Death by Water

The dreams started at a young age and always featured water of some sort, whether standing beneath a shower or swimming in a lake, it didn't matter for death always came in some form. It was the week before Halloween and everyone in town had covered up their houses in some sort of creepy attire all except one. The old house, which was named The Falls, sat at the end of town. It was considered to be abandoned or even haunted by the children. Behind the house sat a massive pool that was surrounded by an ornate fence. The top of the pool was murky colored with a layer of slime that was visible even through the slates of the fence.

On this particular day, some of the residents noticed that the yard in front of the Falls had been cleaned. There had also been other changes such as the moving van that pulled up around the back of the house. There was a flutter of movement as another car, low slung back and black as night, roared in behind it. The men paused in their actions to watch as a lithe figure exited the car. She conferred with one of the men and then stood watching as the boxes were carried into the house.

Her gaze pinned on them and never so much looking around at her surroundings despite the small gathering of people, myself included,peeking from behind the curtains of the houses on the neighboring streets. Tabitha ( for that was her name) shivered from just being in proximity of the house. A house she had always seen in her dreams from the time she was a child in the orphanage. Finally the movers left and Tabitha deigned to look around before strolling to the back of the house where the pool was.

She unlocked the gate and stopped a careful distance away from the edge instinctively knowing that beneath its calm and murky surface was something dangerous. The surface of the water rippled, making her shiver again before stepping back out and re locking the gate. Tabitha entered the house and looked around finding her way through the different rooms sorting her belongings. Later that evening, she crawled into bed and fell asleep.

Plip plop plip plop the water bubbled up leaving trails of murky wetness. The gate creaked as it was opened and she walked onto the path, her arms holding a towel and other sundries before setting them down on a lounge near the pool. Tabitha extended one foot inside the pool then shrieked as a tendril of murky slime wetness seemed to try and pull her down. She dropped her bundle as she backed up away from the edge.

The lingering sounds of the shriek caused Tabitha to jolt out of bed, heart pounding skin clammy. “This was a pretty mild one.” She thought. Tabitha pulled her journal out and read over some of the previous dreams or nightmares she had before coming to the house. There was drowning in the tub or burning to death by boiling hot water from the shower. Several dealt with accidental drowning in a pool or lake or even a hot tub. Shaking her head, muttering “so yes this was mild.” She got out of the bed and started her day. Dressed in a jumpsuit and heels, she then left to deal with some business concerning the house.

The townspeople were shocked when they found out that this outsider, Tabitha, was a descendent of the Falls family. This also came somewhat as a shock to Tabitha as well and explained some of the things that she had experienced. There had been drownings, and all sorts of weird occurrences involving water throughout the history of the Falls Family. Several weeks passed while Tab was finishing the upgrades to the house before she got a chance to work on the gardens and get the pool cleaned and treated.

Nice night for a swim especially now, I think. Stepping into the warm water and sighing as I start to lazily swim. Feeling the burn in my muscles several laps later, reaching out to grab the bar and haul myself up when…..kicking back at the water as it begins to drag me down. Pulling harder on the bar as I feel myself slipping beneath the water breathing through my nose trying not to swallow water. Heart beating wildly pounding in my chest struggling to breathe. Breathe...Breathe I can't. Am I dreaming? Oh Gawd, am I dreaming. Wake up wake up. Sucking in air as my head drops lower in the water struggling not to swallow the water.

Tabitha’s hands grip the surface of the pool bars frantically as she hauls herself out a scream trapped in her throat at the realization that it was real. No dream, cold brackish water streams from her head making her shiver as she stands there in the chilly midnight air. Looking up, seeing the porch lights glinting dimly in the background, Tabitha wonders and realizes that she must have been sleepwalking and climbed in the pool on her own.

Months pass, and the dreams and waking nightmares come more frequently. Sometimes Tabitha dreams of drowning while taking baths or showers. She keeps the doors bolted and locked to the pool daily but yet finds herself dripping wet when waking. She often takes walks throughout the town to help stay sane but avoid doing so on rainy days for fear of choking and dying. The townspeople call her Miss Tabitha to her face when she frequents their establishments but adding cursed once her back is turned.

It's been almost a year since Tabitha moved into the falls. She knows that she is the last of the pure bloodline that resides here and maybe that is for the best. Having spent her time studying the history of her family and realising that yes, we the Falls are cursed and have been since the house was built. Grim determination keeps her alive now. She no longer avoids baths, or even showers because they will not be how she passes to the other side. I woke up knowing that this would be the day. Sliding out of bed I dressed in just a simple robe after showering. I gathered my papers, placing them in protective covering so that only they would survive.

They detailed how my great-great-great grandfather and grandmother built the house and then the town. How the grandmother died while bathing after childbirth and her husband went mad drowning himself in the pool when the child was 10. That child then was raised by her nanny and eventually married. Her husband then tried to kill her when he found out she was pregnant but only succeeded in killing himself. Her name was Tabitha like mine and she wound up having twins. Her twins would become my great grandmother Marie and great aunt Jacinthe. Both of her daughters wound up leaving the falls as young adults to see the world and marry. Marie returned with her husband and young children while Jacinthe spent a few years in a mental hospital after losing her entire family to drowning while on a ship. Marie’s husband would later be killed by their youngest son Peter who says that the bad man made him do it. The son was later committed to an insane asylum until he escaped .

Jacinthe eventually returned to the falls with her second husband and a stepdaughter, Eudora. The children grew up, the stepdaughter was the first to leave upon burying both her father and Jacinthe after a freak boating accident. Marie’s oldest son would leave next to find his way in the world. Years passed, and Marie's daughter became known as the town spinster who cared for her mother until her death. Ten years after the death of Marie, her daughter was shocked when her brother Peter and Eudora ( my maternal grandparents) returned to the Falls as a married couple with 2 teenage daughters Theresa ( my mother) and Samantha (my aunt).

Tabitha heard the water lapping at the edge of the pool, its anger and evilness no longer being able to be contained. She paused reading her history and looked down, seeing the water spilling into the house with each small wave. The ghost of her ancestors smiling at her from the walls in knowledge that soon we all will be at peace and our cursed existence will finally be gone. Soon, Tabitha thought, soon as the water level rises higher with each pass. The dead, innocent and evil alike, rising from their watery graves watching and waiting.

Six months after my grandfather Peter arrived, my great aunt drowned in the pool after taking a midnight swim. Her body was discovered the next day by my aunt Samantha, who also would take her own life by slitting her wrist and drowning in the bathtub shortly after her 18th birthday, two years later. Six years later, my mother would return to the Falls to bury her mother. Another four years later, she came back to bury her father. When my mother turned 30 she met my father, David. They were married and expecting me within eight months of meeting. My parents decided to write down their family history a month after my birth. While doing this they found out they were first cousins. According to my mother’s diary, my father ran off to the military after finding out. He was later killed while on a submarine ship that sinked. My mother, wild with grief, left me on the porch of an orphanage with a note saying what my name was and that I wasn’t to be adopted along with the name of her lawyer, before going off and killing herself. According to the director, my parent’s lawyer sent them a form stating that I wasn’t to be adopted but be allowed to live there until my twenty-first birthday when I would receive my inheritance.

That is how Tabitha came to live at the falls. She thinks I am the last of the branches of the falls. Water rises even higher as Tabitha settles down on a bed waiting knowing that soon she would be dead by water with hopes that her wishes will be carried out with the house and pool being destroyed by the murky poisonous water.