Attempting to leave the disabled toilet seemed harder than it should have been. As she washed her hands, the light flickered obscenely on and off through multiple mauve hues. The drone of the pipes continued its mantra like an obese siren of the walls. Despite this sensory assault, she attempted to move towards the door. The door seemed to have become was a metal monolith, its surface cold and unforgiving. Her fingers fumbled with the handle, a useless appendage in this claustrophobic tomb of porcelain and steel. With a final, desperate heave, she pushed, and the world outside rushed in.

She was out on the library floor once more. The books, the shelves, the empty computer stations. All as it was and quite quite silent; where had she been? A solitary student at his laptop, half hidden on a single desk behind shelves, peered up at her momentarily, curious as to why she lingered so long and lost looking at the restroom entrance. Aware of her awkward moment, she smoothed her dress and then, unable to resist, turned round, opened the heavy door of the disabled toilet, and peered back in. All looked normal. Even the pipe drone sounded normal now. She breathed out, made a note on her phone and headed up to check the same cubicle on the next floor up.

This cubicle seemed identical, a sterile white box with a single, unforgiving window high on the wall. Sunlight filtered through, casting a sterile glow on the porcelain. There was no drone, no flicker. Just the hum of fluorescent lights and the soft rustle of pages turning. A sense of unease crept over her. Had she imagined the other? But why could she hear pages turning from within the cubicle? Mind beginning to race she suddenly also wondered: where did the sunlight come from? Why was there a fucking window here? How did she so blindly accept its presence? The disabled toilet was deep in the middle of the building far from any external wall. Exhilarated and terrified at the dreamlike impossibility of it, she went to the window and peered out.

There was no window. The sunlight was a blinding, ethereal glow, emanating from within the cubicle itself. It pulsed and shimmered, casting grotesque mauve shadows on the walls. A cold dread seized her. This was the same restroom that she had failed to exit. She stumbled backward, her heart pounding in her ears. A voice, distant yet clear, whispered in the darkness beyond the light.

Then her phone fell to the floor, to be picked up later by security.