The Orange Ball

A bourbon for dinner, then let it simmer.

Down the hatch, it’s all in the past. 

Be a man and have one with me, my boy!

     Derek sits at the counter with his girlfriend, hearing her speak but not listening, only staring out of the window above the kitchen sink and hearing his dad garble and jumble utterances in his head. He subconsciously begins to tighten his fingers around his glass, one filled with gin and a hint of soda water, while spinning a steak knife from dinner on the smooth wooden counter with his other hand when Morgan puts her hand gently on his forearm.

“Hey, what’s up with you tonight?” 

He snaps out of it and meets eyes with her. He notices the gentle candidness in her voice and her solemn yet caring look; her dark features are illuminated under the light. He takes a small sip of his drink and prepares for his response.

"I'm sorry; guess it's just been a long week."

"Damn, that's crazy," she giggles, "Talk to me, Derek. I won't sit here and have this one-sided palaver. Whatever is going on in that head of yours can't be more interesting than me going shopping with my mom this week and trying to help her find more baubles for her grotesque foyer. I don't know how my old man puts up with it. Which is why I’ll forever be waiting for the day he calls me and shouts ‘I’m free!’ after she croaks or he decides he’s done with her, both of which may never happen, much to his chagrin."

A slight grin grows across his face. He's looking back out of the window. Dusk approached not too long ago, and the neighborhood still has plenty of activity. An older couple is going for their nightly stroll, a young boy is riding his bike, presumably home from a friend's house, and a few couples are gathered on the front porch across the street, laughing and clinking bottles together to celebrate whatever it is they are talking about or collected for. Probably just because it's Friday, because who doesn't love Fridays? The old man sure did.

When are you gonna man up and have a drink with your father? 

You’ve always been a disrespectful little shit. That’ll change very soon. 

Derek takes another sip of his drink and stands up from the stool. He is tall and almost touches the ceiling as he stretches from sitting for quite some time.

"I have to go to the bathroom. Maybe we can watch a movie or something when I get out."

Morgan pokes his belly with two fingers and says, “Good luck, Buckaroo. If you need assistance, holler out the window at the Ketchums. They have the resources and experience, if you know what I mean.”

She finishes her glass of chardonnay and giggles. Yep, definitely drunk, he thinks, smiling at her while shaking his head. 

He gives her cheek a quick and gentle squeeze and starts heading down the hallway. Most of their home is painted white, including the entire kitchen and all the cabinets, but this hallway is a dark green; pine some people would claim it to be. He flips the first switch on his right as he passes so he can see his way down the corridor. The bathroom is the last door at the end of the hall. He hears the washing machine make a clicking noise, so he decides to stop in the laundry room prior. He swivels toward the room and flips the switch, smelling detergent.

Darkness. 

After the few ordinary flips everyone desperately attempts, he walks to the middle of the room to twist the bulb on the ceiling. 

Still nothing. 

This surprises him as he had just replaced the bulb a week ago. Although it is brand new, you never know what you’ll get these days with anything.

Those goddamned Chinese just love to screw us by making cheap shit and sending it over ‘ere. 

Burp.

Derek shakes his head to try and lose the thought, and he spins back toward the hallway, now thinking of coming back after hitting the John to replace the bulb. He steps but hears a couple of bounces from behind him and halts. Derek turns around and sees a bouncy ball on the floor, slightly rolling back and forth in the light shining into the laundry room from the hall. He picks it up and pulls out his phone to use his flashlight. He looks around the small room and sees a shelf with a couple of laundry baskets and cleaning supplies next to a washer and dryer.

"Must have been in this basket," he says out loud, rationalizing it as he bends down to grab it, putting it in the basket on the top shelf.

Feeling goosebumps on the back of his neck, he walks back out to the hallway and towards the bathroom. He gets there, locks the door, turns on both lights and the fan, and quickly looks in the mirror at his brown ruffled hair and the zit growing on his forehead.

I'm 30 years old, goddamnit, he thinks as he touches it with the tip of his index finger. 

He sits on the toilet and grabs a magazine, a year-old issue of Game Informer that he flips through seamlessly. 

There's a loud thud behind the shower curtain to his right, and he jumps from the toilet seat, almost breaking it.

“What the hell?” he unwillingly exclaims.

“Psst.” He hears from behind the white curtain.

Derek is still half standing with his pants around his ankles, frozen. Trying to think, he twists his head slowly to the door but fails to see anything. In his eyes, there is no door, but there is instead a gaping black abyss that looks endless and even unholy. The bathroom remains the same; white everywhere in contrast to the threshold.

Sweat is starting to form on his face. He notices that he threw the magazine during the process of shooting up from the toilet seat.

“Psst. Hey, D-man, want to pull those britches up before I take a peek at you?”

Still trying to process what is happening without fainting, Derek pulls his jeans up slowly and tightens his belt. The doorway is still overtaken by the black abyss. Although every bone in his body tells him not to, he backs up against the wall and faces the curtain, now about eight feet away from it.

“Are you decent?" the voice says in its still, quiet, and sardonic tone.

“Uh, yeah,” 

Derek watches a hand come around the front of the curtain and grab it, one that looks much like his:

Clean.

Soft.

Pallid.

Human. 

The voice sounds both human and creature, so Derek is surprised to see this hand look so… ordinary?

The hand pulls the curtain back to reveal the face of something horrifying. A man-like creature with stringy long black hair, eyes as dark as the abyss in the bathroom doorway, pallid skin that looks as though it is in the process of peeling off its face, dark red lips that are almost black, and a smile that reveals gray-white serrated teeth. And although this is a quiet voice coming from the creature, it radiates much power.

“Ah, yes, I apologize for confronting you in this setting and manner. I am also in the process of getting a new face; please do not be wary.” still speaking quietly, tittering at the end. 

“Wh-what’s going on? Who are you? Or wh-what are you?”

“Many questions, yes, yes. But there is no point in explaining any of that to you, D-man; just stick to calling me Nort for now. You are smart, but even the smartest men have a limit to their comprehension; you must know I am well beyond that, but my ball isn't!”

Nort pulls out the ball Derek found in his laundry room. Derek is still staring at this thing, affrighted yet somehow full of wonder. Nort’s big white hand gently holds the orange ball and softly squeezes it as he speaks. 

“I’ve been trying to get your attention for a long time without scaring you, but now the time has come, and time continues to go faster and faster until you have no more.”

"What the hell are you talking about?" Derek is still scared but now reaching a new level of fear mixed with frustration, having no idea what is happening to him, “Are you saying that I’m supposed to die?” 

“Few are as lucky as you to receive a warning. Deep down, you knew something was up this whole time; you just can't get the old man out of your head long enough to see it.” Nort continues to titter. 

"You have no idea what you're talking about. This can't be real…." Derek says as the room starts to spin ever so slightly. His legs are beginning to feel wobbly. 

“Face it, D-man, you have nothing to lose.”

After a long pause, “I have Morgan.”

Nort laughs hysterically, throwing his head back where Derek can see the rows of serrated gray-white teeth. Nort wipes his dark eyes and holds out the orange ball to Derek, still pressed firmly against the opposite wall.

“Hold the ball now, and you will see. Hold the ball and run with it while you still can. Time waits for no one, so what makes you think people do? You locked the door after all.” Nort giggles. What’s so damn funny? Derek thinks.

His big white hand still holds the ball out in the middle of the room. Derek doesn't notice all of the cuts on Nort's pallid arm; he's transfixed on the ball, only looking over to the black, cold abyss every few seconds. He does not want to grab the orange ball.

“Take it, D-man,” 

Silence. 

The first alteration in Nort's voice is beginning to come through, sounding almost impatient and incensed.

“D-man, now.” 

Derek, now looking swiftly between the ball and the dark threshold, the room beginning to spin faster. He feels like he is losing his balance, but his feet feel stuck in concrete.

“Derek, take the goddamn ball now!" Nort's voice has now become a roar. His eyes and mouth, and ears are ferociously dripping blood now. Derek can hear the blood hitting the bathtub as it horrifically drips down Nort's face from all angles. A cacophony has filled the bathroom with what sounds like a life-threatening cataclysm mixed with many chimes.

The room is spinning what seems like a million times per second. Derek finally clasps his right hand over Nort’s and the ball and shuts his eyes hard.  

Silence. 

Derek opens his eyes slowly and sees nothing other than his white bathroom.

No black abyss.

No Nort.

He is breathing heavily and processing what transpired, standing there with the orange ball in his hand. He notices how hard he is gripping the ball and drops it instantly, subconsciously wiping his hand on his black shirt.

He hears banging on the bathroom door. 

“Derek!!” 

He is in shock but manages to walk to the mirror and notices nothing different about his face besides the recently formed perspiration on his forehead.

Morgan is charging to break the door down while Derek goes to open it at the perfect time. She has a kitchen knife held up next to her head, and it goes halfway into his neck as she crushes into him like dark waves crashing into a break wall. He lands on the floor, and she lands on top of him, blood starting to gush out from the front left side of his neck. They hit heads hard during the collision, and Morgan shakes her head several times and realizes what had just happened. Tears well in her eyes before they rush down her face like a volcanic eruption. She is screeching while trying to stop the bleeding with her right hand, attempting to get her phone out of her left pocket. Derek does not notice this; he does not hear her bloody shrill while lying on his back. His right cheek is planted on the cold white tile. His eyes focused on the orange ball within his grasp, meddling under the wooden sink cabinets. He watches a large pallid hand grab the ball as he's near falling into the black abyss. The sound of tittering gives him the final push.