A Place So Wicked by Patrick Reuman (life books to read txt) 📕

The doorhandle continued to rattle. “I said I’ll be out in a second!” He had to stop himself from swearing, but damn did he want to. He started reaching for the towel that hung over the curtain rail.

A loud thud echoed through the bathroom. He was about to break and scream at whoever was outside the door when he suddenly heard a quiet whimper that went through his ears just as a sharp pain shot through his body. He bent forward a little, not surprised by the pain. He had been feeling sick throughout the night, even worse that morning, but had shrugged it off. Now it was back with a vengeance. He couldn’t be sure if it was the alcohol or Trevor’s sickness that he had been hoping he hadn’t contracted, but the pain disappeared just as quickly as it came, dulling back to the minor ache it had been most of the day. He rose back up, relieved but still mildly upset at the sudden intense pain he had endured.

The whimpering came again, and for a split second, he thought it was himself, still shaken from wherever the pain had come from.

“Leave me alone!” he heard, water still in his eyes.

The voice was Paisley’s or maybe even Trevor’s. After he had a moment to process it, he determined it couldn’t have been either of them. The voice had been too young sounding. The whimpering continued, growing in volume, the sadness behind it becoming more tangible.

He reached around for the towel that should have been hanging on the shower rod but wasn’t. Desperation growing, he opened his eyes for a second, letting in a little of the soap-tinged water that clung to his face. It burned so they closed involuntarily but not before seeing a dark blur beyond the curtain, the blur in the shape of a small person.

He pulled the curtain aside just far enough to reach for the towel, having remembered that he left it on the sink. “Who is that?!” he shouted.

How in the hell did some little kid get into the bathroom? He was naked, for Christ’s sake. As that thought set in, his panic rose even further. What would it look like if everybody suddenly got home? He found the towel and pulled it into the shower, quickly drying his face off.

This was impossible, whatever was happening. He wasn’t sure if the doors downstairs were locked, but he was damn sure the bathroom door had been locked. He had to be more intoxicated than he had previously thought. Hallucinations like this didn’t come from just a little alcohol. He wasn’t even sure they came with a lot of alcohol. He hadn’t had a trip like this since that one time he tried acid, and he was only seventeen then. He cursed the fact that he had even drank.

He wrapped the towel around his waist and yanked open the shower curtain. At the door was a little boy, his black hair, green sweatshirt, and blue jeans the only thing visible to Robbie as he faced the other direction. The wiggle sound of the doorknob had stopped only to be replaced by a loud, humming groan, which reverberated off the walls like the whole house was shifting on an axis.

Robbie blinked, thinking he saw the door itself stretching inward, which was impossible of course, another side-effect of the booze. The boy released his grip on the door handle and suddenly flung backward. No, he didn’t fling backward, he was still on his feet. He had released the handle and started walking in reverse until he reached the tub where he sat down and then pressed his hands up against his eyes and started crying.

Robbie had leapt to the side, not wanting to be near some kid in his towel. He almost slipped, catching himself on the godsend shower rail. His mind was in a freefall at this point. What had been in his drink? Just vodka and apple juice. He was sure of it. Could the alcohol have gone bad? He was pretty sure that wasn’t even possible. Didn’t most alcohol get better with age, or was that just wine?

But if there was nothing wrong with the vodka or the apple juice, then how was he hallucinating so heavily?

He stared down at the boy who hadn’t even noticed Robbie was there yet. But that was because the kid wasn’t real, just a part of some weird alcoholic trip. If he got out of this, he swore he would never drink again. He liked being drunk, but he sure as hell didn’t like this.

The kid suddenly jumped back up like the tub was electrified and started toward the door in a sprint.

“Wait!” Robbie shouted.

The kid froze mid-sprint, halfway between the tub and the door. Robbie’s heart was pounding. He didn’t know what he expected when he shouted for him to wait, but it wasn’t for him to stop. The kid had frozen, one leg up in the air behind him, the other planted on the floor, ready to push himself toward the door.

Robbie had just stepped forward and was nearing the boy’s side to see what was happening when he heard a loud cracking sound. He stopped in his tracks, just out of reach from seeing the boy’s face.

There was another crack, like something massive was sitting on a bed of ice and the ice could no longer bear the weight, long cracks jolting away from the object in every direction. With the next crack, the kid’s head turned a few inches in the direction of Robbie. There was a pause. Robbie could see little black veins moving across the boy’s otherwise pale white face.

Another crack shattered the silence, this one insanely loud like a tree had just been struck by lightning