TRIGGER WARNING: CHILD ABUSE/SELF-HARM/MURDER
I’m so cold. I sit on the cool white tiles in our bathroom. I can hear the steady drip, drip, drip of the leaky faucet of the tub. It sounds so loud now. Almost like the crash of a cymbal. Each blasted drop mocking me. Mommy is gone. Daddy is too. Sissy and my little brothers as well. It’s just me now. All alone in my bathtub Somnium.
The day I woke up here, started with Mom and Dad scaring me with their arguing. Dad said, “Dammit Drea, I HAVE to go to work. I won’t be gone THAT long. Can’t you just keep it together for one fucking day? Mom will be here in an hour or two.”
“Please don’t go. I don’t feel well”, Mom said with a bit of a stutter. Her dark brown, almost black eyes filled with tears. Fresh cuts lined her already scarred pale thin arms. Her hands shook as she rubbed her fingers over the inflamed tissue.
“NO! Laziness will lead to us losing EVERYTHING. YOU know what Pastor told us last week! Not like YOU care anyway! Shut up, take care of the kids and get this fucking house cleaned up!”, his voice boomed.
He grabbed his lunch bag and thermos and slammed the door on his way out. Mom stayed inside and just whimpered in her rocking chair. She drew her knees to her chest and started chewing on her fingers. My younger brothers John and Paul got up, hungry for cereal. I told them to join me in the kitchen and gave them both a small bowl.
After breakfast mom seemed more agitated. My baby sister was very fussy. Crying uncontrollably every time mom would put her down. I grabbed a toy that had a mirror on it and that seemed to soothe her a bit.
I settled in to watching a show on PBS. I could hear my mother running a bath calling out to John, Paul and Luke to come take their bath. To save money and time, she often bathed several of us together. I’m a big boy now. I’m seven. I get to take a bath on my own. Little sissy still has her baths in the sink since she’s just six months old.
“The COWARDLY, the UNBELIEVING, the VILE, the MURDERERS, the IMMORAL….”, She trailed off as she carried out John wrapped in a towel, limp and pale and took him into his room.
“Those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all LIARS….”, Mom said as she then carried Paul out the same way as John.
“They will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur….”, She stuttered in a voice that didn’t even sound like her. She sounded possessed.
Mom didn’t seem sad anymore. Her black t-shirt was soaked with water and what appeared to be a thick white foam of some sort. She seemed like one of those zombies from the scary movies I sneak and watch at grandma’s house. Legs shuffling instead of walking like normal. Her glasses were completely crooked on her face.
She came into the living room where I was sitting with sissy. Mom picked her up without any care, and sissy began crying and screaming again. I felt something very bad in my stomach. Almost like when your tummy does a flip flop in an elevator.
I heard loud splashing and mom mumbling incoherently. I decided to go see how brothers were doing, so I didn’t have to be alone in the living room. When I walked in John’s room dread filled me from head to toe. He was lying there on the bed with his eyes and mouth open. Foam coming from his nostrils. He was a bluish-grey color and had very dark bruises on his neck and shoulders.
I panicked and rushed into the bathroom.
“Mom! HELP! Something’s wrong with John! Please mom help!”, I half-screamed.
“The UNBELIEVING, the VILE, the MURDERERS.”, she trailed off, slurring, with a crazed look in her eyes.
“Mom, WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Please come help John!!!”, I cried, exacerbated.
I walked closer towards her to try and grab her elbow and drag her to Johns room. It’s then when I saw my beautiful little sister floating face down in the tub. She was the same eerie shade of grey as John and my other brothers.
“MOM, WHAT’S WRONG WITH MARY?”, I bawled as I took a staggered step backwards.
“Come…take a bath Noah”, Mom muttered in a guttural tone.
Something inside me told me to RUN! I took off out of the bathroom and sprinted as fast as I could to the dining room to try and get the wall phone to dial 911. Mother was right behind me. I couldn’t believe she could run that fast. I tried to run around the table to escape her grasp, but her legs are longer than me and she grabbed me. She yanked me by both arms and dragged me HARD back towards the bathroom, even though I attempted to escape, kicking and screaming.
Mom is going to kill me, I realized. “Please Mommy, don’t kill me, I promise I’ll be better. I love you Mommy…PLEASE DON’T HURT ME”, I shrieked.
The last thing I heard before I went under the brown, foamy bathwater was mother wailing, “MY CHILDREN!” Then a few seconds of a garbled bible verse.
Immediately, I experienced the worst horror of my young life. My entire body burned, and my lungs felt like they were going to explode. I flailed and tried my best to get a breath of air. All I was met with, was cold cruel water. I opened my eyes and could see Mary’s face near mine. I got so tired, so fast. I couldn’t fight anymore. “Why doesn’t mommy love me?”, was my very last thought before I was consumed by darkness.
And then…I woke up here. Laying on the bathroom floor. It doesn’t hurt anymore. It’s just SO COLD. The dripping never ends. I already tried the doorknob. It’s locked. “Where is everyone?”, I said to myself.
“We’re all here…”, a child whispered from behind me. As I turned around, I realized my Nightmare was just beginning.