Christopher Fowler - The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror. Volume 10

This was no swan’s head, no swan’s neck.

It was a hand, and an arm; now bending at the elbow as something came up out of the pool.

A head crested from the oil. Long hair, black and dripping.

And all I could do was sit, frozen and terrified, as the woman finally stood up in the pool, so completely covered in black filth that she might have been a statue carved out of basalt. She was motionless now, facing me, as if waiting for me to do something. But all I could do was sit there and stare. The woman’s eyes opened, two white orbs in that hideous black visage.

I opened my mouth, but I couldn’t say a word.

And then the woman began to sing.

The voice was ragged and halting, as if she had been under that oil for a long, long time, and had perhaps forgotten how to use her voice properly. Her face remained blank, but her eyes never left me as she sang.

“Ain’t. she. sweet? I ask you. ain’t she neat.?”

That’s when I must have fainted, because it seemed that the black oil was everywhere then, filling my eyes. The horror of what I was seeing and hearing was too unbearable. I remember hearing:

“. ask you very con-fi-dentially. ”

And then there was nothing.

There were no dreams, no nightmares. Just this terrible buzzing in my ears and a dreadful taste in my mouth. I knew then, even in that dark place behind my eyes, that I was asleep at home and in bed. I had been drinking again. And when I finally surfaced from that sleep, I would have a king-sized hangover. I would wake up and realise that everything about the swimming pool and the thing that had emerged from it was an alcohol-induced nightmare. Something was wrong with the mattress on my bed. It felt too hard, too uncomfortable. I struggled to wake. and felt concrete. Dislocated and afraid, I jerked out of that sleep and struggled to rise.

I was still lying by the side of the swimming pool.

It was still daytime.

The oil lay thick and dark and heavy on the surface of the pool.

And not ten feet from where I lay, the young woman was still there.

She had pulled herself to the edge of the pool, had tried to crawl out of that black mass, but her strength had given out at the last. She had hauled her upper body out of the pool, her arms stretched before her and her fingers clawing at the concrete. Oil lay spattered around her; thick streamers of the damned stuff. But her lower body and legs were still in the pool, hidden beneath the oil.

Instinctively, I recoiled, backing away until I sat heavily and groggily on the concrete steps which led up to the derelict changing rooms. The ringing was still in my ears and I struggled to contain my nausea. I looked at my watch and realised that I couldn’t have been unconscious for more than a few minutes. Remembering the others back on the beach, I decided to run and get help.

But then the woman groaned and one hand groped feebly as she tried to haul herself the rest of the way out of the pool.

I hesitated, thinking: This can’t be happening.

The woman groaned again, unable to pull herself any further.

But she’s alive. The least you can do is get her out of that pool and then you can run for help.

Unsteadily, I moved back to the poolside.

“It’s alright. you’re all right. ”

I didn’t want to touch her, was still struggling to contain the feeling that I hadn’t woken up yet and that this was an ongoing nightmare. I’d had a terrible shock when I’d seen her emerging like that, but I must have imagined that she was singing that song. I must have. The woman tried to lift her head to look at me, but was too exhausted. Fumbling at her face, she tried to brush the straggling long hair away.

“Please. .” Her voice was so faint that I could hardly hear it. “Help me.”

And without being aware that I’d made the decision to help, I was suddenly kneeling beside her. I took one arm. It felt terribly cold. I pulled, but the woman hadn’t the strength to assist, and she remained half-in, half-out of the pool. Standing, I took her under the armpits and hauled her from the oil, leaving a great black trail on the concrete lip. For the first time, I realised that she was naked; her frame slender and slight. Perhaps it was the oil coating her from head to foot. When she was clear of the pool, I turned her over and helped her to sit.

“You wait here,” I began. “I’m going to get help.”

“No,” she replied, gagging as oil flowed from her lips. My God, was she going to die?

“You’re going to be all right, I promise. But I need to get a doctor and. ”

And the woman opened her eyes to look at me.

“Dean,” she said, calling me by my first name.

Everything is fractured, after that. I’ve tried to put the pieces together in my mind, but a lot of it just doesn’t make sense. I seem to remember crying and laughing at the same time, calling my sister’s name. That might be wrong; that might just be all in my mind. But I do remember those eyes, because suddenly that was all I could see. The whites of those eyes were somehow shocking, set into that black-oil sculpted face. The irises were so green that they sparked, and looking at them somehow hurt my own eyes. They were growing larger as I looked. And then I seem to remember something to do with the side gate to the swimming pool; the gate behind the changing block beyond which lay a steep flight of stone stairs, leading up the cliffs to the seafront parade and its rows of hotels.

Something to do with a length of corroded steel pipe that was lying around.

Something to do with enormous effort on my part.

I think, although I can’t be sure, that I smashed the lock and chain on that side gate. And we must have climbed those stairs. We must have, because that’s where I’d parked my car. I must have wrapped my own jacket around her, helped her into that car. Perhaps there were people up there; staring in astonishment at us. I seem to recall faces. Perhaps not.

I must have driven home to my flat.

Because the next thing I remember clearly is standing in my living room, just outside the bathroom. I was staring at that door, and when everything around me registered properly again, I realised that the shower was on. I could hear the water hissing. I raised my hand to shove the door open, but something made me stop. I looked around, trying to convince myself that I wasn’t still dreaming. Yes, this was my living room; just as I’d left it earlier that day. When I tried to move, my legs were weak. I staggered, clutching at the sofa, and ended up at the window looking down to the street, six floors below. It was evening, and my car was in its usual place.

And there was a dark stain on the pavement, from the car to the communal entrance. As if someone had spilled something there. From this distance, it looked horribly like blood.

I squinted at my watch. I’d lost about nine hours.

I braced my hand on the window sill and shook my head. When I turned and looked around again, I expected somehow that everything would have changed; that this strange dream would take a different turn. But the living room was just as I’d left it that morning before heading off to the beach. I suddenly felt nauseous and took a step back towards the bathroom. Fear cramped my stomach with the sudden knowledge that Amy. she. whatever. was in there. It acted like an inner safety valve, preventing me from throwing up then and there.

What was in there?

“Amy.?”

When the telephone rang, it was like some kind of electric shock. My teeth clamped shut so hard that I nicked my tongue, and my mouth filled with blood. With the second ring, I realised that I wasn’t going to have a heart attack. By the third, the fear had returned with a sickening intensity. It suddenly became important that whoever or whatever was in the bathroom not be disturbed by the sound. Staggering across the room, I snatched up the receiver.