A Nightmare On Elm Street

bathtime scares

(EDITED 23/09/22)

A guard exits pushing a cart of food trays. I wait warily until he's gone, then looking back to Tod who looks more like a captured coyote than a human.

"And then what happened?" I asked.

"I told you. It was dark, but I'm sure there was somebody in there under the covers with her."

"How could somebody be under the covers with you guys, without you knowing about it?" I pressed, my voice rising slightly.

"How the fuck do I know?" He shrugged. "I don't expect you to believe me anyway."

I stood up from my position and rested against the wall before wrapping my fingers around the cell bars. "What did he look like? Did you get a look at him?"

"No."

I sighed, moving away. "Well, then how do you know that somebody else was there?"

"Because somebody cut her while I watched." He spits, his voice getting louder.

"And you didn't get a look at him?" I asked, defeat.

"I couldn't even see the fucker. You could just see...cuts happening...all at once."

I edge closer to the bars again. "What do you mean all at once?"

"I mean, it was as if there were four razors...cutting her at the same time...but invisible ones. You know, I probably could of saved her...if I had moved sooner....but I thought it was just another nightmare, like the one I had the night before."

I look up at Tod before he carries on. "There was this...there was this guy. He had knives for fingers."

I open my mouth and slowly back away. I turn around, my back now to Tod. He calls out. "Hey, you think I did it?"

I turn back to face him. "No." I leave it at that and pound on the door for the guard to let me out. I needed to process.

______

I lay in the tub, so drowsy I can hardly rinse without falling asleep.

"One two, Freddy's coming for you." I sing softly.

"Three four, better lock your door." I grab my flannel and play around with it.

"Five six, grab your crucifix." I took the blue piece of material and squeezed the bubbles out of it.

"Seven eight, gonna stay up late. Nine ten, never sleep again."

My eyes droop. I slide closer to the surface of the water, letting its heat sooth my nerves. My legs placed crooked, one knee on each side of
the tub.

There's a ripple in the water between. Then, something tiny and shiny breaks the surface between them. It popped up, beginning to rise.

Higher and higher it rises, soon accompanied by another, then two more shining, gleaming blades, and then the full glove and a dark hairy hand and then the wrist and arm, straight up light an evil sapling between my knees, the knives bloosoming into a bright flower of razor sharp steel in the air, moving over to my belly. The hand rears back, the claws arch to strike.

"Nicole?" I wake up to the sound of mother's voice coming from behind the door.

"What mother?"

"Don't fall asleep in there. You could drown you know."

"Oh, for Pete's sakes." I whisper. Rinsing my flannel out again.

"It happens all the time. I've heated up some warm milk for you."

"Warm milk? Gross." I say quietly.

I listen as I hear her footsteps leave. The next moment, I'm jerked with incredible violence straight down beneath the surface of the tub, as if the bottom had suddenly dropped out and I was in a bottomless well.

I'm pulled sharply down into really deep water, the dim light of the surface and bathroom beyond receding with each yank. And yet, I somehow flail and gasp and struggle back towards the surface, managing by pure panic to break the surface with my hands.

"Help!" I screamed.

"Nicole!" My mother's voice reaches to me, making me thrust up through main force breaking the surface with my head and shoulders.

"Hold on baby!"

Gasping and choking, I break the surface of the bathwater, like a drowning sailer getting one last chance. My mother's voice booms over me, echoing and frantic.

The loud banging on the door finally opens my eyes. I stagger up in the bathwater, again with
solid porcelain beneath my feet. I carefully step out, wrapping a towel around myself as my mom finally enters the room.

"I'm okay."

"You're okay?" She asks.

"I'm okay." I said, nodding my head.

"But I heard you screaming. You were calling me."

"I just slipped getting out of the tub, mom." I say as she throws my blue dressing gown around my gasping self.

"I told you hundreds of people a year get killed like that, honey." She explains, as I put my arms through the holes of my dressing gown.

"I know but I'm okay, mother. I'm sorry for scaring you."

"It's okay." She said, now wrapping a towel over my head. "I'll turn down your bed, okay?"

"All right. I'll get my pyjamas on."

"Okay." She speaks softly, before leaving the bathroom.

I lean up against the sink before focusing my attention on the cabinet. I open the door and look through its contents. Finally taking out a bottle of "Stay Awake Fast"