Ingrid sighed as she pushed open the door of the 24-hour laundromat in downtown Oslo. The clock on her phone read 2:37 AM. She hadn’t planned on doing laundry so late, but her work at the hospital had kept her overtime again.
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting a harsh glow on the empty rows of washers and dryers. Ingrid’s footsteps echoed in the silent room as she made her way to the last dryer in the far corner, where her clothes tumbled lazily.
She yawned, eager to grab her clothes and head home to her cozy apartment in Grünerløkka. The dryer’s timer blinked zero. Ingrid opened the door and reached in, feeling for her favorite sweater.
Suddenly, something cold and strong grabbed her wrist. Ingrid’s heart leaped into her throat. She tried to pull back, but the grip tightened, yanking her forward.
“Help!” she screamed, her voice bouncing off the tiled walls. But who would hear her at this hour?
The force pulled harder. Ingrid’s upper body was now inside the dryer. How was this possible? The drum wasn’t nearly big enough to fit a person. Yet as she looked around in panic, she saw only darkness stretching endlessly before her.
With one final tug, Ingrid fell completely into the abyss.
She tumbled through the dark, her screams swallowed by the void. After what felt like hours, Ingrid landed with a thud on a cold, damp surface.
Blinking, she found herself in a dim, cavernous room. Rows of ancient washing machines lined the walls, their rusted doors creaking open and shut on their own. The air smelled of mildew and something else – something rotten.
“Hello?” Ingrid called out, her voice shaky. “Is anyone there?”
A low chuckle echoed from the shadows. Ingrid spun around, her heart pounding.
An old woman emerged from behind a hulking dryer. Her skin was pale and wrinkled, her white hair wild and unkempt. She wore a tattered dress that might have once been floral print but was now stained and faded.
“Welcome, my dear,” the woman crooned, her voice raspy. “We’ve been waiting for you.”
“We?” Ingrid asked, backing away slowly.
More figures shuffled into view – men and women of all ages, their eyes hollow and skin sickly pale. They moved jerkily, like puppets on strings.
“What is this place?” Ingrid demanded, trying to keep her voice steady.
The old woman cackled. “This is where the lost socks go, child. And the people foolish enough to reach in after them.”
Ingrid’s back hit a wall. The crowd of pale figures moved closer, their arms outstretched.
“No!” Ingrid shouted. She closed her eyes tight and thought of home, of her family in Bergen, of the sunlight on the fjords.
When she opened her eyes, she was back in the laundromat, sprawled on the floor in front of the open dryer. Her clothes lay scattered around her.
Ingrid scrambled to her feet, heart racing. Had it all been a dream? A hallucination from working too hard?
As she hastily gathered her laundry, something caught her eye. There, tangled in her sweater, was a single sock – faded and stained, in a floral pattern she’d never seen before.
Ingrid dropped the sock like it burned. She ran from the laundromat, leaving half her clothes behind.
From that night on, Ingrid always did her laundry in the middle of the day, with plenty of people around. And she never, ever reached into a dryer without looking first.
