There"s an unspoken rule in Youngstown, a piece of ingrained local wisdom passed down through generations, often delivered with a grimace or a shake of the head: Don"t swim in the Mahoning. Everyone knows it, even if they don"t fully understand why. It ain"t just the obvious dangers – the surprisingly strong currents that can snag the unwary, the hidden, submerged debris like rusted rebar or chunks of concrete waiting to trap a foot, or the toxic legacy still lurking in the deep layers of sediment after decades of industrial abuse. It"s something else. Something more insidious, more fundamental. Something in the water itself, they say. Fall in, the old-timers whisper over beers at the corner tavern, their eyes dark with remembered fear or secondhand warnings, and you might climb out, sure. You might walk away. But you won"t come back the same. Not entirely.
Mikey O"Connell didn"t fall. He jumped. It was one of those profoundly stupid, testosterone-fueled, alcohol-lubricated dares that bloom spontaneously in the humid stagnation of a late Youngstown night. It happened after a long session at a dimly lit bar near the Center Street Bridge, the kind of place where regrets are often born. A sweltering July night, the air thick and heavy, smelling of asphalt, exhaust fumes, and the ever-present dampness rising from the river. His buddies, fueled by cheap beer and bravado, egged him on, laughing, shouting encouragement, their smartphones held aloft like digital torches, recording the impending idiocy as Mikey, twenty-two and feeling invincible, stripped down to his faded plaid boxers on the low concrete embankment near the old Brier Hill Works site.
With a whoop and a running leap that was more stumble than graceful dive, he launched himself into the dark, surprisingly cold water of the Mahoning. He surfaced a moment later, sputtering, gasping, but laughing triumphantly, shaking wet hair from his eyes. He swam the few yards back to the shore, his strokes clumsy in the unexpected chill, pulling himself out onto the slick, muddy bank. His friends erupted in cheers, slapping him hard on the back, calling him crazy, a legend, their laughter echoing in the humid night air. They wrapped him in a borrowed towel, helped him get dressed, and the night continued, fueled by the adrenaline of the stunt. Just another dumb story to tell, another notch on the belt of youthful recklessness.
But Kevin, Mikey"s roommate and friend since childhood, noticed the change almost immediately, though he tried to dismiss it at first. It wasn"t dramatic, not initially. Mikey seemed quieter the next day, subdued, more tired than usual, even accounting for the inevitable hangover. He complained of a persistent slight chill he couldn"t seem to shake, despite the summer heat. His skin, normally ruddy and prone to flushing, looked pale, almost grayish, and felt unnervingly cool and clammy to the touch when Kevin accidentally brushed against his arm. Kevin chalked it up to maybe catching a 24-hour bug, or perhaps a mild case of hypothermia from the surprisingly cold river water, maybe even just a particularly brutal hangover.
Over the next week, however, the changes became more pronounced, more undeniable, more deeply unsettling. Mikey"s characteristic high energy levels plummeted dramatically. He, who was always the life of the party, cracking jokes, bouncing off the walls with restless energy, became listless, withdrawn, profoundly apathetic. He"d spend hours sitting on their worn couch, staring blankly at the television screen, not really watching, his eyes unfocused. His infectious laughter, when it rarely came now, sounded hollow, forced, lacking its usual warmth. His eyes seemed duller, less expressive, and Kevin noticed his pupils seemed slightly, but persistently, too large, even in bright light, giving him a slightly vacant, drugged look. He started sleeping excessively – twelve, fourteen, sometimes sixteen hours a day, emerging from his room only briefly, moving slowly, reluctantly.
Kevin tried repeatedly to talk to him, concern gnawing at him. "Dude, seriously, are you okay? You"re still feeling rough from that river dip, aren"t you? Maybe you should see a doctor, get checked out."
Mikey would just shrug, his movements slow, lethargic. "I"m fine, Kev. Just tired. Leave it." His voice was different too – slower, flatter, almost monotone. The spark, the quick wit, the vibrant personality Kevin knew so well, seemed to have been extinguished, washed away.
Then came the fixation on water. It started subtly – Mikey drinking more water than usual, always carrying a bottle. But it escalated quickly. He started drinking water constantly, obsessively, glass after glass, complaining that his throat felt perpetually dry, that tap water tasted "thin" and unsatisfying. He began spending longer and longer periods in the shower, often just standing motionless under the cold spray until the hot water ran out entirely, emerging shivering but seemingly content. Kevin once came home early from work to find Mikey sitting fully clothed in the bathtub, which was filled to the brim with cold water, just staring blankly at the dripping faucet, a strange, placid expression on his face.
He started talking about the river, but not about the jump, not about the dare. He spoke about the water itself, his voice low and distant. "It felt… old," he murmured one evening, staring out their apartment window towards the unseen path where the Mahoning flowed through the city. "Like, really, really old. Ancient. And deep. So much deeper than it looks from the bridge." He began taking long, solitary walks down by the river, especially near the spot where he"d jumped in, just standing on the bank for hours, watching the current flow past, seemingly mesmerized by the movement, the light on the water.
Kevin"s unease grew into alarm when he found several large glass jars filled with murky, greenish river water hidden under Mikey"s bed, along with a collection of smooth, dark river stones and rusted, twisted bits of metal Mikey had apparently collected from the bank. When Kevin confronted him, demanding an explanation, Mikey became unusually agitated, almost frantic, his eyes flashing with a brief spark of something that wasn"t apathy. "Leave it! It"s important! It belongs!" he insisted, though he couldn"t, or wouldn"t, explain why.
His memory, previously sharp, grew increasingly fuzzy, unreliable. He"d forget conversations they"d just had minutes earlier, struggle to recall significant details from his own past, sometimes seeming confused about what day it was. He lost all interest in his job delivering pizzas, eventually getting fired for missed shifts and customer complaints. He stopped answering calls from their friends, ignored invitations. He abandoned the local band he played drums in, leaving his drum kit untouched, gathering dust in the corner of their living room. His thinking seemed slower, more concrete, less nuanced. Jokes went over his head. Complex ideas seemed to baffle him. He started complaining that bright lights hurt his eyes, that loud sounds were physically painful. Everything about the normal world seemed to irritate his senses, except for the cool, damp, quiet environments he now seemed to actively crave.
Kevin, desperate, finally managed to drag Mikey to a doctor. A battery of tests followed – blood work, urinalysis, neurological exams, even a brain scan. Everything came back frustratingly, maddeningly normal. The doctor, perplexed but needing a diagnosis, suggested severe depression, perhaps triggered by post-traumatic stress from the dangerous jump, and prescribed antidepressants. Mikey took them reluctantly for a few days, then stopped abruptly, claiming they made him feel "too dry," too disconnected from the "coolness."
Kevin spent hours online, frantically researching the potential effects of exposure to Mahoning River water. He found countless articles about the known contaminants – heavy metals like lead and mercury, persistent organic pollutants like PCBs and dioxins, various bacteria including E. coli. Could it be a slow-acting neurotoxin affecting Mikey"s brain? Or maybe some rare, waterborne parasite, something that got into his system when he inevitably swallowed some river water during his jump? His search eventually led him to fringe local forums and obscure blogs discussing Mahoning Valley legends, where people spoke in hushed, fearful tones about "river spirits," "water elementals," or the river possessing a "hungry consciousness" that could latch onto people who disrespected it or fell into its grasp, slowly draining their vitality, their memories, their very essence, replacing it with something cold, ancient, and aquatic.
Kevin felt utterly helpless, watching his best friend slowly slip away. Mikey was physically present, occupying the same space, but the person Kevin knew – the funny, energetic, passionate musician – was fading day by day, being overwritten, replaced by this cold, listless, water-obsessed stranger. Their mutual friends stopped coming around, unnerved and creeped out by Mikey"s vacant stare, his strange water-drinking habits, his increasingly long silences, and the faint, but persistent, smell of damp earth and stagnant river water that seemed to cling to him no matter how much he showered.
Kevin tried desperately, futilely, to intervene. He found the hidden jars of river water again and poured them down the drain. He threw out the collection of river stones and rusted metal. Mikey flew into a rare, terrifying rage, screaming incoherently about "taking what belongs to it," about "the balance being disturbed," before collapsing onto the floor, sobbing weakly, eventually lapsing back into his usual exhausted apathy. Kevin tried keeping him away from the river, suggesting road trips, movies, anything to distract him. Mikey refused to leave the apartment for more than an hour or two, becoming intensely agitated, withdrawn, and almost catatonic if kept indoors or away from a source of water for too long.
The physical changes worsened, becoming undeniable. Mikey"s skin took on a more pronounced, unhealthy grayish-green tint, looking almost bruised in certain lights. He barely ate solid food anymore, seeming to subsist almost entirely on water, which he drank constantly. He rarely spoke, and when he did, his words were often nonsensical, disjointed fragments about "the deep current below," "the cold embrace," "the need to join the flow," "returning home." He spent most of his waking hours either sitting by the window, watching the rain fall, or submerged in a cold bath, his eyes closed, an expression of strange peace on his pale face.
One cold, rainy November morning, four months after the jump, Kevin woke up to find Mikey"s bed empty, the front door of their apartment unlocked. A single sheet of paper was on the kitchen table, weighted down by a smooth, dark river stone. On it, written in a slow, shaky, almost childish scrawl that barely resembled Mikey"s usual handwriting, were just five words: "Going home. The river calls."
Panic seizing him, Kevin threw on clothes and raced down to the riverbank near Brier Hill, the spot where Mikey had jumped into the water that fateful July night. The river was high, swollen with autumn rain, flowing fast and brown, carrying debris downstream. The air was cold and raw. There was no sign of Mikey anywhere. Just a single, muddy sneaker, unmistakably Mikey"s, lying near the water"s edge, as if placed there deliberately.
Kevin called the police, his voice breaking. They came, took reports, searched the riverbanks downstream, dragged the immediate area. But Mikey O"Connell was never found. Officially, he was listed as a probable drowning, another tragic statistic added to the Mahoning River"s grim tally. Another victim of treacherous currents and perhaps poor judgment. But Kevin knew, with a certainty that chilled him far more than the November air, that it wasn"t a simple accident, not really. It was the culmination of the change, the final, inevitable act of the river claiming what it had tainted months before, drawing its altered servant back into its cold embrace.
Kevin moved out of the apartment soon after. He couldn"t stand being there, surrounded by the ghost of his friend, haunted by the memory of Mikey"s slow, horrifying transformation, the echo of his obsessive water habits, the lingering scent of the river. He avoided the river completely, taking longer routes to avoid crossing bridges, looking away whenever he caught a glimpse of the water.
Years passed. Kevin moved away from Youngstown, tried to build a new life, tried to forget. But the memory lingered. Recently, back in town visiting family, he found himself walking near the Center Street Bridge, drawn by a morbid curiosity, a need for some kind of closure he couldn"t explain. He stood on the bridge, leaning on the railing, looking down at the Mahoning, its surface murky and indifferent under a typically grey Ohio sky. He thought about Mikey, about the vibrant life extinguished, about the coldness that had seeped into him, replacing his essence with something stagnant, ancient, belonging to the river.
As he watched the brown water flow past, he saw a flicker of movement in the depths below, near one of the bridge piers. A pale shape, indistinct at first, rising slowly just beneath the surface. For one heart-stopping, terrifying moment, it looked like a human face looking up at him – a face chillingly, unmistakably like Mikey"s, but bloated, empty, gray, with eyes like dull river stones. Then, just as quickly, it was gone, dissolved back into the brown current, leaving only ripples and the certainty of horror in Kevin"s mind.
Kevin stumbled back from the railing, gasping, a cold dread washing over him, colder than any river water. The river hadn"t just taken Mikey"s life that night he jumped. It had taken him, slowly, piece by piece, over months. And maybe, just maybe, a part of him, the part that belonged to the river now, was still down there, integrated into the river"s cold, ancient, perhaps hungry consciousness, waiting beneath the bridges, watching the world go by from its watery prison.
Don"t fall in the Mahoning. Don"t swim in it. Don"t even disrespect it. You might climb out. You might walk away. But what climbs out, what walks away, might not be entirely you anymore. Not entirely.