The Hijacked Line
The phone pressed against my ear felt like a block of ice. The voice emanating from the tiny speaker matched the mocking, singsong tone bleeding through the thin wood of the bathroom door.
“I said, 911, what is your emergency?” the voice repeated. It was followed by a low, agonizingly slow scraping sound—metal dragging against wood.
He had intercepted the call. Or maybe the call never went to a dispatch center at all.
I scrambled backward, pressing my spine against the cold porcelain of the bathtub. The doorknob rattled, violently. The cheap metal lock held, but the hinges groaned under the sudden weight.
“Cat got your tongue?” The voice chuckled, both in my ear and outside the door. “If you don’t report an emergency, I’m going to have to create one.”
CRACK.
The heavy, gleaming blade of my own kitchen cleaver pierced through the center of the door, stopping inches from my face. I screamed, the sound tearing out of my throat before I could stifle it.
“Ah, there we go,” the voice purred from the speaker, perfectly synced with the man in the hall. “Dispatching a responder now. ETA… zero seconds.”
The knife ripped downward, violently splintering the wood. A hand, clad in a thick black leather glove, snaked through the jagged hole, blindly feeling for the deadbolt.
Desperation wiped away the paralysis. I dropped the phone, grabbed the heavy ceramic lid from the toilet tank, and raised it high above my head. Just as his fingers brushed the lock, I slammed the ceramic block down onto his wrist with every ounce of strength I had left.
A bone-chilling howl erupted from the hallway. The hand retreated, frantically pulling back through the splintered wood and leaving smears of crimson on the white paint.
I didn’t hesitate. I kicked the damaged door open, ignoring the sharp sting of splinters, and bolted. I flew past him—a tall, shadowy figure clutching his ruined arm in the dark hallway—and sprinted straight out the front door. I ran into the freezing night, my bare feet slapping against the asphalt, not stopping until a neighbor’s porch light flicked on.
As I pounded on their door, sobbing for help, a faint, muffled vibration came from the pocket of my sweatpants. It was my smartwatch.
A text message had just come through from my own phone, left behind on the bathroom floor.
Don’t hang up yet. I’m still listening.
