The Tub

It was just strange and I’m thinking, this is too good to pass up. Right in the middle of the woods was this hot tub, steam rolling across the water and spilling over the edges. The tub sat in the middle of a big circular pad, maybe thirty-five feet around. There was a shiny metallic covering over the bottom pad, draping from the edge of the tub itself and leading to stone skirting all the way around.

I was sweaty from hiking the woods and tired too. The hot tub looked very inviting. I looked around the woods and saw nothing but fluttering greenery in the cool October afternoon. I walked up to the pad around the hot tub and lightly pressed the toe of my boot onto the surface. It sunk in only a small amount, like there was carpet underneath. I looked around again and considered yelling hello to see if someone was around. But I could be in and out in no time really. No need to disturb anyone. I could see into the tub and the light blue water sparkled in small, silent swirls. I took five quick steps over and stood at the edge of the tub looking in. I leaned over the shiny steel rim and the steam felt good rolling over my hands. Beneath the rim, the tub wall changed to dark blue and then shiny steel emerged again and swept across the entire bottom. I stepped back and looked at the outside of the tub and noticed the beautiful rock inlaid wall. I looked around furtively as I untied my boots and quickly stripped off my socks. The metallic pad I stood on felt very strange beneath my feet but I assumed that was due to relief from my socks and tight boots. My shirt and pants were quick to follow and momentarily I stood at the wall in only my skivvies ready to hop in. I placed my hands on the metal lip of the tub and bent my knees. In one pounce, I swung my legs up and over like an Olympian mounting a pommel horse. The water felt fabulous. I traced my fingers at the surface of the water as I slowly began to crouch down. As the water rose above my torso to my chest, I settled into its warm embrace.

I heard a click behind me and my heart caught in my throat. I spun wildly around expecting to see someone, feeling, almost knowing they were standing right behind me. My eyes fell on nothing but trees. I opened my mouth to speak but suddenly heard the click again. My eyes were drawn to movement at my left. A small slot had opened at the side of the tub on the top of the tub wall. What appeared to be an overlarge CD slowly rose straight up as if balanced on its’ edge. Halfway up out of the slot it stopped, then began to spin. A slight whirring sound accompanied the spinning and increased to a quiet but high frequency hum. As the spinning increased, the CD thing seemed to become transparent yet created a light neon blue hue. The word “HELLO” appeared in large white letters within the blue and vibrated there for a moment before becoming completely stable. I stood transfixed.

“PLEASE FEEL FREE TO RESPOND VERBALLY” were the next words to appear. Smiling from nervousness, I replied

“Hello” I said quietly.

“ENGLISH! VERY GOOD. HOW ARE YOU TODAY?”

“Okay” I replied with a growing sense of concern.

“ARE YOU A FRIEND OF JOHN’S?”

I hesitated. John who? I thought. Should I ask? The white letters flashed once and there was a click. I paused then said

“John who?”

The white letters disappeared for a brief second then a click and

“THAT ANSWERS THAT QUESTION” then those letters disappeared. Click click.

I looked around the woods about me and began to wonder if maybe someone was playing a joke on me. When my eyes roamed back past the CD thing it said

“JOHN IS THE OWNER, OF COURSE” click click.

“Oh, THAT John” I said. I started to move towards the edge of the tub.

“PLEASE REMAIN MOTIONLESS FOR A MOMENT” appeared in white letters with a click. I stopped. The whirring sound drop an octave then slowly returned to the previous high pitch.

“PLEASE SAY “THE BROWN DOG JUMPED THE FENCE” “ it said and clicked twice.

“What?” I asked. It flashed a solid blue block twice then repeated the same line

“PLEASE SAY “THE BROWN DOG JUMPED THE FENCE” “ it said again., this time with three clicks. I paused.

“The brown dog jumped the fence?” I said quietly, looking around the woods again.

“THANK YOU” appeared momentarily then clicked off.

“YOU ARE NOT IN THE DATABASE” It flashed with two clicks.

I slowly started to move towards the edge again thinking it would be best to get the hell out. The clicking started almost immediately.

“”REMAIN MOTIONLESS” it flashed. This time I didn’t stop, just slowed a bit.

Suddenly a huge blast of noise nearly made me shit in my shorts.

“What the FUCK!” I yelled as my hands instinctively flew to my ears. It was like one of those air horns blaring right in my ears. The noise stopped.

“IT WILL BE WORSE IF YOU MOVE AGAIN” I couldn’t hear the clicks because my ears were ringing from the horn blast but knew that they were there. I froze.

“WHAT IS YOUR NAME?” it asked.

I looked around fearfully, judging my options.

“PLEASE ANSWER WHAT IS YOUR NAME” it shone flatly.

I had to get out of there. I stuck my fingers in my ears and lifted my right foot to take a step. There was a buzz and a searing jolt of electricity shot up through my left leg causing the muscles to convulse and snap my leg straight. My knee popped and my jaw slammed shut as I screamed through clenched teeth. The electricity disappeared almost as soon as it had started leaving my whole body shaking.

“I WARNED YOU SHOULD NOT MOVE AGAIN” it flashed and clicked once. Then blank with a short pause, then

“DIDN’T I?” followed by three spaced clicks.

I was petrified

“Oh fuck, I am in deep shit here…” I mumbled to myself while looking at the letters hovering in the air. It went blank again.

“WHAT IS YOUR SSN?” it asked. Click.

“”What?” I replied.

“YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER” it flashed. Two rapid clicks.

“”WHAT IS YOUR SSN?” Click.

“Ummm, it’s two, eight, two, ummm…”

While I said this, I slowly lowered myself into the water. I raised my feet off of the metal floor of the tub and extended my arms out to the side. I brought my arms together in front of me and then straight back out to my sides, hovering in the warm water.

“Ummmm, I don’t think I want to tell you my…”

The buzz came and I could feel a small vibration in the water but because I wasn’t touching any metal surface I wasn’t shocked. The letters went blank and the blue block flashed twice, there was a pause then there was another buzz. This one lasted longer and sounded different than the first two. Three spaced clicks.

“THE ELECTRICAL RESISTANCE TELLS ME THAT” shown for a moment then

“YOU ARE STILL IN THE TUB” blue block flash. Three spaced clicks, then

“SMART MOVE TO FLOAT IN THE WATER” came up in white letters. Two rapid clicks.

“Yeah, I didn’t get shocked that time you bast...” I wondered if I should say something like that at this point.

“LUCKY YOU” came up on the screen then faded in and out going nearly transparent. No clicks.

The whirring sound slowed momentarily then dropped down two octaves. Up an octave. Down two more. Up another. Down one. Up another. Down two. Then a slow click., click, click, click That could not be. The motherfucker was humming.

I slowly hovered towards the side. The whirring sped back up. I looked at the white letters

“NOTICE THE SIDES” faded in. Click.

“JUST LIKE THE BOTTOM” Click click.. The rim of the tub was shiny metal just as was the bottom. I even noticed a thin strip about six Inches wide on either side of the tub connecting the two.

“Fuck” I said to myself out loud. Three spaced clicks.

“DIRECT CURRENT IN THE TUB” came up in white letters.

“200 VOLTS” click

“CAN YOU SEE OVER THE EDGE?” the question faded in slowly and pulsed at me with two rapid clicks. I could.

“THE BIG METALLIC MAT” click, fade-out.

“THE ONE YOU WALKED ACROSS” click, fade-out.

“THAT IS A/C NOW” pause. No clicks, then

“ALTERNATING CURRENT” click, click, click, click, click, click.

“480 VOLTS”

“Jesus” I was trying to think as fast as I could. What was my dad always saying about A/C and D/C electricity? Damn, something about one will hurt but the other will kill you, what was it? What the fuck was I going to do? Was this thing going to kill me? There was a long pause then the white letters faded and it went to humming again. Jesus.

I could get out of here. It was just a tub. A damn hot tub was all it was. An electrified hot tub. My mind raced. I couldn’t stay here. Who knew where I was? No-fucking-body. Nobody was going to come look for me. What difference did that make because I couldn’t hover in the water forever. What about floating? Could I just float? I put my head back and swung my feet slowly from under me. I filled my lungs and my chest bobbed to the surface. My legs sort of drifted below. I could do that at least some of the time if I had to.

Suddenly without any warning the air horn blasted again. Before I even knew it I had flung my hands to my head instinctively. At the same time I made the mistake of swinging my feet to the bottom to brace myself. If there was a buzzing sound it was hidden beneath the air horn but the shock was stunningly noticeable. My leg muscles clenched thrusting me upward. My knees locked painfully as I was catapulted skyward out of the water. Even through the burst of bright white light in my head I knew when I came down I could not come back into contact with the metal floor. As my feet left the metal all the pain went away and for a brief second I was lucid. I immediately brought my legs up and spread my arms as rapidly as I could. As I descended back to the water I made sweeping motions with both my arms and legs, trying to capture as much surface tension as possible. Incredibly I was able to generate enough downward pressure on the water that I barely stopped myself from touching the bottom. The air horn stopped and the buzzing sound emerged sounding like a mad hornet. The water vibrated and I gulped in ragged breaths of air while madly treading water.

Slowly I got control of my breathing. Amazingly the CD thing shone

“HMMMMMMMMM…”

“You gotta be fucking kidding” I mumbled under my breath. My mind raced around trying to find the way out. I knew I couldn’t stay in the water forever. I probably couldn’t last an hour before my shoulders wore out. Jesus, how do shipwreck victims last for days in the water? True, it’s salt water but…

There were two clicks, then

“SHALL WE TRY YOUR SSN AGAIN?” it asked.

“Up yours” I muttered.

A plan formed in my head even though I pushed it away as hard as I could. My mind struggled mightily telling myself I couldn’t do it. Oddly, my body began to prepare even while I mentally battled. Slowly my leg muscles flexed and stretched being careful to avoid touching the bottom. My fingers and forearms contracted and expanded while I maintained the hovering strokes. The idea was basic and simple and would hurt like hell if it didn’t outright kill me.

If I sprung off of the bottom of the tub in one bounce and landed on my dry clothes, then the metallic mat wouldn’t be able to shock me. That was, at least until the water ran off of me and created the electrical path. That meant landing on the clothes had to be like a springboard or trampoline or something because my next jump was going to have to be about eight feet. Shit. There was no way. Plus, whatever I did at the end of the second jump, I could not fall backwards onto the metallic mat or I’d fry like a piece of bacon. Jesus, that mental image was petrifying. Was the metallic mat really electrified? I splashed a bit of water over the side opposite from my clothes. Nothing. There was no way to know ahead of time. There was no reason to think it wasn’t electrified. What about yelling for help? Click, click. I looked at the CD thing.

“GETTING TIRED YET?” It flashed once, twice, then faded.

The horn blared but surprisingly it didn’t cause me to react. In fact, I almost knew it was going to do that but didn’t know how I knew. I slowly started deeply breathing in and out and gathered my concentration.

“So, did you catch any of the game last night?” I asked the CD thing quietly. Click, click.

“DO YOU WISH TO TELL ME YOUR SSN?”

“I don’t think…” then I had an idea.

“Yeah. Yeah, I do. It’s two… eight… two…”

On the second “two” I briefly touched a single toe to the bottom, bracing for a shock. There was none.

“…eight… three…”

It was now or never. I brought my arms down beside me then violently slung them upwards to force my buoyant body to the bottom. I slammed my feet into the metal bottom and thrust myself skyward with everything I had. Briefly everything seemed to occur in slow motion. Water flew up around me in a great explosion. I seemed to float upwards as I left the water like a rocket. I glanced at the CD thing which shown only a blue block. The block flashed once. I sailed upwards as a violent buzzing sound burst from the pool’s surface as it to grab me and pull me back down. I arced up and over the edge of the tub. My trajectory wasn’t perfect because I was going to overshoot my clothes. My mind seemed to be in hyper speed. I realized almost instinctively that I could adjust by only landing on the clothes with one foot instead of two. The problem with this would be a loss of distance in the second jump. I hit the peak of my leap and was suspended in the air for just a moment. Things seemed to speed up again as I descended and I gulped a huge breath of air. Due to my flight path, I had only a minimal opportunity to push off of the clothes and realized I wasn’t going to make the distance over the metallic mat. The air horn suddenly blared but again I was undaunted. My left foot came down in contact with the lump of my shirt, pants and socks and for just the briefest moment I thanked myself for being so orderly as to have placed them in a neat pile. My leg sprung me up and away from the tub and for a blink of time it seemed that somehow, amazingly, I would cover the distance to the edge. It wasn’t to be. Before I reached the peak of my second leap for freedom, I knew I was going to touch about two feet short. I leaned my body forward like a long jumper into the pit. Only a partial thought made it through before I hit

“Maybe it’s not electrif…”



I don’t know how long I was out. I felt something warm against my cheek and realized I was laying on dirt in a patch of sunlight. My eyes slowly opened and there was a coppery taste in my mouth. I wiggled my fingers and toes to see if I could still move them. They worked. Thank goodness. I slowly brought my arms up underneath me and pushed myself up. Blood dripped onto my left leg and I realized my mouth was bleeding. I wiped my chin and realized it wasn’t my mouth that was bleeding, it was my tongue. Apparently I had bitten it badly on the right side. Still bleeding pretty good meant… meant what? That I wasn’t out for very long, I thought. Where the hell… then I remembered the hot tub and looked around. I saw the tub as I began to stand up. I noticed my toes hurt badly as well as the bottom of my feet. I looked down and realized my toes were blackened. My feet both stung and burned at the same time. I gingerly stood up and put my arms out to steady my balance. I could hear steady clicks like a metronome coming from the tub. The CD thing was still spinning but was blank. I looked around me then up at the sky. It was maybe five, five-thirty? I realized I still had on only my skivvies. It took me a few minutes to find a branch in the woods that was long enough to reach my clothes and boots and dry enough not to carry electricity. As I scraped them towards me with the branch, the clicking increased and there were several buzzing noises. Thank god for wood. Nearly dry everywhere else, I stripped of my underwear and pulled on my shorts and shirt. Pulling my socks on was a slow and delicate affair. The boots hurt like shit at first but once on, my feet felt better right away.

Being careful to stay away from the metallic mat, I walked off the distance to where I woke up. Wow. That was like fourteen or fifteen feet. In the air. No wonder my tongue was bitten so hard. Then again, maybe I bit it when the a/c hit me. Who knows? I was ready to leave. I looked at the tub. The CD thing had stopped spinning. There were two clicks and it retracted down into the wall. A final soft click closed the little door behind it.

“Motherfucker” I said to myself

“Rat’s ass son of a bitch. Somebody oughta go to jail for this…” was all I could think to say.

I left and it took me about an hour to get back out of the woods. I paid closer attention on the way out and saw the “No Trespassing” signs behind me as I went. I acknowledged that I didn’t pay much attention to them in the past but it still seemed very, very wrong.

I only told one friend, Dave, about the entire ordeal and I think he believed me for the most part but since I wouldn’t lead him back there, I think his faith waned. There was no question in my mind that he thought I believed it anyway. My feet looked like Crispy Critters and who could make that kind of shit up?

“Bro, I think you got hit by lightning is what”.

“On a clear blue sky day?”

“Hey, it happens”

“You gotta be kidding me”

“Makes a helluva lot more sense then some asshole hauling a hot tub an hour into the woods and running it off of some kind of micro-nuclear generator”

“Who said shit about a freaking nuclear generator?”

“Nobody but then how’d he get all that juice out here? Riddle me that.”

“Shit, maybe there was a generator in the woods or something”

“You ever hear it?”

I can’t say that I did.