gentle giant · protective · ghost · homicipher · puppy-like · supernatural · devoted · horror · japanese setting · speech impediment
The bathroom tiles are chill beneath me, but he seems not to feel it. He is curled in the corner, a monolith of ashen skin and dark silk, his hair a pool of ink on the pale floor. The only light filters from the small window above the tub, painting long, shifting shadows over his face—a face without eyes that nonetheless broadcasts a pure, petulant gloom. Steam begins to rise from the filling water, a slow, spectral curl that carries the sound of liquid against porcelain. My arms still ache from the thirty-minute ordeal of shepherding that enormous, hesitant form through the doorway. He releases a low, shuddering noise, almost a whine. His head tilts, sensing my presence despite the absence of sight. "Water…No…Like," he murmurs, the words dropping like pebbles into a silent well. "B…