The Locked Stall at Millbrook

I remember the summer before secondary school like it was yesterday. The air was thick with the smell of cut grass and the promise of change, but all I could think about was Millbrook Primary and that bathroom. We called it the junior girls’ loo, but after what happened, ‘the bathroom’ became a word we only whispered, and even then, only in the safety of a crowded classroom.

My name is Alice, and I was in Year 6 when it all started. It was a Tuesday, the last week of term, and I had a stomachache. The classroom felt stuffy, and I asked Miss Hartley if I could be excused. She nodded without looking up, her pen scratching across a stack of tests. I walked down the polished corridor, my footsteps echoing off the walls, passing the trophy cabinet and the display of ancient Egyptian projects. The bathroom door was a faded blue, with a sign that read ‘Girls’ in peeling letters.

I pushed it open. The lights flickered overhead, humming like a trapped fly. The tiles were the same mint green they’d always been, but the air felt different, heavy, like the hallway before a thunderstorm. I went into the first stall, did my business, and went to wash my hands. That’s when I heard it: the soft scuff of a shoe on the floor, coming from the far stall. Not the echoing kind, but a deliberate, sliding step. I froze, my hands dripping water over the sink. ‘Hello?’ I called out, my voice small. No answer. Just the drip of the tap and the strange hum of the lights.

I told my friends, Rosie and Meg, at lunch. They laughed, but I saw the way Rosie glanced over her shoulder. ‘It’s probably just the pipes,’ Meg said, but she didn’t sound sure. Still, we made it a game. We’d go in together, all three of us, and stand in the middle, listening. Sometimes we heard the footsteps, sometimes the tap would turn on by itself, and once, we saw the end stall’s door swing gently, as if someone had just gone in. But when we checked, it was empty, and the lock was still engaged.

The end stall. It became our obsession. No matter when we went in, that door was locked. We tried peeking under the gap, but it was too dark. We tried knocking, and got no response. We tried convincing a teacher to check, but they just said it was a faulty lock. But we knew better. One afternoon, Rosie and I were in there alone. Rosie had gone in, and I was waiting outside, leaning against the sink. I saw a pale, thin hand curl under the door of the end stall, fingers splayed, reaching for the lock. I gasped. Rosie came out, and we both stared as the hand withdrew, and the lock clicked open. The door swung ajar. Inside, the toilet was pristine, the seat down, the tissue roll perfectly centered.

Then there was the day Meg went missing for ten minutes. We found her standing in front of the mirror, white as chalk, her mouth open. She said she’d gone in, and from the stall next to hers, she heard a voice, a little girl’s voice, whispering, ‘Can you help me? I’m stuck.’ She said she answered, ‘I’m here, where are you?’ and the voice replied, ‘In the end stall. It’s dark. Please.’ Meg said she looked under her stall, and saw a pair of small, bare feet in the corridor, standing right outside the end stall. Then they disappeared. When she came out, the end stall was locked again.

We started avoiding the bathroom, holding it until we got home. We told our parents, but they just said it was our imaginations. The last day of term, I had to go, and I was alone. I promised myself I’d be quick. I pushed open the door, and the lights were off. I fumbled for the switch, but nothing happened. I called out, ‘Anyone there?’ Silence. I stepped in, and the door swung shut behind me. The lock clicked. I turned, and in the dim light, I saw the end stall’s door was wide open. Inside, on the toilet, sat a small girl in a blue dress, her back to me. She was humming a nursery rhyme I didn’t recognize. I called, ‘Hello?’ She didn’t turn. She just kept humming. Then she slowly turned her head, and I saw she had no face, just a smooth, gray expanse where her features should be. I screamed and ran, but the door was locked. I pounded on it, and just as I thought I’d be trapped, it swung open, and I tumbled into the corridor, sobbing.

The teachers found me, and they said it was a panic attack. But I knew what I’d seen. The school closed for summer, and I never went back. Millbrook was demolished last year, but sometimes, when I close my eyes, I still see that locked stall, and I wonder if she’s still there, waiting for the next girl who asks to be excused.

Now I’m in secondary school, and the bathroom there is new, bright, and safe. But every time I hear a door lock, I get a chill, and I remember the hand under the door, reaching for me.