The Bathroom Door

I was six when we moved into the yellow house on Cedar Lane, a fresh start my parents insisted, though all I could remember was the ache of leaving my swing set and the whispered promises to a best friend I’d never see again. The house itself was an old Victorian with a wraparound porch, but the upstairs bathroom, with its cracked tile and a tub that dripped even when off, felt like an afterthought. It was there, in the humid steam of my evening baths, that I first felt it—a presence, not seen, but sensed, like a cool breath on the back of my neck when the window was closed.”

“I was a child who hated silence, so I’d leave the door ajar and sing nonsense songs to the hum of the faucet. My parents would be downstairs, laughter from the TV drifting up like a lifeline. But the moment the water turned cold, a stillness would fall, and I’d swear I saw a tall, thin silhouette in my peripheral vision—always at the edge, never fully there, always gone when I turned. It wore a wide-brimmed hat that cast a shadow over its face, and it would glide past the door, never pausing, like a forgotten film reel. I named it ‘Mr. Hollow’ and told my mother, who dabbed my forehead with a towel and said, ‘It’s just your eyes, sweetie. Floaters. They look like little circles, but sometimes they can be tall and thin, that’s all.’ I wanted to believe her, but the fear was too real, gripping my chest until I couldn’t breathe. I began timing my baths to finish before the light in the hallway dimmed, before the tall shadow could come, and I’d rush out, dripping, without drying my feet.”

“Years passed, and the vision faded into a childhood quirk, a story I told myself I’d imagined. I was fourteen, now in high school, and the yellow house was just a drafty old thing we were about to leave, my father’s job transferring us to Ohio. But on the last night, as I packed my boxes, I heard the bathroom door whine. It was the same sound it always made, but this time, I paused. I was in the doorway, looking down the hallway, and in the dim light, I saw it again—not a shadow, but a man, solid as my father, but taller, with that same wide-brimmed hat. He stood at the other end, facing me, and I could see the suggestion of a mouth opening in a silent scream. Then he pointed one long finger at me, and I felt a freezing cold wash over me, like being plunged into ice water. I blinked, and he was gone, but the door was now shut tight. I didn’t sleep that night, and I didn’t tell my parents, because I knew they’d say it was stress, that I was seeing things.”

“The move to Ohio was supposed to be an escape, but the new house, a modern split-level, felt wrong in a different way. The bathroom here had a sliding door, and I avoided it as much as I could, taking quick showers with the curtain pulled, hoping the contact high would keep me grounded. But Mr. Hollow found me there too, on a humid August afternoon, when the window fogged up. I saw his reflection in the mirror, not a reflection, but a superimposition, his hat brim low, his hand reaching for the glass. I screamed, and he vanished, leaving only a handprint on the mirror that slowly faded. I knew then that he wasn’t tied to an old house or a creaky door; he was tied to the act of washing, to the vulnerability of being naked and wet and alone, to the threshold between the known world and some other.”

“I am seventeen now, and I think I understand. It started in Indiana, but it’s not bound by place. It’s bound to me, to the moments when I’m most exposed, most vulnerable, when the water muffles sound and the steam clouds my vision. I see him less often now, but I feel him always, waiting behind the curtain, in the mist, in the drip of the tap. I’ve learned to never close the door, no matter how cold I get, and to never look directly at the mirror after I turn off the water. I still take baths, because I can’t give up that simple comfort, but I’ve made a pact with myself: when he appears, I will look him in the eye, and I will whisper, ‘You do not frighten me anymore.’ I tried it once, last week, when he stood at the foot of the tub, and the words came out shaky, but for the first time, he paused, and the hat tipped back, and I saw not a face, but a void, and in that void, a flicker of something that might have been surprise. Then he was gone, and the water was suddenly freezing, and I knew I’d won a small battle. But I also know this is a war, and he’s patient, and he knows I will always have to bathe, and sooner or later, the door will not be enough to keep him out.