Chapter 4: The Drowning Room

Chapter 4: The Drowning Room

Leaving the library didn’t bring relief; it brought a horrifying clarity. The woman in the water had a name: Seraphina Raine. The knowledge was a lead weight in Leo’s gut, and it seemed to fuel the curse that was systematically destroying him.

The thirst was no longer just a craving; it was a physical agony. His throat felt like it was lined with sandpaper and broken glass. His skin was tight and papery, his eyes sunken and fever-bright in his haggard reflection—a reflection he now avoided at all costs. He was withering, drying out from the inside, a living testament to a death by drowning. His body was a battlefield, and he was losing.

By the second night, he was delirious. The world swam in and out of focus. Every shadow in his small house seemed to coalesce into her silhouette, every creak of the floorboards was the sound of her waterlogged footstep. He knew, with a certainty that transcended logic, that he couldn't survive another night like this. She was no longer content to be a passive vision. He could feel her presence gathering, a storm building just beyond the veil of reality.

He had to do something. The thirst was a roaring fire, and he was down to his last embers of strength. The memory of the black sludge from the kitchen faucet kept him paralyzed, but his body’s betrayal was absolute. He needed water. Not to drink—he knew the drowning horror that awaited him there—but just to feel it on his skin. A final, desperate gamble for some small relief.

The bathroom was a chamber of horrors. He’d taped a towel over the mirror, but he could still feel the weight of a gaze coming from the reflective surface beneath. He moved with the slow, deliberate shuffle of a man twice his age, his joints aching with dehydration. He turned the handle for the shower, his hand shaking so violently he could barely grip the cold chrome.

For a moment, it was normal. Clear water hissed from the showerhead, steaming up the small room. Leo stepped under the spray, clothes and all, letting the hot water soak his hoodie and jeans. He slumped against the tiled wall, a weak sob of relief catching in his raw throat. The heat was a blessing, chasing away the bone-deep chill that had plagued him for two days. He closed his eyes, focusing only on the sensation, trying to pretend he was anywhere else.

The sound changed first.

The clean hiss of the spray deepened into a thick, guttural gurgle, like a throat being cleared. The scent of soap and steam was instantly overpowered by the foul, familiar stench of stagnant pond water and rot.

Leo’s eyes snapped open. Panic, cold and absolute, seized him.

The water was no longer clear. A viscous, oily black sludge was pouring from the showerhead, coating his clothes and skin in a foul, cold film. He cried out, scrambling to get away, but his legs tangled beneath him. He stared in abject terror as the sludge began to thicken, and ropy clumps of long, black hair emerged with it, coiling in the basin like nests of black eels.

He tried to scream, but the stench filled his mouth, choking him. He pushed himself away from the wall, slipping on the slick, hair-matted tile, and that’s when he saw her.

She wasn't a reflection this time. She was manifesting from the steam and the shadows in the corner of the shower, a solidifying nightmare of pale skin and tattered white cloth. Her face, a mask of serene, sorrowful rage, turned toward him. Her empty, black eyes held no hatred, only an endless, crushing weight of despair.

Her hand, wrinkled and bone-white, shot out from the swirling steam and clamped around his wrist. The grip was like iron, the cold not just a temperature but an active presence, leaching the life and heat from him. He was paralyzed, his muscles locked by a terror so profound it felt like his heart had stopped beating.

She didn't speak, but her voice flooded his mind, a gurgling shriek of cold water and forgotten promises. You stand on my grave. You swim in my tomb. You will feel what I felt.

With impossible strength, she dragged him backward. He fell hard, his head cracking against the edge of the bathtub. The world exploded in a flash of white-hot pain. Before he could recover, he was being pulled over the edge, into the tub that was now filling at an unnatural rate with the same black, hair-choked sludge.

The foul liquid closed over his head. It was thick as mud, filling his nose and mouth, a suffocating blanket of filth and decay. He thrashed wildly, his hands slipping on her icy arm. The long strands of hair were everywhere, wrapping around his neck, his arms, his legs, pulling him down, a living, suffocating tapestry of her rage. His lungs burned, screaming for air that wasn't there. This was it. This was the end she’d been promising him.

BANG. BANG. BANG.

A sound penetrated the watery chaos. A loud, insistent pounding from somewhere far away.

BANG. BANG. BANG. "Leo! You in there, man? You sound like you're wrecking the place! Open up!"

Drew.

The name was a flicker of light in the crushing darkness. The ghost—Seraphina—hesitated. Her head tilted, her focus momentarily broken by the intrusion from the world outside. Her grip on his wrist loosened by a fraction.

It was all Leo needed. He shoved upward with the last of his strength, breaking the surface, gasping, retching up a mouthful of the vile sludge. He clawed at the edge of the tub, his vision swimming, and rolled onto the bathroom floor, a shivering, soaking mess.

The spectral form in the shower wavered, her edges blurring like smoke. With a final, sorrowful sigh that sounded like the tide going out, she dissolved back into the steam, leaving behind only the overwhelming stench and the rapidly draining tub.

The pounding on the front door was more frantic now. "Leo! I'm calling the cops if you don't answer!"

Leo crawled from the bathroom, leaving a trail of filthy water behind him. His limbs felt like lead, his head throbbed. He fumbled with the lock, his fingers slick and numb, and pulled the door open.

Drew stood there, phone in hand, his face a mixture of annoyance and concern. "Dude, what the hell is—" He stopped, his words dying as he took in the sight of his friend. Leo was pale as a sheet, soaked to the bone in a foul-smelling black liquid, with a bleeding gash on the back of his head.

"I told you," Leo rasped, his voice barely a whisper. "She's real."

"You're bleeding, man, you need a hospital—" Drew started, moving to help him, but his eyes drifted past Leo to the open bathroom door. He froze.

The room was a disaster. The shower curtain was torn, water was pooled on the floor, and the air reeked of a swamp. But it was the bathtub that made Drew’s face lose all its color. The porcelain was stained with a greasy, black residue, and clinging to the white enamel, stark and undeniable, was a single, impossibly long strand of wet, black hair.

Drew stared, his mouth agape. The logical, skeptical world he lived in crumbled in that single instant. This was no concussion. This was no hallucination. This was real.

"Oh my God," Drew whispered, his voice trembling.

Leo leaned against the doorframe, the last of his strength failing him. He couldn’t go to a hospital. What would he tell them? He couldn’t fight this alone. Drew believed him now, but what could he do against a ghost? There was only one person who had looked at the madness and seen a story.

With a shaking hand, Leo pulled his phone from his drenched pocket, praying it still worked. The screen flickered to life. He found the number he’d looked up after leaving the library.

He didn't have the strength to stand on ceremony.

The phone on the other end rang twice before she picked up. "Oakridge Library, this is Elara."

Leo’s voice was a ragged, desperate plea. "Elara? It's Leo. From the library. The guy looking up the pool." He took a shuddering breath, the stench of the grave still in his lungs. "You have to help me. She knows I know her name. She's trying to kill me."