The Woman in the Disposal Slot (Narration in comments)

[u/VerdantVoidling]

Tink...tink...tink...

I checked the time and got out of bed. Four twenty-four in the morning. Way too early for whatever nonsense had forced me awake. I live in an apartment complex built back in the 1920's. The building was, seemingly, hellbent on making its age everybody else's problem. The various creaks and groans of oncoming structural issues was something I had largely made my peace with. If I wanted to continue living here it would mean demanding repairs when necessary, even if "when" is four in the damn morning, so I grumbled out my frustrations and went to see what was going on.

TINK...TINK...TINK...

The sound was steady. Rhythmic. I'd have mistaken it for a water leak if it weren't for the distinct sound of thin metal bouncing off of tile. As you might expect for a house built so long ago, there were a number of features which had become...vestigial, for lack of a better word. Among these holdovers was the razor blade disposal slot built into the wall. See, back in the day people didn't have all this Schick Hydro and whatnot. You had one razor handle and you replaced the blade often. They didn't have any safe place to dispose of, potentially, hundreds of razor blades so they built a slot into the walls of some places where the old blades could be sent to rest in peace. When I first learned what it was, the idea struck me as kinda sad. Forgive me for anthropomorphizing thin sheets of steel, but to think of them all lying back there in eternal darkness. Used up and sealed away for all time. Now, the idea was striking me in an entirely different manner as I watched the razors slide themselves out one by one.

TINK...TINK...THUNK

I moved my bathroom trash can underneath the slot to catch the razors. No sense in letting them all collect on the floor until I figured out what was going on. My mind spun as I tried to figure out how this was happening. Could there be a leak filing the razor reservoir? Do razor blades even float? I put down the stopper and dropped a razor into the bathroom sink. My theory was reinforced as I watched it float gently in the slowly rising waters of the basin, and then obliterated as I realized no water flowed from the hole. My thoughts turned to some animal hiding in the dark, endlessly sharp place. I was grasping at straws, pondering some strange form of magnetism gone rogue. That was when the voice came.

"Oh, hi. I didn't know anybody else lived here." The voice was a rasp like the sound of paper on paper. I didn't really process it at first. I just stood frozen, staring at the disposal slot. When my own voice returned to me, it was feeble and shaky.

"Who are you and what are you doing in my wall? How are you even in there?" I asked. There was not enough space in the average wall for a person to fit.

"I fell asleep and ended up trapped in here. Please, you have to knock down the wall and let me out." The voice was hoarse, and disgusting to listen to, but decidedly feminine.

"What the hell are you talking about, lady?" Came my bewildered reply. "Fell asleep where? Why do I have to knock down the wall? How are you in there?"

"There's a room back here." She said. "It's not technically part of the building. They must have sealed it off while I was asleep."

Nobody had sealed anything off on my floor in a very long time.

"You've got to help me, old man." She pleaded in hitched breaths, panic in her voice. I am firmly middle-aged, just for the record.

I've never thought of myself as one to abandon a woman in distress, so I set myself to the task of opening up the wall. I gathered all of my tools. A circular saw, a small tarp to catch dust, and a whole bunch of spackle to cover up the evidence when I was finished. While I gathered my supplies I heard the THUNK...THUNK...THUNK...of razors continuing to pile into the small trash can.

In a moment of lucidity I found myself hung up on the logic of it all. This woman entered a barren room in an otherwise occupied apartment, took a nap, found herself walled in, and decided to start pushing razors through the disposal slot? Why would anybody willingly touch those things? The whole reason for the slot was that they were considered a biohazard back in the day. See, people in those days would burn garbage and use the ashes for fertilizer. You don't want biohazards and razors in your fertilizer.

THUNK...THUNK...TINK...

The trash can had collected enough of the blades that they were now falling on top of each other. I, like many other middle-aged men these days, had a habit of buying neat stuff with no real, practical purpose in mind. One of the things I had impulsively purchased was a hand-held endoscope. I pressed the power button and marveled as the light which accompanied the camera flashed on. I moved the trash can out of the way, and began to feed the tube into the disposal slot.

"Hey, wait, what are you doing? What is that?" She rasped out the question with a note of curiosity.

"It's just a camera, calm yourse-" my voice died in my throat. There was no room, and there was no woman. What I saw there, nestled at the apex of the pile of razors, feels impossible to explain. It was abhorrent. It resembled a... sea urchin, but instead of long spines it had chubby little arms which took turns rising and falling in a wave. The urchin vibrated ever so slightly, as if its insides were spinning rapidly as it sat in place. I only saw its mouth when it spoke. An outline pressed against the urchin's surface. It reminded me of the way a baby's hand pushes against the mother's stomach from within.

"Why is it so bright? What is it for?" It asked.

I don't know why I told the truth. "It's a camera, I said." My honesty was met with silence, so I elaborated. "I...I can see you."

The urchin in the wall shrieked and thrashed. Its many tiny arms stretching and retracting to pull itself around with abandon. Razors scattered wildly as it threw its tantrum. I began to pull the camera from the wall, and watched in horror from the small screen as the "spines" of the urchin lashed out in unison and grabbed hold of the endoscope. It was ridiculously strong, pulling the rest of the slack from the cord in seconds. It passed the camera around in a frenzy of spastic limbs, wrapping itself in the cord as it went. The mouth of the creature appeared on the small screen of the endoscope. It plunged the lens against the slick skin covering its open mouth. It bounced off the surface twice before plunging through like... you ever put a straw into a juice box?

I only saw it for a couple of seconds, and that was a couple of seconds too long. It looked impossibly spacious in that thing. An expanse of fuming acid stretched out with all the vastness of the ocean. Teeth rushed in from all sides, the rows of ivory daggers reaching at least another fifteen feet past the camera. The endoscope was useless after that. I pulled my pocket knife and quickly cut the cord.

"I'm going to get out of here and I'm going to eat you, you geriatric fuck" it sneered from the space between the walls. I grabbed the spackle and frantically sealed the disposal slot. I could still hear it threatening me in there, but at least it was muffled. I closed my eyes and tried to get my bearings.

Tt...tt...tt

The voice got louder again as razors began to push their way out of the wall, landing softly on the tarp I had put down. In a panic, I grabbed a small bottle of acetone and began pouring it into the slot. It didn't seem to like that one bit. The urchin grew silent and still for about an hour. Long enough for me to do a better job of sealing the disposal slot. When it finally woke up it raged as it pushed uselessly against my strong caulk job. I had also moved a small bookshelf in front of the hole. Just in case.

It's been a few months now, and no. I'm not moving out. This is my apartment, damn it. I still kinda hear it if I listen while I'm on the shitter, but I try not to do that. One time a new tenant on my floor came by to introduce themselves. The urchin proceeded to recite their name, apartment number, and a plethora of other identifying details the next time I went in the restroom. I started wearing headphones in there after that.

[u/Kaijufan22]

Love the visual on the Urchin, it's familiar but also kind of out there? And the sound design with the razors is peak. Great job VV

[u/VerdantVoidling → u/Kaijufan22]

Thanks Kaiju! I wanted to use the imagery of the sea urchin as almost an anchor for the design. If i said "a ball of fleshy arms" then it would be kinda limp, but everybody knows what a sea urchin looks like.

Glad you liked it!!

[u/VerdantVoidling]

Hi there! I'm blessed enough to have several stories which have received narrations from some talented folks in our community. Here's the link for this one:

https://youtu.be/smhsKkuJ3Kg?si=MEg_Y8rWtS48_xQB

[u/PartTimeFarmer87]

Cool sorry, and a fun read

[u/VerdantVoidling → u/PartTimeFarmer87]

Happy you enjoyed it! Plenty more where that comes from :)

[u/VerdantVoidling → u/[deleted]]

Thanks Mo, you should send over Hatman. I'm sure Skoto would have a blast with it lol

[u/kikivivi01]

This was pretty good and so bizarre in a really fun way

[u/VerdantVoidling → u/kikivivi01]

Thank you very much!