I wash my hair in the shower. Some people like to dunk their head into the sink instead and I never knew why. I think I do now.
It was 2013 and I was staying at my girlfriend’s grandmother’s house for a week. She had gone on to Aspen and I was to wait for her to return at which point we’d drive back to our house in Ohio from there.
Her grandmother kept to herself most of the time. She also went to church nearly everyday and spent her lunches and afternoons with her ladies group playing cards and talking. This left me alone most of the time in that old house.
The house was built sometime before 1920. I’d heard Al Capone had stopped in there a few times back in the day because it had previously been owned by someone in his gang. It was three floors with an attic and a basement. The old wood creaked nearly everywhere you went in the house. Every door, every stair, every floorboard.
The place made noises on its own as well, all day and night. I know the sunlight heats the house and causes the wood to expand a little and then it cools at night and both processes can cause the wood to make sounds. Creaks and pops. Logically I knew it. But emotionally it’s still a little freaky to hear sometimes. I’m just being honest.
The bathroom was dimly lit with one tiny fluorescent tube. Not one of those long ones you see in government buildings. This one was a mini tube about four to six inches long. There was also a round glass window about the size of a dinner plate. It didn’t let much light in but had a lead cross shape in the glass dividing it into four sections. Supposed to look fancy I guess.
The door wouldn’t lock, and the floor was peeling linoleum from decades ago. The walls were a dull shade of light green. There were two closets and a laundry chute. One closet was just towels and bathroom paraphernalia. The other was deeper and had a bunch of plumbing junk piled up in there along with a water heater. The laundry chute had a door on it that was stuck in the open position. It was dark in the chute and when I put my face up to it I felt cold air.
The light and little round window were outside of the tub which itself was one of those old tubs that stood on the floor instead of being attached to the wall. It had little feet that reminded me of cat’s paws. The shower curtain was on a pole and attached with rings that made that distinctive ting (metal on metal) sound when opening and closing the curtain.
This all matters very much because what happened that week in that bathroom when I was showering might have some reasonable explanation. Or might not. It depends on whether these things could somehow be the cause of what I heard when I closed my eyes while washing my hair in the shower.
The first time was literally the first morning I was there. I’d slept the night before after dropping my girlfriend off at the airport. In the morning her grandma was just leaving for morning mass at the local Catholic church when I was getting up.
I got the water going and waited until it wasn’t freezing to get in the shower. I did my normal routine which was unlike most people I’m told, in that I always wash my hair last instead of first. I don’t know why. I just do.
So I had a nice foamy head of shampoo going and closed my eyes to begin rinsing. As I’m rinsing the soap out of my hair I can hear the water pouring past my ears as well as the drone of the water coming out of the shower head.
Just then I heard mixed in with that a bump. It sounded like someone bumping into the cabinet that holds the sink. It was loud enough to get past the noise of the shower and water. It startled me and I thought grandma had come back for some reason and had needed something in there.
But it takes a good ten seconds at least to get enough soap off my closed eyes so it won’t burn when I open them. That’s the longest ten seconds of your life I can tell you.
I got that done and pulled the curtain back and peeked out expecting grandma to be there. She wasn’t. I figured she had come in and then gone. It’s a little rude to come in while someone is in the shower, I thought, but hardcore churchgoers don’t want to be late for service. I get that. I was a guest and I really didn’t want to get into an argument so I let it go and just didn’t mention it.
The next morning I was washing my hair in the shower and once again I heard something while my eyes were closed. This time it sounded like the shower curtain was being opened. This really freaked me out. I quickly rinsed my face and used my hand to stop any shampoo from running into my eyes and I opened them to see.
There was no one there, but the curtain looked like it had been pulled open about four inches. I peeked out into the rest of the bathroom and no one was there. I quickly rinsed off and checked the closets. The room was empty. The door was shut.
I dried off and dressed and then quickly checked the entire house including the basement. No one else was in the house.
Maybe I hadn’t shut the curtain all the way, I thought, with all that noise from the water perhaps I’d imagined it. I decided to accept that it was an auditory hallucination of some kind caused by the white noise of the shower running, the sound of the water flowing over my ears, and my own paranoia at being in that creaky old house alone.
On the third day I taped one side of a very thin piece of tissue paper to the inside of the door and the other side of it to the door frame. If someone opened the door the tissue would tear and I’d know it after I got out of the shower.
I was washing my hair as usual. My eyes were closed and all was black. Between the “shhh” tone of the shower there were several thumps spaced apart as if someone was walking. It seemed to be coming from the door and getting closer to the tub. I quickly started to clear my face of soap when I heard the shower curtain being pulled back. My heart rate shot up.
I began frantically rinsing my face but it was taking longer than I expected.
The distinct sound of someone stepping into the tub hit my ears like a sledgehammer. Foot coming down on the tub floor. The thud of mass on solid with space behind it, like thumping on a hollow tree. There was no mistaking it. Someone was in the shower with me.
I could feel their presence with my body like when you stand next to a wall with your eyes closed how you can somehow tell there’s a wall there. I could feel it. Someone was there.
I was both afraid to open my eyes and panicking to get them clear of soap so I could. The fear that they may strike me with a club or stab me with a knife short circuited all my internal debates and I opened my eyes and lifted my arms in front of me to block a blow simultaneously.
The soap burned my eyes blurring my vision but in the distorted unfocused dim light I swear there was a figure. Just for a fleeting moment. I let out a single tone of surprise and alarm. “Oh!”
Then it was gone.
I rinsed my eyes and scraped the soap backward over my head with my hands in one quick motion and then flung the curtain open to catch the perp in action. Now with clearer vision I stared in disbelief at the empty room and the still intact tissue paper on the door.
I turned the water off, bringing on the silence like a switch. I heard nothing. I stared around the room, paralyzed with fear. Then I saw it.
There were wet footprints on the floor leading from the tub to the closet where the water heater was. I hadn’t gotten out of the tub yet and I was bone dry when I had gotten in. Whoever it was was in the closet and the closet was between me and the door.
There’s no panic like the panic when you have nowhere to run. Like when you are the cornered animal. When you see the trap but have no choice but to spring it.
I glanced around the room for something I could use as a weapon if I needed to. The only thing there was the toilet plunger. I was still frozen in fear though and found it hard to move. I forced myself to reach out and grab the towel, all the while keeping my eyes on the closet door in case it started to open.
I dried myself quick but just as much as I needed to. I was more concerned with my wet feet causing me to slip if I were to get into a scuffle with someone. I dried them off one at a time, setting each dry foot out of the tub onto the bathmat. Then I wrapped the towel around my waist, tucked it in good, and picked up the plunger.
Holding it like a baseball bat, I approached the closet door slowly. I called out to whoever it might be. “Look, whoever you are: you’ve got me fearing for my life so if you’re just some neighborhood kid or whoever - and you mean no harm that’s fine. Just call out and say so. I don’t want to have to hurt you, but I will if I have to protect myself.”
There was no answer.
The footprints went right to the closet door. I was expecting it to burst open any moment and someone to attack me from inside. “I know you’re in the closet,” I explained, “I can see the wet footprints, so just tell me who you are so no one gets hurt.”
There was no answer.
My heart was pounding so hard I could hear it. I should just run past the closet and get out of there, I thought, but then whoever it is could escape to come back another day.
I got within reach of the closet door and reached out with one hand to open it. I turned the knob slowly with anticipation and fear increasing with each passing moment. I pulled the door open very slowly as it creaked. Peering into the dark crack between the door and the doorframe I saw nothing but blackness. I heard nothing but the droning drum of my heart.
The light swept across the back of the closet revealing one pipe after another until the door was open wide and the closet was shown to be empty. But behind the water heater was a dark space large enough for a person to fit. He had to be back there, I thought.
But upon closer inspection, that space was also empty.
Confused, I looked over the closet in detail even checking the ceiling. There was a secret door in the back wall. I recalled how the house had once belonged to one of Al capone’s men. Maybe there was a secret room back there used to hide guns, booze, or some other papers or things that might be needed to be concealed from the law.
I decided to get my flashlight and a better weapon before proceeding. I dressed fast and called the police while I searched for a weapon. I kept my eye on the stairs, the only way out of the house from the upper floors.
I headed back to the bathroom with a maglite and a poker from the fireplace. The police were coming but I didn’t want to wait. I didn’t know if there was a window he could crawl out back there or what.
I opened the secret door in the back and shone the light back there. It was a stairwell. I hadn’t seen any stars in the basement so I didn’t know where it was going.
I followed it down, noticing the wet footprints on the steps as I descended into the darkness. The stairwell seemed to go past the floor below and into the basement area. It must have been a separate basement; I thought it was probably used to store alcohol for the mob during prohibition.
When I got to the bottom it was a cold dark room about the size of four large suvs parked side to side. The room was made of concrete blocks and the floor was concrete and covered in dust. There were no windows, light fixtures, furniture, or anything at all in the room except a small cot.
The wet footprints went out from the stairs a few feet and stopped. I noticed that on the cot there was a blanket with something under it. It looked the size of a body. I approached it thinking it must be the person who came into the bathroom and I pulled the blanket back.
It was my girlfriend’s grandma. She had a knife sticking out of her chest. She was dead. A few minutes later the police showed up and I was taken into custody.
The following are facts as best as I can recall:
The affiant declares and affirms under penalty of perjury of the laws of the State of Indiana that the foregoing is true and correct.
Signed: John Feilding
November the 9th, 2013 X