The Faucet’s Lullaby

I’ve been living in the basement unit of a crumbling Victorian house on Bramble Street for seven months now. It’s a two-bedroom, but we only use one; the other is a damp, windowless box we use for storage. My wife, Lila, and I moved here for the cheap rent and the proximity to the university where I teach. The house itself is a relic, with peeling wallpaper and radiators that clank like bones in the night. The upstairs tenants are an elderly couple, the Hendricks, who have lived here since the Nixon administration. They’re friendly enough, but they keep to themselves, exchanging brief nods in the hallway.

One evening, I was out on the porch, having a smoke, and I chatted with Mr. Hendricks as he tended to his potted geraniums. He asked how we were settling in, and I mentioned we’d had a few odd noises—pipes, drafts, that sort of thing. He gave me a long, searching look and said, ‘You know, that unit of yours has been empty for nearly three years. Some say it’s because of the water.’ He didn’t elaborate, just went back to his plants. That night, I told Lila, and she shrugged it off. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that he was trying to warn me.

A week later, we had a dinner party with our friends, the Masons. They’d lived in the area for years, and as the wine flowed, they got to talking about the house. ‘Oh, you’re in the basement apartment,’ said Dana Mason, her eyes widening. ‘We heard a family moved in a while back, but they left after a month. The husband claimed he saw a woman in the hallway, but the wife said it was just the mirrors. And the kids… they used to sing to the faucets.’ I laughed it off, but Lila’s hand tightened on her glass. I remembered that on our second night, the bathtub faucet had turned on by itself, the water running ice cold for a full minute before I turned it off. We chalked it up to faulty plumbing.

A few nights later, I was up late grading papers, and I heard a faint sound from the bathroom—a soft, rhythmic dripping, like a leak. I went in, and the faucet was off, but there was a puddle in the tub. As I watched, a drop fell from the spout and hit the porcelain with a clear ‘plink.’ It was regular, almost melodic. I turned the handle firmly, but it did nothing. The dripping continued, and I noticed the drip was coming from the cold side, even though the water was off. I felt a chill, and then I heard a woman humming—a low, soothing lullaby. It seemed to come from the drain. I called out, but the humming stopped. I told Lila in the morning; she said I’d been watching too many horror movies.

But I’d always been sensitive to things like this. Since childhood, I’ve seen figures in peripheral vision, heard whispers in empty rooms. Lila, more rational, dismissed it. Until the night she woke up screaming. She said she’d felt a pressure on her chest, and when she opened her eyes, she saw a dark-haired woman standing over her, water dripping from her hair, her lips moving as if singing. The woman pointed at the bathroom and then faded. Lila was pale, trembling. We didn’t sleep the rest of the night.

The next day, I confronted the Hendricks. Mrs. Hendricks finally admitted that the previous tenants—a young mother and her son—had experienced the same things. The boy used to call the woman ‘the wet lady.’ They moved out after the mother woke up to find the bathtub filled with black water. The realtor had to repaint and replace the pipes, but they never rented it out for long. I asked if there was a history of death in the house. Mr. Hendricks hesitated. ‘A woman died in that bathtub, back in the ’50s. She drowned her two children and then herself. They say she’s still singing to them, waiting for them to come back.’

That night, I couldn’t help but listen to the pipes. At around 3 a.m., the bathroom faucet squealed to life, water gushing. I rushed in. The tub was filling with dark, murky water, and the drain was gurgling. I shut off the water, but it wouldn’t stop. The mirror began to fog, and I saw a faint figure behind me—a woman with long hair, soaked, her eyes empty. She opened her mouth, and the humming filled the room, a lullaby I didn’t recognize. I backed away, and she reached for me with a dripping hand. I fell backward, and she vanished.

We couldn’t take it anymore. The next week, we started packing. But the night before we left, I heard the humming again, clearer this time, and the faucet began to play a tune—a series of drips that formed a pattern. I realized it was the lullaby the woman hummed. And then, from the bedroom, I heard a child’s voice singing along. Lila was beside me, her face ashen. We left the boxes behind and drove to a motel. In the morning, we returned only to grab our essentials. As I locked the door, I heard the faucet turn on, and the humming stopped. It was replaced by silence—a silence that felt heavier than any sound.

We moved to a different city, but sometimes, at night, I wake up to the sound of dripping water. And when I go to the bathroom, I find the faucet of the sink we never use slightly ajar, and I swear I hear a lullaby, faint but persistent. I’ve learned to sleep with earplugs, but the dripping is not a sound you can block out. It’s a memory, and it echoes in the pipes of my mind. The faucet’s lullaby will follow me wherever I go.