The Devil's House

Chapter 9

Ryder

    Ryder opened his eyes. He immediately closed again when a streak of blinding light hit his eye. Ryder groaned and opened them again, slower this time. He let his eyes adapt to the bright light. He turned his head to the left to see a bowl of water and a bloody towel on the nightstand. He turned his head to the right and saw the curtains pulled away from the window.

    Ryder sat up and winced at the pain from his ribcage. He looked in front of him and saw Luci coming out from the bathroom. He looked like he had just gotten out of a shower with a white towel around his waist as he used a smaller one to dry his hair.

    Ryder slowly got up and asked, "You took a shower?"

    "Yeah. Why? What is wrong?" Luci asked, walking over to him.

    "I just thought that we shouldn't do that. What if the demons heard us? Or worse... The Devil."

    "They're not allowed in here," Luci said, sitting on the enormous bed.

    "What?" Ryder said, staring at Luci.

    Luci paused a moment before answering. "I mean... I lock my door so they can not get in." He smiled. "How about you go take a shower and clean up?"

    Ryder nodded and limped over to the bathroom door. He looked at the door leading outside to the hallway and paused. He looked at the doorknob more closely. It was unlocked.

    "Ryder?" Luci asked, still sitting on the bed and shaking his hair, making droplets fall everywhere. "Are you ok?" Ryder turned to him and nodded.

    He decided to not bring it up. He didn't want to talk anymore. All he wanted was to take a nice, hot shower.

    Ryder stepped into the luxurious bathroom and shut the door behind him. "Wow," Ryder whispered.

The bathroom was almost as big as the room oustide. The floor was black marble with red splatters that was spotless underneath him. Ryder walked farther into the barthroom. To his left were two sinks that rose out of the black marble countertop like bowls.

    "There's a lot of black marble in this bathroom," Ryder laughed.

    He continued walking and he came across a bathtub on his left. The freestanding bathtub was dark red.

    Ryder looked to the right and saw the biggest shower he had ever seen. It looked big enough to fit ten people and it would still have room. It had a sliding glass door. There were red tiles along the wall of the shower.

    Ryder continued to limp further looking for a toilet so he could relieve himself. He saw an opened door on his right and stepped inside. There were black walls and a red toilet in the center of the small area.

Ryder quickly went in and closed the door. He pulled down his pants and opened the toilet’s lid and sat down. He sighed loudly as he relieved himself.

    “Oh my god,” Ryder said happily. “That feels so much better.”

    He got up and flushed the toilet. He went outside and washed his hands in the luxurious sink.

Ryder limped over to the bathtub. He wanted to relax and lay in warm water. He needed to stop walking so much, he thought his rib cage might’ve felt worse than before.

    He turned on the hot water and let the bathtub fill up. As it filled up, he began to take off his clothes. He pulled off his pants and shirt. He limped over to a long mirror and looked at himself. He saw the bruise and it looked a little bigger.

    He pulled off his boxers and put all of his clothes in a pile next to the bathtub. He turned off the faucet and felt the water. It was the perfect temperature. He stepped into the bathtub and sat down. He had his arms around the edge of the bathtub.

    Ryder closed his eyes and took a deep breath before his head went underneath. He let his whole body submerge into the water. 

    Ryder opened his eyes and let the water wash over them. He felt the water cleanse the cut on his forehead.

    He let a out breath and the bubbles from his nose swam to the surface.

    Ryder wanted to stay there forever. Under the water where he could forget all of his problems.

He let another breath out. More bubbles went up to the surface. He let out another breath. Then another. And another.

    He soon let out all the air he could. He had none left in his lungs. He laid underneath the water for a while.

    After a minute, Ryder’s lungs screamed for air. But he didn’t get up. He didn’t resurface for oxygen.

His heart pounded through his chest, begging for oxygen. He was calm and stayed underneath the water.

    Ryder blinked. He felt disoriented. He lifted up one hand in front of his eyes. He saw two hands instead of one.

    He opened his mouth and tried to breath. All that came into his mouth was water. He instinctively struggled to get above the water but he somehow kept himself under.

    Ryder became dizzy. He couldn’t see clearly. Ryder began to sink to the bottom of the bathtub. No more bubbles went to the surface as he had no more air in his lungs.

    Ryder closed his eyes as he opened his mouth. He was about to let water fill his lungs when he felt big and strong hands under his arms. The hands lifted him up and out of the water.

    Ryder was still dazed as the person pulled him out of the bathtub and onto the floor.

    “What were you doing?!” Ryder could hear someone yelling.

    “I-I don’t know,” Ryder could hear himself saying. And it was true. He didn’t know what he was doing. He opened and closed his eyes, trying to blink out the blurriness of his eyes.

    “You are an idiot! You could have died!” The person yelled. Ryder turned his head to see Luci. Ryder coughed.

    He continued to cough and Luci lifted him up into a sitting position. Ryder coughed into his fist as he leaned against the bathtub.

    Luci sighed and softly asked, “What were you doing, Ryder?”

    He didn’t reply. He just sat silently, not knowing what to say. Ryder felt more water fall from his eyes but he realized that they were tears. He quickly wiped his eyes.

    Luci looked over Ryder and realized he had no clothes on. He quickly looked away and grabbed a soft, white towel from a rack on the wall next to the bathtub.

    He walked back to Ryder who was still sitting up and gave him the towel to cover himself. “Here you go,” Luci said.

    “Thank you,” Ryder said, grabbing the towel. He stood up and stumbled backward a little.

    Luci caught his arm before he could fall. “Careful,” he said sternly.

    Ryder nodded and wrapped the towel around his waist. He sat down on the edge of the bathtub and stared at the floor.

    Luci said, “I will get you some of my clothes to wear. You should not wear your other ones.”

    “Okay,” Ryder said quietly, not taking his eyes off of the marble floor. Luci went out of the bathroom to his closet. Ryder took deep breaths which hurt his lungs so he took smaller and quicker breaths. He thought, What was I thinking? Better yet, what was I trying to do? Kill myself? Why? What is wrong with me?

   Footsteps walking into the bathroom interrupted Ryder’s thoughts. He looked up to see Luci walking in with a stack of clothes.

     Ryder winced and clutched his stomach as he stood up. “I don’t think I need to wear that many clothes,” Ryder chuckled.

   Luci smiled and said, “I know. I brought a lot of clothes so you could choose which the ones you want.” He placed the clothes on the countertop next to the sink.

    “Thank you,” Ryder said, limping over to the clothes.

    Luci stood there silently for a moment as Ryder went through the clothes. Luci said, “Should I trust that you will not do anything stupid while I leave?”

    Ryder stopped going through the stack of clothes and looked at him. He nodded and said, “Yes. I promise I won’t do anything stupid.”

    Luci gave a small smile and walked out. Ryder was left alone in the bathroom.

    He went through the stack of clothes and saw very expensive looking clothes. “Wow,” Ryder said.

    There were three sets of clothes ready for him. One set had a dark blue button up shirt with black jeans. The second set was an expensive looking brown jacket with a black short sleeve shirt and black jeans as well. The third set had a plain black hoodie, white t-shirt, and gray sweatpants.

    Ryder picked up the third set with the hoodie and sweatpants. There were some boxers in different colors and he chose the black one.

    Ryder liked the other sets of clothes, but he wanted to be comfortable. He took off the towel around his waist and pat himself dry. He set it on the counter and pulled on the black boxers and the gray sweatpants. Ryder put on the shirt and black hoodie and immediatley felt warmer. He shivered as his body got used to the warmth.

    He limped out of the bathroom, to the bed. He sat down and looked around the room. “Luci?” Ryder called out.

    No answer.

    “Luci?” He called out again, louder this time. He got up and limped over to the door that led outside into the dangers.

    It was open.

    There was a little gap and Ryder could see out into the hallway. He saw a shadow move. He didn’t make a sound. He was too scared to move. Too scared to shut the door just in case it made a noise.

    The shadow seemed to come closer to the door. Ryder held his breath. Suddenly Luci popped into Ryder’s view.

    Luci stepped into the room looking at Ryder who was holding his chest where his fast beating heart was. Ryder yelled, “Damn it, Luci! You scared the shit out of me!”

    “Sorry,” Luci said.

    “It’s fine. What were you doing outside?” Ryder asked, now suspicious.

    “I was… Umm… I…” Luci looked away from Ryder and ran his hand through his hair. “I thought I heard something outside. I thought that it might have been your friend so I looked,” he quickly said.

    Ryder slowly nodded, eyeing Luci suspiciously. “So what did you find?” Ryder asked as Luci closed the door behind him and locked it.

    “What?” Luci asked, turning around.

    “You said you heard a noise outside. So what did you find?”

    “Nothing. There was nothing outside,” Luci said, turning to walk away. “You should rest. You shouldn’t be walking with broken ribs.”

    Ryder dropped the discussion and walked over to the enormous bed. He laid down and pushed all of the thoughts out of his mind as he closed his eyes to sleep.