On the first floor of building B, down the hallway from room WB156, there’s a women’s washroom. The fluorescent lights are dim inside and sometimes they flicker on and off. Most, if it can be helped, usually avoid using this bathroom, insisting that it gives off a creepy vibe.

I was talking with my friend before class one day about it, confused as to why no one would step foot inside despite it seeming like a very normal washroom. She told me that a few years ago, there was a student named Delilah Morin who was in the last semester of her program. She was set to graduate with the rest of her peers, and she’d be doing the honours of the commencement speech.

However, Delilah had been getting bullied often by a group of girls since she’d started attending Algonquin. They’d whisper things as she walked past, trip her when she was rushing to class, and belittle her achievements. Amongst other things, it started getting to a point where Delilah was afraid of walking onto campus.

One day, a few weeks before graduation, Delilah excused herself from class and headed to the washroom. The group of girls followed her inside. My friend said no one knows exactly what happened, but Delilah never ending up walking out again. It was speculated the girls had drowned her as it was one student who found her in the last stall, hair drenched with toilet water. Once paramedics were called and the body had been taken away, the coroner ruled her death as accidental drowning.

Ever since that day, students and faculty alike avoid using it. Those who have the guile say the air feels thick inside, like breathing through a towel pressed to your mouth. Others have reported that stall doors creak open, faucets turn on and off, and never stop dripping, and most of all, the last stall locks automatically once you step inside and you have to crawl underneath the gap between the floor and the door to get out.

Intrigued, I decided to do a little more digging, and this is what I could find. While the college is closed at night, two students were dared to enter this specific bathroom by their friends. Too stubborn to decline, they ventured inside. When they came out again, roughly five minutes later, they were pale as ghosts and twice as silent. It took an hour for them to open up about what happened.

One of them said as soon as they walked inside, the lights flickered off and refused to come back on. Still, they pressed on and didn’t think much of it, using their phone flashlights as a solution. The other student described the feeling of being watched, like the walls were glaring at them. Either of them didn’t dare approach the last stall. When they turned to leave, one of them caught a small glimpse of a face peeking over last stall through the mirror. Too freaked out to investigate (that was probably the right idea), the two students bolted.

Now, there’s a lot of debate whether or not this story is actually true. Many want to believe the ghost of Delilah Morin haunts the washroom, while others think those two students lied for fun. But since I personally believe it to be true, I wanted to mention that this wouldn’t be the first haunting in a bathroom.

In Korean mythology, Cheuksin is a toilet goddess who waits until you’re vulnerable before wrapping her long hair around your neck, strangling you to death. In a Japanese urban legend, a young girl, Hanako-san, haunts a toilet. Supposedly, you can summon her by knocking three times while saying, “Hanako-san, are you there?” and she will answer before grabbing you and dragging you down the toilet. As for a more lighthearted tale, Harry Potter’s, Moaning Myrtle, is a young ghost named Myrtle Warren, and she haunts the girl’s bathroom on the second floor at Hogwarts.

While Delilah isn’t Cheuksin, or Hanako-san, or the harmless Moaning Myrtle, her story is widespread across Algonquin College because of the uncertainty surrounding her case. Did she actually accidentally drown, or did her death have something to do with the group of girls who followed her inside? Is she really haunting the last stall, or is it just a faulty lock?

Unfortunately, I’m too afraid to find out. I’ll gladly walk an extra minute or so to a different washroom if it means staying out of that one.

Peyden Mongrain has been a lover of the eerie and paranormal ever since she was young. She was born and raised in northern Ontario, but is currently enrolled in the Professional Writing program at Algonquin College in Ottawa. Her favourite thing to do is listen to scary stories either on Youtube, or reading them on Reddit. It doesn’t matter if they’re true or not because she just likes being afraid. She’s heard more than a few good scary stories and would be happy to tell them if asked.