I think I made a mistake entering a contest from Captain Thorne’s Bath Co.

I don’t know what made me do it. It was 9:06PM on a Tuesday evening. I was bored and watching a cable rerun of an old movie. The ad break started and I cracked open my third beer. As I thumbed through my phone, the usual commercials for laxatives and life insurance played.

Then one came on that caught my attention. The first thing I noticed was how old it looked. The resolution wasn’t great and the whole thing had the feel of a tourism ad from the 90s. A New England beach came into view as accordion music and seagulls played in the background. And then this old-timey sailor guy walked into the frame. Thick beard, gruff face, wool sweater and a faded cap like he just stepped off a trawler.

“Ahoy there lad! Has the stench of the brine taken the wind out of ye sails?”

He looked directly at the camera as though he were talking to me. Then he held up a blue soap bottle and began touting its benefits.

“This here is Captain Thorne’s Lathering Wash. Avast ye of your foulest odours, and let the force of the sea cleanse your skin.”

I was mildly amused by this guy who seemed like he was doing his best to channel the captain from SpongeBob. As he finished his pitch for the bodywash, the camera started to move in closer to his face. His tone grew quieter and he began to speak just above a whisper.

“Only a chosen few can truly harness the glory of the sea. Fill out my captain’s log if you have the mariner in thee. The tide is rising lad.”

A QR code stayed on the screen for a while longer and I scanned it with my phone. I guess their low budget ad was effective, because there was no way I wasn’t going to find out what his captain’s log meant.

The code took me to a website straight out of the dot com era. It had a red and white colour palette and a lighthouse bell sound played once it loaded. A privacy notification popped up but I quickly pressed ACCEPT ALL to make it go away.

The “captain’s log” was a simple form with a few weird maritime questions like “Would ye rather drift, or sink?”. With the novelty wearing off, I quickly filled out the questions, pressed submit, and closed the tab.

It was getting late and I had work the next morning, so I set my alarm for 5:30AM on my phone, placed it beside my bed, and went to sleep.

—

It was 2:47AM when I was woken up by this incredibly loud foghorn noise.

BWWWAAAAHHH! BWWWAAAAHHH!

Somehow my phone had connected to my speaker, and this repeating foghorn was playing at a volume I had never heard it play before. I fumbled with my phone to try and shut it off but the normal interface had been replaced with this nautical map puzzle. Still groggy, I realized you had to drag this cartoon boat with your finger through the winding river on the map to the position named OFF.

BWWWAAAAHHH! BWWWAAAAHHH!

After three attempts of hitting land, each time with the boat resetting at the start, I finally got to the end and the foghorn stopped. I fell back in my bed, heart pounding and feeling absolutely exhausted.

My phone buzzed with a text from a 207 number.

“Time for your watch, skipper!”

“Who is this” I replied.

The typing bubble appeared for a second.

Then vanished.

I tried to get a bit more sleep, setting my bedside clock alarm instead of my phone this time.

—

As I drove to the site, I struggled to keep my eyes open after the restless night I had. We were breaking ground on a new construction project out of town, and I entered the site’s address into Google Maps. As I merged onto the highway, I tried to forget the alarm incident and the contest with thoughts of site grading and blueprints.

“Take the next exit and keep left”

The city had delayed permits for this project for months, and my company cut my hours while we waited. Now that approvals finally came through, I was trying to think about work instead of the stupid contest and that creepy captain.

“In 500 feet, turn right onto Black Creek Road”

My eyelids felt heavy as the car’s engine softly rumbled.

“Stay straight for the next 10 nautical miles”

My mind continued to wander with the thoughts of work. My foreman told me he would be retiring next year. My company would need a replacement and I am the next most qualified guy. If I could show initiative and help get the project back on schedule, maybe I cou….

Suddenly my headlights illuminated the expanse of open black water.

SCRREEEEECCHH!

I slammed on the brakes stopping my car just in time as the road dropped off into a boat launch. A group of fishermen nearby swung their heads around to look at the lunatic that nearly drove full speed into the ocean.

I had only been driving on this road for two miles. I looked down again at my phone and it was now indicating for me to make a u-turn and return to the highway.

My phone buzzed. It was the same number from earlier.

“The sea’s a lovely lady… but she’s quick to anger.”

I deleted the message, and then turned my car around to get to work.

—

When I got home, there was a small cardboard box in the hallway outside my doorstep. The label was made out to me, but there was no sender address. As I lifted it up, some sand fell out of the seams.

Upon opening the box, I see that it had been filled with sand, seashells and bits of seaweed. Not the clean stuff you would see in jars sold to tourists. It stunk of the ocean, and seemed as though someone had only recently dug it up from the seafloor.

Along with the sand was a blue soap bottle labelled “Captain Thorne’s Lathering Wash”. On top of it rested a messily scrawled note on a piece of rough parchment.

“Lather with care, lad. The sea’s taken notice of ye.”

After everything that happened, the captain is still peddling his bodywash. That figures.

But after a full day of construction, I needed to shower. I grabbed the bottle and went into my bathroom.

Stepping into my shower, I picked up the faint smell of algae and heard a distant rumbling in the pipes. I live in an old building and plumbing issues were very much the norm.

I turned on the shower and a weak trickle of water came out of the showerhead. Not an uncommon occurrence. I tapped a few times on the head to help the flow. The pressure started to increase but I noticed a stringy piece of seaweed coming through the outlets. Weird.

For a second, I actually wondered if somebody upstream dumped something into the water supply.

I tapped again on the showerhead and it suddenly broke off completely. Ice cold sea water started streaming from the open fixture. Mixed in were small seashells and seaweed which began to build up around my feet.

I’m standing there naked and dripping wet, completely paralyzed. As the water continues to pool at my ankles, I hear my phone ring. It goes to voicemail and I hear the all-too familiar voice of Captain Thorne.

“A little gift from the goddess herself, skipper.”

He chuckles softly.

“Tide’s turning now. Crew’ll be by soon.”

I don’t know what to do.

I’m sitting in the bathroom and water is still coming out.

I can hear drunken men singing outside my apartment building.

Wet boots are moving through the hallway now.