.
Cautiously, I walked towards where I thought the unsettling sounds were coming from. Slowly, the muffled voices grew louder and the banging more frequent. I grabbed a golf club from a bag I passed by and kept moving slowly towards the source.
All of a sudden, as I reached my room’s door, the sounds suddenly stopped. Utter silence and uneasiness invaded the air as I scanned the surroundings.
Studying the hallway, still clinging to that iron golf club, I spotted a slight movement from the ripple-glass on the bathroom door. I walked closer, gripping that club tighter with my right. My left reached for the door handle. My hands felt the icy cold metal knob and
BAM
BAM
BAM
BAM
From the other side, a hand pounded on that rippled glass. A human silhouette, seeming tall and lanky, pounded the glass with such intensity; determined to knock it down.
“HELP ME! LET ME OUT! LET ME OUT! LET ME OUT! HELP ME! HELP ME! PLEASE! LET ME OUT!”
The yells were amplified tenfold from when I entered the house. With more horror as well, because now, I saw the source of the voices. I saw its face. Or at least its mouth. I saw its lips parting and closing clearly, giving shape to those words I heard, “HELP ME, LET ME OUT!” The bangings (BAM BAM BAM) grow louder and louder.
I screamed now at the top of my lungs in surprise as well in terror. The vision of the shrieking mouth was too much for me to handle. I dropped the iron club to the ground and ran away to the outside; letting my fear—and my better judgment—control me. I yelled all the way there in reply to each wail of the bathroom man. Once outside, the sound of the screaming is still audible, albeit not as strong.
I fumbled the phone in my front pocket and finally called 911.
*****
I sat outside my porch as I waited for the police to arrive. I blocked my ears in a futile attempt to tune out the horrid sounds from inside my house.
However, when the police car stopped on my driveway, the screams came to a silent halt.
Two men stepped out of the police car and greeted me. I was impatient. I led them straight to my bathroom, though now I walked more confidently with two police escorts following me. Armed men that can and will protect me from the thing inside my bathroom.
When we reached the bathroom, I stuck my back to the wall across and watched as the two men carefully opened the door and…
Nothing.
There was nothing inside the bathroom!
A toilet, a sink, a large mirror, a bathtub with a showerhead, a bathroom cabinet but otherwise, absolutely nothing!
“But… but… it was here!”
Yet this feeble excuse served little to sway their opinion. They began to look at themselves and ask me if I was intoxicated.
Intoxicated? Me? Perish the thought!
I tried to convince them of the bathroom man’s existence, though feebly, and they kept going back to the topic of whether I am drunk. Or high. Either one. They even took me outside to take a breathalyzer test and found no alcohol nor illegal drugs in my system.
They now blamed me for setting up a prank. I tried to defend myself, but these policemen kept pressuring me with guilt and blame that I was finally forced to “admit” my shame.
“Just don’t do it again.” One policeman said as he stepped into his car. They drove away, leaving me alone again.
But… maybe they’re right.
Maybe it is all my imagination.
Yeah, maybe it’s all in my head, somewhere, in the deep recesses of the mind, it created some sort of dark hallucination.
Probably.
I turned back to my house, intending to go to sleep on the couch or something, with the radio on full blast.
But as I looked towards my front porch, I noticed fresh, muddy footprints on my front porch heading outside.
Upon realizing what it might be, I ran at full speed towards the bathroom to make sure that my mind was just playing tricks on me.
And when I reached the bathroom, the footprints were there, stepping from the cabinet and heading to the world outside.
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