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“Joel?” Bea whispered softly. “Joel, wake up.”
I opened my eyes and sat up slightly to see her on alert. She was looking out the window and listening for something. After a moment, I heard it; the tapping of water droplets against the window and roof, as well as the occasional screech of the creature that waited for us outside.
“Is that… rain?” I asked. She nodded slowly. “Is everyone okay? Why is the Curator freaking out?”
“I’m not sure. I just woke up a second before you did. There was a loud creaking noise, and then the rain started. I don’t think that thing likes the water.” A moment after she said that, we listened as it pounded hard against the walls of the house, begging to get in
I stood and helped Bea up, then crossed to the door and threw it open. I was surprised to see Ethan standing there with his hand raised about to knock.
“Oh, good, you’re awake. Have you seen Bea? She’s not-“ He noticed the girl standing behind me, and a flustered look ignited across his face. “Oh, uh, there you are. I didn’t realize you were- uh, I was just worried when you weren’t in your room.”
“Oh, um, sorry. Joel and I just couldn’t sleep, so we were just keeping each other company.” Bea nervously admitted.
“No, it’s all good. No big deal. I just was worried.”
All went silent, the halls filled only with the gentle patter of rain and awkward tension.
“What’s going on?” I asked, changing the conversation, “Is everything alright?”
“I’m not sure. The pipes just started creaking a second ago, and now waters spraying from the ceiling outside.”
“Weird…”
“Daniel?” Bea yelled over the railing. “You alright down there?”
“Yeah.” He called up as he appeared in the entryway below, “You guys hearing this?”
“Uh-huh. Definitely weird.”
Dan made his way up and joined us, “And that stupid thing is still out there, which means we aren’t going anywhere. I really hope this water is just a routine thing that happens in this room and isn’t a sign for something else.”
“Man, why’d you have to say that? Now you know something bad is going to happen.” Ethan sighed
“Come on.” He said, patting him on the shoulder. “There’s some food downstairs.”
“Man, this place even has food in it?”
“Sort of. Everything like bread and fruit rotted in the pantry a while ago, but there’s a lot of cans and boxes of stuff. Just don’t open the fridge. I don’t want to know what’s in there.”
“Ew,” Bea said with a laugh as she started down the steps. Ethan followed, and I did as well, but I looked back just in time to see Daniel looking at the bathroom door he had asked us to keep shut. I could see his hand was clenched into a fist.
I cleared my throat, and he turned to me.
“Sorry.” He said before starting down.
That day went by agonizingly long. The Curator didn’t stop screaming the entire time as the water rained down onto it. Sometimes we would catch a glimpse of it through the curtain in the window, violently scrubbing away at its patchy, lumpy skin as if trying to brush the water off. At one point when Ethan checked, he said that he saw a piece of its skin come loose, and from beneath it, a pair of binoculars came tumbling out. We heard it scream wildly in anger before it snatched them back up and shoved them under a different fold of skin. We stopped checking after that.
The four of us just sat in the living room and played games for most of the day to pass the time. Luckily, Daniel had a stash of actual board games, and we all rejoiced at the prospect of playing something other than cards for a change. Some of us were a little happier than others, however. The whole time we interacted, it was mainly Bea and Ethan carrying the conversation. Daniel and I weren’t really in a talking mood. His reason was obvious. This was his room, and he had already put it together that the chances of him leaving it were incredibly low. I could tell he was also distraught for us. Every now and then, someone would make a joke or a remark that he enjoyed, and I would see him hold eye contact for a moment with a longing gaze as if he knew it might be the last time ever hearing such a thing.
I was upset for all the same reasons. I wasn’t going to lose Daniel. I refused to. I spent more time thinking of ways that we might be able to get him out than I did strategizing in the game of Stratego we had been playing. I racked my brain for all of the rules I had learned of the house; any detail I could think of might help break out of the prison Dan found himself in. I came up blank every time. In the end, I always knew too little, and every plan always hinged on too many ‘what if’s’.
On the other side of things, the guilt was killing me in more ways than one. I was the only one who currently knew Daniels’s fate, and I could tell that he would rather me keep it that way. I did so, but hiding such a bombshell from Ethan and Bea felt like a boulder in my gut. We had always told each other everything, ever since we got here. How we were feeling, what we were afraid of, what our thoughts on everything were. But I knew that right now, telling them was more stress than Dan needed and would only cause panic. I kept kicking myself over and over again. Why did I let him come down here with me? Why didn’t I just go alone? Sneak out like Andi did? That thought left a bitter taste in my mouth.
‘Why didn’t you just go with Andi in the first place?’
“Everybody, wake up!”
Grace wiped the sleep from her eyes, “Joel? What’s wrong, dear? Why are you-“
“Andi’s gone! She left!” I yelled through the sobs catching in my throat. I was hysterical. I didn’t know what to do. How far had she gone? How long ago had she left? Of all the nights to get good sleep, it had to be the one where she decided to sneak off. My brain had already gone to the worst places. She was dead, or at the very least, going to be. There was no way she could survive on her own down there with that thing. I had to go after her. I needed to find her. Maybe she was still okay, and I could catch up to her.
Daniel sat up, “Whoa, Joel, calm down. What’s going on?”
“Andi’s gone. I-I woke up, and she wasn’t here, so I went out to find her and the pantry… it… it….” I couldn’t even force the sentence out. Instead, I turned to my belongings and dropped to my knees, emptying anything I didn’t need and cramming back in the things that I would. As I did, Frank, Claire, and Ethan immediately stood and ran out the bedroom door to check for themselves.
“A-are you sure?” Jan questioned, “Are you sure she’s not just outside?”
“Yes, the bodies are out there. There are only six rooms in this damn house! It’s not like she’s playing hide and seek!”
Daniel suddenly noticed what I was busy with and spoke up, “What are you doing, Joel?” I didn’t answer. I just kept stuffing the bag. “Joel?”
“What?”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going after her.”
The room filled with gasps and murmurs of panic.
“Like hell you are!”
“She’s down there, Dan! I can’t just let her get herself killed!”
“Why would she even do something like that?” Ben lamented. “What was she thinking?”
The question felt like a bullet tearing its way through my heart. I knew why. I knew what she was thinking. She was thinking about it because of me.
“Because she thinks the exit is down there.” I finished packing and slung the bag over my shoulder.
Without hesitation, I rushed back out the door and into the hall. Everyone hopped up and followed behind as I turned and slammed into Ethan, who was on his way back.
“He’s right,” Claire confirmed in a shaky voice. “She’s not here.”
I didn’t stop to indulge. I blew past the three and made my way to the kitchen. I grabbed the knob and threw the door open. The yellow room greeted me with its hug of stale air. I was about to step through when a hand grabbed my shoulder and yanked my back inside.
Dan slammed the door and then released his grip. “Are you crazy?”
“Joel, don’t!” Jan begged. I could see everyone else wore faces of concern and were starting to well up as they began to take on the same grief that I had felt moments ago.
“I need to go after her.”
“Joel, you need to calm down.”
“And then what?” I snapped. “I calm down, and then she’s still out there! It doesn’t change anything! She’s going to die if someone doesn’t go help her.”
“You’re going to die if you charge down there without thinking!”
“I don’t care.”
“Well, I do!” Dan yelled, louder than intended. It was enough to make me wince. I could see his face ease into a look of shame as his eyes darted to the floor. I took a moment to look back at everyone else. At this point, most everyone was sobbing. Ethan and Bea held each other, Jan cried into a disbelieved Mark, and Benjamin just leaned against the wall and slowly slid down to the floor with watery eyes. They were all already hurting. I was only adding fuel to the fire by the way I was acting. This isn’t what they needed right now. I turned back to Dan, who sheepishly continued.
“We all do.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “Look at me. I know you’re upset. I think we all are. We just need to take a second, okay? We’ll figure this out. We never heard that thing last night, right? That means she made it out okay. Andi’s a smart girl; She’s going to be okay for now. But if you run down there while we don’t have a plan, you might not be.”
I didn’t say anything. More tears just fell from my eyes as I looked at the floor.
“I don’t think you’re in any state to be going down into somewhere so dangerous.”
“I need to, Daniel. I need to find her.”
“I know. I know we do. But when you’re acting this impulsive, you can’t. I’ll go.”
“What?” Jan said, perking up.
“I’m going to go. I’m the only one here who’s been down there. I remember most of the layout. If that thing is down there, I think I can sneak around it.”
“Daniel…” Ben muttered.
“We don’t have time to argue. If we want to find her, this is the only way.”
“I want to go with you.”
“Joel, no. I just told you why that’s not a good idea.”
I went to argue, but when I locked eyes with Dan, I couldn’t bring myself to say anything. His eyes were watery and full of sorrow. He was grieving just as much as I was.
“She’s gone, Dan…” I mumbled. Sobs began to break through my voice again. “She’s gone…”
He pulled me into his arms and held me tightly, “Not yet, kid. We don’t know that.”
“Joel?”
“Huh?”
“It’s your turn.”
“Oh, sorry. I zoned out for a second.” I said as I turned to investigate the board.
Bea exchanged a glance with Ethan before adding, “Are you guys alright?”
“What?”
“You both seem really out of it.”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” I said, forcing a smile, “Just hate being cooped up in here is all.”
“Same here.” Daniel lied, “Still not used to being back in my own home yet.”
I looked at Dan, and he looked at me, and then we both darted our eyes to the board. Bea and Ethan clearly caught the look but decided to say nothing.
Instead, Ethan spoke, “Wait, do you guys hear that?”
I listened to the sound of rain pattering on the roof, but when I didn’t hear anything else, I returned a “No, what?
“Exactly. That thing isn’t screaming anymore.”
We all listened again for a moment, and when we realized that Ethan was right, we slowly stood.
Bea crossed to the window and pulled the curtains back just enough to look out, then softly said, “Uh-oh….”
“What is it?”
“See for yourself.”
We all joined her at the portal and gazed out as she drew the shades all the way. Outside, the water continued to bucket down; however, in our lack of checking, we hadn’t noticed that it was coming down so much it was beginning to flood the streets. The places where sewer grates once were, were now overflowing and pooling with water, and the roads themselves had turned into foot-deep rivers that flowed slowly. Across the way, the thing from downstairs perched atop the roof of a house, staring down at the water the way a cat might look at a full bathtub. Upon seeing us, it let out one last squeal, threw a tantrum of fist pounds against the shingles, and then vaulted off somewhere behind the structure. We listened as it squealed away into the distance until we eventually didn’t hear it at all.
“Thank goodness,” Bea sighed under her breath.
“Better wait a bit before we go back out there.” Daniel suggested, “Just in case.”
Ethan nodded, “Then we can go get the keys to your car and get out of here.”
Daniel and I looked at each other again, but we didn’t linger on it this time.
“Way may not want to wait too long, though. It looks like that water is getting deeper.” Bea noted.
She was right. None of it appeared to be draining, only pooling more and more by the hour. To compensate, we waited for about thirty minutes before making our way over to the doorway of the garage. Daniel peeked his head out first, then opened the door when he saw that it was clear.
“You kids wait here a second.” He said before stepping off the landing and onto the flat concrete floor. Through the garage door, we could see the faux rain falling like a waterfall from the darkness above. By this point, the flood was so high that it surpassed the street curb and was slowly creeping up the driveway.
“We better hurry up, or we may be swimming back over to the exit.” I joked nervously. I didn’t like that it was all collecting so fast. At first, I thought it might just be some weird simulation of rain to fit the reality of the neighborhood, but the fact that it was flooding seemed intentional, and I didn’t want to hang around long enough to figure out why.
Bea, Ethan, and I watched as Daniel crossed over to his now famed Ferrari. I was never a big car person, but even I could appreciate its value and beauty. The vehicle was sleek and spotless, and the shiny yellow frame was slender and clearly built for speed. The black tinted windows reflected Daniel as clear as a mirror as he approached and pulled the handle to the door. It opened wide and the light within slowly glowed to life as if welcoming its owner back after his long years away. Daniel didn’t seem to care at all, however. He simply slid into the passenger seat and opened the middle compartment, then reached inside, shuffling around its contents.
“Man, what on earth did you do for a living, Dan?” Ethan asked.
Daniel laughed, “I was an accountant for a company that manufactured car engines.”
“Dang, really? I didn’t realize you were so smart.”
“Some might say I’m not.”
After a moment, he came back up with a small black car remote then pressed a silver button on its side, unfolding the key.
He smirked, “Glad I kept a spare.”
“Keeping a spare key inside of your Ferrari might be why some people think you aren’t smart.”
“Watch yourself.”
We all stepped down the landing and gathered by Daniel, then turned to the pouring rain outside the garage door.
“Well, should we get moving?”
“That’s probably the best idea.”
“You wouldn’t happen to have any umbrellas, would you?”
“Ha. I think we’re going to need something more heavy-duty. Especially for all that water on the ground. Come on, it doesn’t look too deep; I have some old fishing boots that might get us there without getting hypothermia.”
We all walked upstairs to Daniels’s closet in the master bedroom. He began to pass out jackets that he had and fitted us each with a pair of boots, some of them in better shape than others. I slipped into a new coat and then reached down into my pocket. I retrieved the faded, crumpled note and went to slide it into a pouch on my bag where it would be safe if it got wet. As I did, I traced its edge, considering a look. I knew the words by heart, but even still, it never felt like I read them enough…
After we were all changed, we reassembled in the living room, and with a simple nod to one another and a twirl of the key around Daniel’s finger, we stepped out into the streets again. The water came down in thick droplets that would have simply felt like rain were it not for how messy it fell. The flood was cold, and I was glad Daniel suggested that we try to stay as dry as possible. It would probably take weeks for our clothes to dry once we got out of the water, and with how frigid it was, our health would have probably been severely at risk.
We all sloshed through the water in a diamond formation, although we said very little as we travelled back to the door. Besides, with the plummeting flow from above harshly meeting the liquid below, it was hard to hear anything other than the sound of our boots wading through the murk. It was now ¾ of the way up our calves, and we made sure to walk slowly as to not let any slosh over inside the boot.
I caught Dan looking down at the water with a blank expression at one point. He wasn’t even watching where he was going; it looked like he was on auto pilot. After a moment, however, I saw him take a deep breath through his mouth and then return his gaze forward. It was an action that I knew well; he was swallowing some sort of emotion deep down in an attempt to drown it. I couldn’t tell whether it was because of what he and I knew or something else.
“You can feel it, can’t you?” He said, barely emerging his face above the water’s surface.
I didn’t respond. I was done indulging my own insane imagination.
“This is all going too well. Nothing has been this easy so far. You know that. I know that.”
My boots sloshed onward through the black, murky water.
“The key isn’t going to work, and then you’re going to be stuck here. Stuck here with old man Daniel. Or maybe, there’s something else in here with you all, just waiting for the right moment to strike. Maybe that moment is now, while you’re defenselessly coasting through the water. Or maybe, it’s both.”
I resisted the urge to quip back. ‘Just ignore him. He’s not saying anything that matters anyways.’
“So, you’re not talking to me now, huh? Boy, really doing anything you can to avoid your problems, aye, Brother?”
Not a word in return.
He smiled and stared straight up from the water with soulless eyes. “Kinda reminds me of how you were before you left home. Ignoring my existence so you didn’t have to confront the mess you made.”
I clenched my fists and tried to focus straight ahead. If I kept ignoring it, it would stop, right?
“But you and I both know that’s not how it works, Joel. Ignoring things? Running from them? It doesn’t change what you did.”
“Please, stop,” I muttered.
“That’s what’s got you so worried, isn’t it? After all these years, I think you’re starting to figure this place out. What the rooms are?”
My heart began to pound fast. Why was my mind doing this to me? Why would it do something that just caused it more pain?
“But then again, part of you always knew, didn’t you? Ever since you got here, you did. That conversation with Mark before he bit it was enough to sell you, but coming down here just confirmed it.”
“Stop,” I demanded.
“What do you think your room is going to look like? If Daniel’s looks like this, then you’ve probably got a good one in store.”
“Shut up.”
“What skeletons do you think he’s hiding, anyways? A place like this? Dead daughter? Maybe you should ask him. It might help shed some light on a way out of here. Well, for you three at least.” He suddenly lifted his head entirely from the water and began to drift slowly to me, his neck stretching like a serpent. “I don’t think he’s going anywhere.”
I lifted my boot from the water and brought it down hard onto His face. Wake splashed violently outward, soaking Bea from behind and filling my boot to the brim with icy cold liquid. I recoiled suddenly in shock and stumbled backward, nearly tumbling entirely into the sea beneath me.
“Joel, what the heck!” Bea scolded with rage as she turned around. When she saw me looking down at the water with a ghost white face and a look of fear, however, her tone turned more sympathetic, “Joel? What’s wrong.”
I looked at the water for any sign of movement, anything that might be hiding below the surface.
When I concluded that there was nothing, I wiped my face and turned to Bea, “Oh, um, I’m really sorry. I almost tripped and had to catch myself.”
Her expression went back to annoyance, and she returned her gaze forward.
“Well, stay focused, kid. We’re almost there.” Daniel called from the front.
I looked to the water one last time to where He had been, then scanned the surrounding area. There was absolutely nothing. It was nothing. It had to be nothing, right? Hallucinations could be that real. I tried to tell myself that because it hadn’t been the cold water that shocked me at that moment. It was the fact that I had felt the heel of my boot connect with something other than the ground.
After a while longer of slogging through the dark abyss, we finally reached the door. We had all but given up trying to keep the insides of our boots dry and instead just focused on moving faster. This was because the water seemed to be rising a lot quicker now, reaching the rim of our shoes by the time we hit the catwalk’s edge. There was no longer a moat below us; it had risen up to spill over onto the land mass. We would have hardly known where the bridge was if it weren’t for the railings that still stuck out above the water. Daniel reached the door first, then turned back and waited for the rest of us. He looked specifically at me with intense dread, and I returned the same look as we both prepared for the worst.
“What are you waiting for?” Ethan asked. “Let’s leave before we have to drink our way out.”
“Alright.” Dan shot back, a slight longing in his voice. He inserted the key, and it slid in with a perfect Chook! I saw him take a deep breath, turn it, and then try the handle. Our collective hearts sank as we heard the metal bar resist. Dan looked back at me with a knowing glance.
“Did it not work?” Bea asked.
“No. The key fits in, but the door won’t unlock.”
“Maybe it’s the wrong key?” Ethan suggested after a pause of thought. “Some keys fit into locks but don’t actually turn them.”
“It has to be this one kid. It turns and everything.”
“Let me see.”
Daniel stepped back and let Ethan try, but it yielded the same results.
Dan looked up and closed his eyes before speaking again, “Look, there’s something that I need to-“
“Let’s all try!” I blurted out before he could continue, “There’s a ton of water piled up. Maybe the pressure is keeping it shut.”
He gave an expression of sympathy and nodded, “Sure, let’s try that.” I could tell he just was going along with it to make me feel better. He knew I wouldn’t be content until we tried everything.
We all managed to squeeze up close to the door and fit our hands on the handle, then all at once began tugging hard. Despite our best efforts, we didn’t even manage a groan out of the thing.
“Damn it!” Bea yelled, delivering a kick to the metallic surface and sending a wave of water splashing in our faces.
Ethan wiped the tsunami from his mug, “Whoa, Cool it. We’ll figure this out.”
Daniel turned to me, “Joel, this isn’t going to-“
“No!” I interrupted again. “Ethan tried it too, so it can’t be that.”
“It can’t be what?” Bea chimed in.
I ignored her and continued, “There has to be another way, Daniel. That ballerina who helped us upstairs knew where we were heading when we were looking for the key. That means she knew where it was, which means you do too, so just think for a moment. Is there any other key that would work?”
Daniel and I stared each other down for a long moment; me in desperation and him in distress before his eyes suddenly widened. “These are just the spare keys. We need the real ones.”
“Okay,” I said with a breath of relief. “Where are they?”
His face contorted for a second before he spoke again. “They’re in the bathroom upstairs at my house.”
Bea made a confused face, “Bathroom? Why were they in there?”
“Because my daughter loved them. They’d keep her calm during baths.”
The air felt heavy as more pieces of the puzzle slid into place. Nobody spoke for a moment, and only the sound of pattering water could be heard.
That was, until something broke the silence.
Far off from the dark void on our right, we heard crying. Horrific sobbing of agony. It was young. Infantile. The kind of cries babies make when they’re scared or in pain. The hair from my neck stood on end as the sound echoed through the rain and shadow to meet us. Dan’s face had changed entirely from the usual fear and sadness he had recently been wearing. Now it was pure panic and horror. Horror, unlike anything I had ever seen.
“No, no, no, no…” He muttered over and over as if he was trying to convince himself that none of this was real.
“Dan,” Bea whispered with hardly any breath, “What is that?”
Daniel’s breathing was hard and fast like a racehorse. His eyes were wide, and his jaw was clenched. I didn’t expect him to be able to speak, but he did, “We need to get off this bridge. Run. Back to the house.” We looked to him, hoping for more answers, but he didn’t give us any. “Go!”
I started leading the way back down the catwalk, the group in tow. The water was now to our waist during our time standing there, and every step felt like I was running through tar. People often have nightmares where they can’t run fast from something that’s chasing them, but until you experience it in real life, I don’t think you could even fathom how genuinely terrifying it really is. The crying suddenly subsided as we reached the road again. It faded into a gurgle before stopping altogether.
That was when I gave up on running. I dove forward and started furiously paddling, checking over my shoulder quickly to make sure my friends were still with me. They all too had abandoned their legs and were tossing up the water. We swam fast through the dark, and I was thankful that the flashlight I had found was waterproof, or else we wouldn’t have known where we were going. With every stroke through the murk, I prayed that whatever was in it with us wouldn’t be in front of me. We reached the intersection of Daniel’s road and began to swim down it just in time for the streetlights to come on.
My prayer was unanswered.
Stretching high above the water, the orange bulbs clicked on one by one, illuminating the scene before us. Thick white ropes floated lazily among the flood, drifting up to the surface only to be buried by the falling rain moments later. Their texture was slick and slimy, and they tangled and crossed back and forth down the middle of the street like a boiling pot of spaghetti. Five feet away from me was what looked like a plastic bag drifting lazily in my direction. I thought that maybe it was until the light ahead of me shined a spotlight down on top of it.
It was a tiny figure; a baby… A fetus.
But it certainly wasn’t. Its skin was too distorted, too warped. It was bloated and far too big. Its eyes were nothing but soulless black beads that bore right through me from beneath the dark swell. The chords that invaded the streets plugged themselves into various spots around its body, and as it moved toward me, it dragged them along with it. Further down the road, I could see more of them, all curled into balls as they drifted closer. I watched as the one nearest to me opened its mouth beneath the water and began to emanate a muffled sob that bubbled and gasped to the surface. Not wasting any time, I launched myself back, stretching my arms out and netting my friends. I could hear Bea start to protest, but as soon as everyone took the sight in for themselves, they followed suit. We all turned to paddle back the way we came, but it was too late. We could already see more jellyfish-like tubes approaching.
“Shit! What do we do?” Ethan yelled.
I looked around quickly. Daniel was in sheer panic, panting hard with wide eyes. Bea struggled to open her jacket and retrieve the gun that I hoped still worked, and Ethan moved closer to huddle up to everyone. Off to our left, I suddenly noticed a clearing in the tentacles, a spot where they hadn’t reached yet. Beyond, a raised porch led back up to safety, and a fence connected to its side. If we could reach it, we could walk the edge of the wall back to Dan’s house. From there, I had no idea….
“Over there! Red house!” I screamed over the sea of sobbing and rainfall.
I took off, leading the way through the wake as everyone followed. Looking both ways, I saw the Fetus things were quickly closing in. They glided through the water with a jerky, thrashing motion of their bodies, and their chords did the same, stretching outward with a mind of their own. I hit the porch first, climbing halfway onto the steps then turning back to help the others. Bea took my hand and hauled herself out, then withdrew the gun. The pale slimy ropes were now only ten feet away and began to spread further apart, casting a vile net of flesh. Daniel was next, but he didn’t need any assistance. He launched himself forward on sheer adrenaline alone and hoisted himself up from the floor, looking back at the pursuers in utter horror.
As Ethan swam, he yelped when a rope drifted close to his side, and he quickly flipped into a backstroke to avoid it. His butt hit the stairs, and I bent over to grab his jacket, but I wasn’t the only thing that had a grip on him. A tentacle barely caught his leg, and the muscle within tightened.
“Ethan!” I yelled as his legs were abruptly yanked back into the water. I took a step down off the porch and pulled back with all of my might, but there was no give at all. Another tendril drifted close and wrapped around him once more, further up the leg this time. It pulled him in further, and Ethan looked back at me with an expression of pure fear.
“Joel! You have to let go!”
“No!”
“It’s gonna take you in too!”
I ignored and continued tugging. It was no use; my feet slipped, and I fell down onto my tailbone, my boots sinking below the water once again. Behind, I felt Daniel grab onto me and begin assisting, but even with the two of us, Ethan was only getting pulled further in. The fetus that had him raised its head above the water and made its muffled cries known over the sound of the chaos.
“Let me go!” Ethan Screamed.
“No! I won’t let you-“
BANG!
The water by the fetus’s head exploded, sending a shower of liquid launching high. The noise was so jarring that my hand slipped a bit, causing my grip to slide from Ethan’s shoulder. Immediately, I scrambled for his hood, catching it with the tips of my fingers. More fleshy tumors were upon us now, and they, too, were reaching out for Ethan. I began to panic, demanding that my body pull harder, but I was only rewarded by slipping further into the pool. Ethan was up to his neck now, and I let out a loud scream in defiance. I was not going to lose him. I couldn’t lose one of the only friends I had left. I was going to die before I let him go.
BANG!
Flesh and dark crimson burst into the water surrounding us, and the tentacles that held Ethan loosened their grip. Wasting no time, he yanked them off, and in the same instant, Daniel and I pulled him onto the porch. I looked over my shoulder to see Bea lower the pistol with shaking hands, partially from shivering, partly from fear.
“Nice shot.” I offered between breaths.
She nodded and gave me a very pitiful smile.
We looked back to the water to see that the creature Bea had just shot was floating lifelessly as rain relentlessly beat against its corpse. The others brushed by the unmoving chunk of flesh without a second thought and made their way to the edge of the porch. The four of us scrambled against the wall of the house and held our breath as we waited to see what happened next, but relief found us when we watched them bounce harmlessly against the wall, unable to pull their limp bodies from the water. I breathed a sigh of relief and then turned to everyone.
“You all okay? Ethan?”
“Yeah. It didn’t hurt me at all, just tried to pull me in. And I swallowed a bit of water. But other than that, all good.”
I nodded. “Dan?”
Dan tore his eyes away from the corpses and looked at me. I couldn’t tell if the water streaming down his face was from the rain or from tears. He wiped it all away and replied, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m alright.”
“Good.” I gave Bea a quick check-in look that she affirmed before continuing. “This fence over here, we should be able to balance on it back to the house. We can also take the backyards as well. It doesn’t look like they can climb.”
Nobody had any qualms with that idea. Together, we hoisted onto the slick fence and began to inch our way across it. Behind us, the babies in the water all wailed and gurgled below the surface. Once we reached the wall of the house next store, we hopped off of our perch and splashed into the lake that had formed in the backyard. From there, we swam and climbed through several yards until we were once again standing before Daniel’s home.
“How are we going to get in? they’re going to be in front of the garage?”
“The back door,” Daniel replied. “I left it unlocked before we left. Figured you never know when we may need to get back in. Guess that was the right call.”
We shambled through the water and felt around for the steps to the deck. The flood was up to mid-chest, and only the railings protruded from the water now. Peering in the back door, we saw that a foot of water had taken over the first floor of the house, and as Dan slid open the glass, more flowed in. We sloshed inside but suddenly stopped when we heard the sound of rushing water coming from the entryway. It wasn’t a whole lot, but it was a loud enough trickle to warrant alertness. Daniel brushed past us all and took the lead.
“Careful, Dan,” Bea called after him.
We each slowly rounded the corner to see that a steady waterfall was gently cascading down the steps. We may not have been able to see the source, but all of us knew exactly where it was coming from. Daniel placed his hands on the railing but didn’t bother to move up at all. He just stood there with his eyes locked on the bathroom door, breathing almost inaudibly. Ethan, Bea, and I didn’t say anything. We waited until he was ready. Without a word, he slowly took the first step up, then another, then another, carefully repeating the process until he stood at the top of the stairs. We followed slowly behind, making sure to not slip on the slick steps, but halted again when Daniel placed his hand on the doorknob.
We could hear a stream of water pouring into a full tub from the other side. The three of us shifted glances to one another, waiting for the next move when Daniel suddenly placed his forehead against the door. We were confused until we heard a soft sob come from him. Instantly, Bea crossed the rest of the way and stood next to him, then slowly wrapped him in a hug. Ethan and I followed suit.
“You know, I was so excited to be a dad.” Daniel began. “When my wife told me, I was ecstatic. We immediately started talking about names, whether it would be a boy or a girl, whose eyes they would have… the day after we knew, I tore down the guest room and started making renovations. Bought a crib and toys and everything I knew we would need.” He glanced over his shoulder to the door covered in butterflies and bees. “I wanted to do everything right, you know? My dad, he wasn’t ever around. I wanted to be different. I wanted to love her more than anything in the world. In all of my spare time, I researched things. The best diet for infants, what birth defects were common and how to best handle them, what to do if they choked, how to perform CPR on….” His voice caught in his throat before he could finish the last part of his sentence, and instead, only a shaky breath came out as tears rolled down his cheeks.
“It’s okay, Dan.” Bea gently reassured.
Daniel didn’t respond. He just shook his head and turned the knob to the door. Inside was a dark bathroom with a sink, toilet, and large, overflowing bathtub. The faucet continued to pour gallon after gallon of water into the basin that refused to hold anymore. Instead, it flowed outward past us and down the steps to join the flood below. Daniel sloshed into the room and stopped by the counter. A ring of keys sat; one proudly displaying the Ferrari logo. He picked them up and stared longingly at them.
“When she was born, it was the best day of my life… I took Paternity leave and then some to make sure I was home as much as possible. I wanted to be involved, you know? Work had me so busy, I knew that once I went back, I wasn’t going to be around as much. When it was time, I tried working from home for a bit. It was stressful, juggling a kid and managing a company’s finances, but I didn’t care. She was more important. But then…”
His voice caught again as he moved toward the tub. He stared into the water and sob by sob broke down. This time, none of us stepped over to comfort him. I could sense that it wasn’t what he wanted.
“They kept calling to pile more and more on. My boss told me that there would be some repercussions if I wasn’t more present, so I started trying harder. Any time they called, I would answer….”
He slowly sat on the edge of the tub and reached over to the faucet, placing his hand on the handle. Daniel struggled hard to continue. At this point, we knew it wasn’t for our sakes. He need to confront this.
“One day, my wife left to get groceries. She asked me to give our daughter a bath… It wasn’t deep; I knew better… I also knew better than to… than to leave her alone… but still- the phone rang and… I thought, you know… I thought that it would only be a second… I was so tired, and I didn’t think that….”
He turned the handle with a creak of the pipes, and slowly, the flow trickled to a stop. Daniel slid from the edge of the tub to the floor and stared at the center of the room as he forced himself to finish between broken emotions and labored breaths.
“I tried everything while the paramedics came, but she wouldn’t wake up… CPR didn’t work… trying to give her oxygen didn’t work… Begging her to wake up didn’t work… It was too late for any of that… I let my daughter die because I….” He looked at the keys in his hand and angrily lobbed them out of the door and against the hallway wall. “I belong here. This is what I deserve.”
He buried his face into his arms and knees and let the grief take over as Bea, Ethan, and I all stared at one another. Nobody knew what to say. Nobody wanted to move. Nobody wanted to do anything. After a moment, I looked back to Daniel and then silently stepped into the room with him, sliding against the vanity and sitting in the puddle. After a moment, Ethan and Bea did the same. Our thoughts on what had happened were irrelevant. What was done was done. We knew that, and Daniel certainly did as well. Nothing we could do was going to cure that. Dan hated himself, and that wasn’t going to change either. So instead, we just sat with a man who was broken and hoped that that was enough.