Chapter 4 - Fade

John returned home after visiting his wife, forgetting momentarily that was why he originally went to the cemetery. That girl, the girl with the auburn hair and beanie hat, Jennifer. She had been there again. He glanced down at the palm of his right hand and saw the phone number written there, its ink now slightly smudging. By tomorrow the ink would be completely faded, perhaps Jennifer along with it.

“It’s alright talking to you.” She had said to him when he got up to leave. Truth be told, the feeling was mutual.

John realized then, just how rarely he talked to people these days, another thing that seemed to fade along with his wife. Lucy had been the one that had organized the friendly parties, BBQs, and Sunday church. Since her passing John secluded himself to voluntary confinement, like a turtle slowly retreating into its shell until at last it's hidden from the world outside entirely. This state of solitude was comfortable to John, offering him a sense of freedom from any shackles of responsibility. He was responsible for himself and himself alone.

Friends and neighbors did attempt to stay in touch, making appearances now and then, either to pass on their condolences or to reach out. But John quickly dealt with them almost clinically, as he purposely made the few brief interactions stale and boring, as if he were in a rush or in the middle of something important. After a while, the friends and neighbors that would visit regularly slowly faded away, leaving John to his solitary peace.

John had begun cooking in his kitchen, watching the ink on his palm slowly fade away. Deep down he wanted to type the number in his phone, but a greater part stopped him. Putting a random eighteen-year-old girl number in your phone when you were in your prime of forty-two seemed wrong; it was wrong, right? Not only that, but John was a married man. What would Lucy think? But Lucy was gone and with her: she took the only social structure John sometimes relied on. He pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and added Jennifer’s number.

When he had added the number under the name ‘Jennifer’, he suddenly came to the disheartening conclusion that this might not be Jennifer’s number. That the girl had played him falsely for some cheap prank. She had after all shown she was capable of tricks, and shamefully so. The image of her blue tongue jabbed out at him in his mind’s eye, the taunt that would haunt him further still.

Grimacing, he texted the number simply writing: John.

If this was a ruse then whoever’s number this one, albeit a sex line or otherwise—would simply get a name and nothing more. He thought about how many 'John’s' there were in his county, and felt a calming blanket beset him. Before the microwave signaled its gleeful climax after cooking his lamb hotpot, he received a reply. The phone buzzed noisily on the kitchen counter and chirped like a bird. Lifting the phone John read: Jennifer ;).

Awkward relief washed over John and the microwave alerted him it was truly finished with another beeping signal. John took his meal and ate.

Later that night, while John sat in the silence of his home feeling the walls slowly close in around him. He thought he heard something coming from the bathroom again. He muted the tv once more and despite the many tendrils of fear that slowly wrapped around his nerves like an octupus, another part of him--perhaps sadist part, yearned for the same phenomenon as yesterday. This time he would enter the bathroom entirely unafraid of what was on the other side. The silence drew out, the buzz from the tv being the only constant to break the absolute stillness.

John stood, not taking his eye from the handle of the bathroom door twenty paces from him. At one point he thought he saw the door handle move but quickly realized it was only golden chrome reflecting some of the light from the tv; presenting the illusion. That is just what this whole thing was, an illusion, a mirage, something his mind was producing without his managerial sign-off upstiars in the logical department. Most likely, it was just an echo from the long annulated grieving process, nothing more. He took a step forward, hearing his slippers drag along the carpet. The door drew closer until eventually, John stood facing it.

John was ready--hand on the handle. If even a water droplet fell from inside he would burst in, unmasking whatever lurked within. As if the thing on the other side read his thoughts, John heard the inviting noise of:

‘Drip’

The sound hit him like a bullet and John turned the handle before his courage forake him. The door swumg violently open, revealing the bathroom in increments as the light spilled in. Sink, mirror, and bathtub uncovered themselves, all of them statues like the toys in ‘Toy Story’ whenever a human made an appearance. The toilet sat perfectly still and John for a fleeting moment thought whatever was in here had slivered behind the door. He went to peer around the door but putting his face into that encroaching darkness terrifed him. What if something was behind the door. What if he peered around to find it waiting for him; its hands already outstretched to snatch him, pull him into its embrace.

He turned on the bathroom light feeling it not only fill the room with light, but also his heart with courage. He stepped in, checked behind the door--his hands sweaty but ready to punch if anything attacked. Nothing.

‘Drip’

The noise came from behind, it waited until his back was turned and John whirled around to face whatever IT was. He saw with blinding sight a man, a pale man with dark circles for eyes looking dead at him, he let out a yell and… realized it was his own reflection in the mirror. Fear, shock, and a little piss leaked out of him at the realization. He laughed nervously under his breath and rubbed at his temples; that was when the shower curtain moved.

Looking up, he saw an elongated shadow standing inside the tub, nothing but the baby blue curtain to conceal it. Fear, shock, but not the piss, came rushing back into him like an electric shock. Something was in the tub, standing there, waiting for him. He wanted to flee but found he couldn’t. He took some breaths, staring deeply into that shadow that stood idle. It was thin and tall, standing sideways as if part of the shower attachment. No, It WAS the shower attachment he told himself unconvincingly.

‘You’re going to peel back that curtain and it’ll be the showerhead resting atop its frame.’

‘But how did the curtain move?’ A sinsiter voice whispered to him, and for a moment he was not sure whether the whisper was in his mind, or the thing in the tub egging him on; reading his thoughts like a shade in some fantasy novel.

He watched his hand reach up to grab the curtain. In one rapid swipe, he drew the curtain back as if unmasking a circus performance. For a terrifying moment, he thought he would reveal the thing that so many horror movies tried to depict. Something that would quite literally scare you to death, something that would make any living person's hair turn to white simply at its sight.

Inside was nothing but the showerhead and the frame that supported it. Assortment of shower gels, shampoos, and sponges arrangeed themselves like footsoldiers. As if to answer his previous dilemma, a gush of wind blew in through the small awning window above the tub, causing the curtain to dance merrily beside him. The wind kissed him with icy lips and John drew back the shower curtain forcefully.

“You’re going crazy old man…you’re going crazy,” He said to himself aloud, then realized that was what crazy people did: talk to themselves.

John went to bed early that night, determined the extra sleep would put his mind at rest.