Jeff crept out of bed as to not disturb his silver fox girlfriend. He turned on the light in the small bathroom adjacent to the bedroom and aimed at the toilet. Sleepily, he relieved himself, staring off into the bathroom mirror in front of him. There was a shower behind him, with the plastic white curtain drawn. His eyes were drawn to a strange object at the bottom of the curtain.
A shoe. And not an empty one.
Jeff's eyes widened as he realized someone was potentially watching him pee this whole time. Once the sound of his own pee stopped, he also distinctly heard the person shifting and their clothes creaking. Creeped out, he formulated a plan, where he would pretend he did not notice them and walk calmly to the exit as if nothing has happened.
The curtain bulged out in two spots, obviously caused by the strangers hands reaching outwards. They reached faster and faster, until the person was running at Jeff and he had no time to exit.
It all happened in a second. The figure lunged at Jeff and the curtain-covered arms dug into his body. Jeff screamed as the attacker's mouth, still covered by the curtain, chomped into his forearm. Hard.
"Get off me! Alex! Grace! Help!"
As the struggle continued, the curtain was stained with blood around the attacker's mouth, but not ripped or punctured with their teeth. Grace ran into the bathroom, grabbed the showerhead, turned the cold water to the max, and directed it at the attacker. It worked. The person hissed and leaped to the side.
Grace ripped the curtain off with one decisive motion. Her and Jeff's eyes widened in shock and incredulity. Bea was beneath it, soaking wet, staring back at them with pitch-black, animalistic, offended eyes, her bloodied lips trembling.
"I need food!" she whined.
"Jeff… go out and get some food," Grace whispered, not taking her eyes off Bea and holding her arms in front of her in a calming gesture. Beas eyes darted to Jeff as he made a move for the door, but Grace redirected attention back to herself.
"Don't worry about him, Bea, you will get your food."
Jeff returned within minutes, now wearing pants and with hands full of hotdogs, bags of chips and a pack of wonderbread. Grace cautiously extended a hotdog to her friend. Bea sniffed it suspiciously. She paused, seemingly in thought, and then chomped off half of it, causing Grace to drop it and withdraw in fright. She then tossed the rest of the food onto the floor at Bea's knees, who promptly started devouring it. Grace gestured to Jeff to back out and exit the bathroom slowly, and they did. Grace closed the door behind her and started propping the door up with furniture as quietly as she could. Bea seemed not to care, as only munching and crunching sounds came from the other side of the door. A sofa, an armchair, the sewing machine, a bookshelf and a table were blocking the door, stacked on top of each other and in front of each other.
"That'll do… I hope. Even if she pushes the door open, she'll have to weasel her way through all of this and most likely make a lot of noise if she tries," Grace reasoned.
Once they were in the living room, Grace and Jeff thought about what to do next.
"What the hell happened? I thought I'd lose my arm for sure for a moment there, but I think it stopped bleeding. I'll need a rabies shot," Jeff whined. "And a tetanus shot too."
"She hasn't had an episode in years!" Grace sighed as she inspected Jeff's injury. "Now she will probably not see the outside of an institution for months! Or longer…." Her eyes welled up with tears. "But there is no other choice. I must call the ambulance. I don't think anyone is sober enough to drive to the ER." And she stood up to make her way to the house phone.
At this moment, Alex ran up to them, looking horrified and disheveled. His hair stood up, his eyes rolled around in their sockets, darting from Jeff's bloody arm to Grace's tear-stained face, his mouth agape in silent horror.
"Hey guys.. Have you seen Bea?"
"Yeah, first she watched me while I was naked in the shower and then took a bit out of my arm," Jeff said.
"She's having a psychotic episode," Grace sniffled. "We're calling an ambulance."
"Wait!" Alex almost yelled. " It's not a psychotic episode, it's…" he rubbed his head guiltily. "We accidentally made her eat various party drugs instead of her normal medications."
Grace's face changed from grief to astonishment, to anger.
"You did WHAT?!" She balled her hands into fists. "What the hell is wrong with you guys?"
"I'm sorry!.." It was Alex' turn to tear up, "It was the biggest mistake of my life! Me and Dante were so high that we lost all common sense and thought we were just making an innocent prank! And now Bea is biting people, and Dante is missing!"
Grace's shook so violently now, she thought she could scream. Her hand connected with Alex' back of the head, creating a smack so loud that a few people woke up and looked angrily in her direction. Alex hung his head like a scolded five-year old.
"Just help me find her, Alex," Grace rubbed her temples. "Find her, and contain her. And then, if she is fine at the end of it, it will all be water under the bridge. Last time she lived in an institution certain workers disrespected her boundaries, so I'd rather avoid it if possible. Alright?"
"Alright."
"Good. She was in my bathroom last time we saw her."
Suddenly, a loud, earache-inducing noise came from the upstairs bathroom, like an earthquake, or several heavy people falling onto the floor all at once.
They ran back to Grace's bathroom, but it was too late. All the furniture was shoved away in one single effort, and the bathroom door was wide open.