Beers, Wines and Spirits

Submitted into Contest #148 in response to: Write a story involving a noise complaint. ... view prompt

18 comments

Drama Fiction Horror

This story contains themes or mentions of suicide or self harm.

Jim’s Room. . .


The Carlsberg frothed like sea foam along the green carpet until it hit an invisible boundary, stopped dead, and soaked into the fibres. The tell-tale patch on the floor darkened as Jim grabbed at a box of tissues just out of reach on the cabinet.


“Bugger,” he said, wiping his hands on his jeans.


“Was that the last one?” asked Claire, still sipping from her can, feet dangling over the side of her flatmate’s bed.


“Last one?” Jim laughed. “There's a case of 18 under there. You’ll get the hang of it, Matie.”


He shuffled his bum across the floor and made a shift-out-of-the-way gesture at Claire’s legs before reaching under the bed and dragging out a recognisable green and white box. It was open in seconds and the next lager was ready.


“Are you going to clean that up?” Claire nodded at the sodden mess from the spillage.


“I’ll shift the empty, I suppose.” Jim popped open the ring pull, took a long gulp from the fresh beer and grabbed the other can from the floor. He tossed it expertly into the metal bin, under the study table opposite, with a satisfying clatter.


“You’ve done that before.”


“Oh, only seven hundred and twenty three times.”


Bang!

Bang!

Bang!


“What’s his bother now?” asked Jim, shrugging and sliding back to his cross-legged position.


“Must have been the can hitting the bin.” Claire scratched her cheek. “But it wasn’t that loud, surely?”


“I think Harvey bought that broom just to bang on the ceiling. Never seen him use it for anything else. I wouldn’t mind, but he does it when I’m not even here. Sarah can hear him from her room.”


“Maybe the noise travels from other rooms and he thinks it’s you?”


“Must be something like that. Or he’s hallucinating. I’m pretty sure he’s drinking something stronger than Carlsberg – or smoking it, or snorting it.” Jim ran his nose along his forearm, with a long, loud sniff.


“You think he’s on drugs?”


“Only sensible explanation. I got an email from the hall tutor yesterday saying I had to keep the noise down 'cos there were complaints at the weekend just gone.”


“You went home last weekend," said Claire.


“Exactly!”


“What noise does he think you’re making?”


Jim made air quotes with his fingers. “Banging on the floor and screaming.”


“Screaming?”


“Apparently so, like a teenage girl in a Freddy movie.”


“I’m pretty sure if someone had been screaming, I’d have heard it too. Or Sarah at least, next door to you. Did she hear anything?”


“Not a sausage.”


“So weird.”


“Indeedy. But it was all Saturday night apparently. On and off.”


“So, he heard screaming all night and didn’t call Security?”


“Nope. Just emailed the tutor and blamed it on little me.”


“I do think he’s a bit odd. Not just because of this. He skips loads of lectures, and have you seen how skinny and pale he is?”


“Drug addict I recon, he’s got the money for it.”


Sarah’s Room. . .


Thud.

Thud.

Thud.


“There he goes again.” Claire sipped a glass of pinot. “That Harvey bloke underneath Jim.”


“Yeah, he was at it all Saturday night." Sarah poured herself some wine. "I wouldn’t mind, but it was the one weekend I needed my sleep. I had that psych presentation on Monday morning.”


“He made a complaint against Jim over banging and screaming all night. Jim wasn’t even here.”


“I know. The guy is weird.” Sarah brushed her chestnut hair behind her ear. “I knew as soon as he moved in, he was going to be a nightmare. Shuffling around the corridors, not speaking to anyone. I think he's joined the Paranormal Society. Weirdo."


“Why did they put a finalist in with a load of first years anyway?” Claire said, “He was bound to have noise problems. I just expected they'd be caused by real things!”


Sarah laughed and nodded and clenched her toes into the soft, grey carpet of her room.


Claire’s Room. . .


“Anyone know any ghost stories?” Claire looked around the faces of her flatmates, half hoping they didn’t.


“Not exactly a ghost story, but I heard something really grim.” Sarah crossed her legs in front of her on the grey carpet and straightened her back against the off-white wall.


“How grim?” asked Claire. “Will it give me nightmares?”


“Women!” Jim cracked open a Carlsberg. “It probably will, because you’re a wuss.”


“Go on Sarah, what have you heard?” Claire spun her study chair round a couple of times while she composed herself.


“Well, you know that guy on my course with the blue hair? Pete Sanding?”


“That’s his natural colour?” said Jim, with a giggle.


“Don’t be daft,” said Claire. “What about him?”


“His cousin was in a flat in one of these blocks five years ago, dentistry course.” Sarah cleared her throat. “Pete doesn’t know which flat. But apparently a guy in a room on the floor above was found dead after the Fresher’s ball.”


“No way!” said Claire, eyes wide, mouth open.


“Yeah. No one saw him all night, and when Security opened his room, he was lying on the floor, stinking of vodka, blood all over himself and the carpet, with a suicide note addressed to his parents.”


“That’s awful," said Jim, sobering up.


"The worst of it was," Sarah leaned in, "that they think he changed his mind part way through, but there was no one around to help him."


There was a short silence, and no one breathed.


“So creepy. Imagine living in that flat after that,” said Claire.


“Yeah, there was a police investigation, and the university closed the flat for the year and moved all the students out to other places," Sarah sighed, “When they reopened it, they had redecorated that room, and obviously had everything cleaned or replaced."


“How did he kill himself?” asked Claire.


“The story I heard was that he swallowed razor blades. But I doubt that’s true. Can you imagine how painful it would be? You'd never stop screaming.”


“Someone would have heard that.” Claire shuddered.


"Apparently, the only other person in the block that night was a deaf guy in the room directly below," Sarah said, "Everyone else was at the ball. Hence no one coming to help."


“You’d never know which room it was now, I guess,” said Jim. “Except it can’t be ground floor.”


“Anyone’s room look different? Mismatched shade of magnolia on the walls?” said Sarah.


“Hang on a minute.” Jim’s face fell. “My carpet’s green.”

May 29, 2022 20:35

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18 comments

Graham Kinross
00:19 Sep 16, 2022

Great story. The way it comes full circle is excellent. To do it so well and tie everything together is brilliant.

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07:05 Sep 16, 2022

Thank you for reading! I'm really glad you liked it 🙂

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Graham Kinross
07:06 Sep 16, 2022

You’re welcome.

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Zelda C. Thorne
09:02 Jun 09, 2022

Oooooo loved the end harkening back to the start. Cool finisher. I enjoyed the set up of this, with the different rooms. It worked and was a refreshingly different way of revealing the story. Mystery and horror wrapped together. Enjoyed this one. Well done and good luck🙂

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17:11 Jun 11, 2022

Thank you for your kind comment. I'm glad the three rooms thing seems to have worked. I wasn't sure about it.

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14:04 Jun 08, 2022

Great story, Katharine 😎 It reads well, smoothly, it has such a natural flow. Well crafted sentences. No excessive adjectives or verbs. Not easy to pull that off. You forget you’re reading - it’s like you’re watching a movie. - Not easy accomplishing that. Very well done! 🥇 The dialogues sounded authentic, believable. Just like kids in UK would sound like. Good kids. I liked that you didn’t use profanities here - they weren’t necessary, anyway. Clever ending. I am not familiar with your stories, but you sound like somebody who’s d...

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17:10 Jun 11, 2022

Thank you so much for reading and for the encouraging comments. I've been writing short stories for about a year and a bit, most of what I've written has been on Reedsy, so you'll find stuff here if you're interested. Thank you for taking the time to comment, I'm really glad you liked the story.

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Michał Przywara
20:43 Jun 06, 2022

This was a fun horror read :) The setting is believably mundane, just some students drinking in dorm, but there's enough weirdnesses we get the sense something else is going on. Initially, I was wondering if Harvey was trolling. Maybe he was dark and disturbed, something like that. But the twist of him being haunted is nice, and the revelation of the room, unsettling. It also makes me wonder about some of the previous scenes. The first line has this: "The Carlsberg frothed like sea foam along the green carpet until it hit an invisible ...

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17:23 Jun 07, 2022

Thank you! I really appreciate your comments. I'm so glad the ending made you wonder about the begining, I do like to try to pull that off when I can. I can't take credit for the updated title, that was my mum's idea. My original title was a play on a vodka based cocktail that no one really got the reference for. I'm having the same problem with the story I posted last night. I'm not always great at titles.

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Piper Ollie
01:55 Jun 05, 2022

Such a unique entry! I really like your writing style and tone! I thought the way you had the three different rooms was a super intriguing element not many others would have thought to add.

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Lucas Savard
12:48 Jun 04, 2022

I like it also good luck!!

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Alex Sultan
17:48 Jun 01, 2022

Hey friend - I think this story was great. I liked your unique approach with the scenes split into three rooms, and the build up to the plot twist was cool. I like how you kept the story short, at barely over a thousand words, so you get to the twist of the story fast, which was the highlight for me. I thought Jim's humour was good too, and it made him stand out. not too many notes for this one: “I’ll shift the can, I suppose.” Jim popped open the ring pull, took a long gulp from the fresh beer and grabbed the [empty] from the floor. -I thi...

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11:00 Jun 02, 2022

Thank you Alex - of course it is helpful, you always are. I have made quite a few of your changes. I think the use of the word "empty" is a UK thing. Anyone in UK would understand that it meant an empty drink of some kind, and in this context it would mean a can. To try to clarify a bit more I have switched that line around a bit, I wonder if it helps? I was trying to avoid repetition of "can". I'm glad you like the new style - I'm quite pleased with this one - I just think the title let it down and I'm not sure everyone would get the refer...

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Alex Sultan
13:08 Jun 02, 2022

It's good! The way you changed it works - the context comes through clearly, even if it sounds different to me. I will admit, I did not understand the title. After looking it up though, it does make a lot of sense and is pretty clever. I wouldn't be sure if to change it or not - I'd say incorporating it into the piece with a small, one phrase explantion would work, if you could manage it.

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Bradon L
19:29 May 30, 2022

Wow! This is stellar! I love how you had the characters talking from three different rooms. The color of the carpet didn’t seem like a necessary detail until the end of the story. Foreshadowing was spot on! Your stories always have me on the edge of my seat, this one was no exception!

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11:01 Jun 02, 2022

Thank you Bradon, this is very kind praise. I'm glad the foreshadowing works. Thank you for reading and taking the time to comment.

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Jon Casper
11:16 May 30, 2022

This is a well-crafted, dark story. I love the dialogue! It flows very well, and you have a good mix of dialogue tags and character actions. I enjoyed Jim's sense of humor. I found myself curious as to the nature Harvey's predicament. Presumably he's hearing the ghost of the suicide victim, thrashing about and screaming in pain from his properly gruesome method. Is Harvey the same person who was in the floor below, five years ago? Is he just an echo of the person who was in the floor below? Or is he just an unfortunate resident who happens ...

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11:05 Jun 02, 2022

Thank you Jon for your insight - it has really helped me to shape the story and add in a few details that I think make all the difference. I do like the effect you describe when you get to the end of the story and it is a realisation about what has happened, rather than the story spelling everything out - I do like to make the reader think for a second about what has gone before, and I'm glad you experienced that with this piece. Sometimes I get it a bit wrong - like with the telescope story (Eye Spy) where I'm not sure if the past / future ...

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