The Hardest Fall(12)
As I stood there holding my breath, completely naked and utterly still for at least five seconds—waiting for God knows what—my heartbeat steadily got heavier. My mouth was as dry as sandpaper, and when I finished my internal countdown from ten, I started panicking at full tilt. If it had been Mark, he would have called out by then. I thought of calling out a greeting myself, but all the horror movies I used to force myself to sit through with my dad came to mind, and I decided I didn’t want to get killed by a clown that day.
It was not my time, not my day, and for sure not my first choice of a killer.
I especially didn’t want to get killed by a clown while I was stark naked with water dripping down from my wet hair and body. I heard footsteps and only then realized that whoever had broken in hadn’t moved for those first few seconds. When he finally started to walk, his footsteps were the slow kind…you know those steps, right? Again, in the horror movies I’d watched, I’d learned an important lesson: if someone is moving in slow and deliberate steps, you turn around and run. Run, my friend, run as if you have hellhounds nipping at your heels, because you know what? Those slow-walking creepy bastards always kill the shrieking girls.
It was too bad for me because I didn’t have anywhere to run. The two-bedroom apartment was L shaped, and I was standing just around the corner from my soon-to-be killer.
Did I mention I never watch horror movies anymore? Or any kind of movies that keep me up at night?
As I started to silently back away, I looked down at my phone and cursed myself for listening to Spotify and draining the battery. Then I realized how badly my hands were shaking and started panicking even more. Grabbing the wall for some much-needed support, I managed to back into the bathroom quietly, grab a big hand towel, and wrap it around me, which only managed to cover me to a certain degree. Half my ass and other parts were just…there, but that little towel felt like an extra level of protection.
I heard some more footsteps coming from the open living room area then a loud crash followed by a hissed curse. Having trouble swallowing, and generally functioning, I cupped both my hands over my mouth to hold back a gasp and just crouched behind the door. If I could make myself as small as possible, I would be invisible and safe, and in a few minutes, it would all be over, because why would a thief come into the bathroom where there was nothing to steal? Unless he came to check why the lights were on…then I was screwed anyway.
Another crash sounded loudly, and this time I squeaked. My breathing was irregular and louder than I would’ve liked. Since my knees were about to give out on me, I put my palm on the wall and gently pulled myself up, only to feel my legs go to jelly.
Spotting a rolling pin leaning against the wall underneath the sink—don’t even ask what it was doing in the bathroom—I grabbed hold of it and closed my eyes, just in case I needed it.
I was probably going to die in a bathroom in Los Angeles—actually, there was no probably about it because it would either be from a heart attack or at the hands of a stranger, whichever happened first. Unfortunately, neither one sounded all that appealing to me.
I had no idea if mere minutes passed or an hour, but I couldn’t hear a single sound anymore. When I was sure there was nothing, I started to weigh my options—not that I had many.
Even so, I was either going to suck it up and get out of the bathroom, or I was gonna stay in there indefinitely. Then I remembered that all my camera equipment was out in the open in the living room: lenses I’d borrowed from my professor, the beloved Sony camera my dad had gifted me, my laptop, and even more expensive equipment I had no way of buying again anytime soon. Still shaking and shivering, I decided to step out and at least take a look around the corner. Surely, if someone was still in the house—though I was hoping really hard that someone wasn’t in the house—I’d either try to make a run for it, or I’d just drop dead on the spot, because I had a feeling my heart wasn’t going to be able to hang in there much longer.
I was so scared, I forgot how to breathe. Forcing my body to move forward, I swallowed and opened the door so I could slowly peek around the wall.
Someone was definitely in the house. It wasn’t exactly pitch black thanks to the street lights softly illuminating the living room, but other than that, none of the lights in the apartment were turned on. There weren’t many pieces of furniture in the living room, just a big comfy couch, an armchair big enough to comfortably seat two people, and a coffee table. Seeing this awful stranger kneeling down right behind the couch and going through something in a big bag on the floor made my blood turn to ice.
He was stealing my equipment.
The rolling pin still securely held in my hands, I pulled myself back from the edge, then leaned against the wall. The apartment door was closed. I was trapped. Even if I ran for it, he’d hear me and catch me before I could make it out. With the size of him, I didn’t want that to happen. My only chance—my only option, really—was to hit him in the head with the rolling pin while he still had his back to me, grab the key I was eighty percent sure I had left on the kitchen island, and then make a run for it—after grabbing the bag that held my camera equipment, of course. Considering my lack of clothing, getting to Ms. Hilda, who lived at the end of the hall, was my best shot. She was always home, so I wasn’t worried about not finding anyone, but was it possible to even make it out there?
When I realized there were cold tears running down my cheeks from the fear and anxiety of the whole thing, I took a choppy, deep, but quiet breath and told myself I could do this. I repeated it over and over again in my mind.