Page 4

“Don’t eat that,”

Malcolm said, popping up next to me like the angel on my shoulder, clinging to my rabbit.

“It’s just an apple.”

I shot my friend a look before returning my attention to Bane, a “Thank you”

on the tip of my tongue. But he was gone. Spinning in a small circle and scanning the crowd, my brows furrowed. “How the fuck does he keep doing that?”

“Doing what?”

Taylor asked as he moseyed up to us, stuffing a wad of black and white cotton candy into his mouth.

“The guy. The… Bane, guy.”

I searched the edges of the crowd where he tended to lurk, but all I saw were excited patrons and undead ghouls terrorizing them. Shrugging, I looked at the apple in my hand and took a bite out of the gift.

Sweet and sour exploded on my tongue at the same time, more intense than any apple I’d ever eaten before. I didn’t know which was responsible for what flavor, the apple or the coating, or some combination of the two. Whatever it was, it was fucking delicious.

“There could be a razor in there,”

Malcolm said, peering at the bright white flesh. It had been streaked with black from the candy coating.

“That’s an urban legend.”

I licked the sticky sweetness from my lips, hoping they weren’t stained, and took another bite.

“What next?”

Taylor asked, unconcerned in the slightest that I was one mouthful away from certain death. “Another haunted house? I think I saw one that’s, like, a funhouse.”

“Is that the kind with mirrors and shit? Like a maze?”

Malcolm asked.

“Yeah, probably.”

“Ok. I can handle that.”

As we walked, Taylor tore off another piece of cotton candy and handed it to Malcolm.

Just as he was about to put it in his mouth, I looked over. Horrified, I smacked his hand, dislodging it. A clump of wispy black and white hair fell to the ground.

“What the fuck?”

Malcolm glared at me.

Taylor shoved my shoulder. “What was that for?”

“It’s fucking hair!”

I picked up the tangled locks and shook them in front of their faces, the silken strands waving with the movement.

“You’ve lost it, bro.”

Taylor swiped the candy out of my hand and flung it into the air. The wad of hair drifted to the ground slowly, landing in the dirt. Shaking their heads, Taylor and Malcolm stepped over it and continued on their way.

I stared at the bi-colored clump on the ground. It still looked like hair, but I knew it was impossible. I was tired, that was all. First, cutting my finger at work, and then not eating for most of the day? It was no wonder I was hallucinating.

I shook my head at myself and took another bite of the apple, hoping the extra sugar would wake my ass up for the remainder of the evening.

By the time we reached the funhouse, I’d finished the surprisingly filling piece of fruit. Taylor had finished his cotton candy too, or simply threw it out to avoid any more potential issues. While we waited in line, I chucked the stick and the apple core into the cornfield on the edge of the carnival. It’d make some field mouse’s night.

The yellow stalks bobbed in the night breeze like the corn agreed; their dry leaves scratched and scraped against each other, begging for more. My gaze skipped from row to row. Still-rotting skeletons dotted the field, hidden in the stalks. The remaining strips of decomposing flesh peeled away from the yellowed bones like curling leaves. Their slack jaws hung open in silent laughter—or screams.

I blinked hard.

Nothing but corn stood before me. No corpses. Nothing except a neglected harvest.

A shiver raced down my spine regardless.

Like all Midwestern horror fans, I didn’t trust the corn. More specifically, I didn’t trust what could be lurking in it, ready to devour the unsuspecting idiot who wandered through the suffocating golden rows.

Taylor grabbed the front of my t-shirt and tugged. “Come on, Griff!”

I let him take the lead, falling into step behind Malcolm as a guy in a demented scarecrow costume ushered us inside the funhouse with an impatient wave. His hand wasn’t a hand, though. It was a bundle of bloody twigs, gleaming in a beam of moonlight that managed to pierce the cloud cover.

The scarecrow’s beady black eyes bored into mine as I passed. The burlap that made up his mangled face twisted and crinkled, like a sneer. He smelled like rot and decay, like something that had been buried and dug up again after a month. I had to hand it to the carnival, they’d gone all out for an immersive, sensory experience.

I held my breath and hurried past, into the twisting labyrinth of the funhouse.

The first part of the maze was filled with bodies hanging from the ceiling, all shrouded in white, save for the splashes of blood. Some of them were still dripping. The pathways between them were so narrow that you couldn’t help bumping into things, which only aggravated the situation. The wrapped bodies twisted and swayed, jostled by other people trying to squeeze through the maze and find the door. The floor was slick from all of the blood and I slipped more than once on the metal flooring.

I kept waiting for one of those bodies to grab me. Surprisingly, they never did.

Sliding out of the shroud room, we entered another where there was no escaping the things dangling from the ceiling. Thick, heavy cords hung everywhere, gray and rubbery, dripping in even more blood. The stench clung to my nostrils, sharp and familiar. Offal. I’d gutted enough animals in my life to know fresh intestines when I saw them—or smelled them. The carnival’s dedication to realism was both impressive and more than a little disturbing.

“What is this shit?”

Malcolm asked, swatting a plump cord out of his face.

“Rubber tubes or something,”

I lied, nudging him forward. “Just keep going.”

The red-and-gray fringe parted to my left. By the time my head whipped in that direction, I only caught a glimpse of a bare, muscular shoulder and a black mask. Bane?

Metal slid against metal, almost sensually, like someone was honing a blade nearby. I spun in a circle, trying to see them through the swaying curtains of entrails, but I couldn’t make out anything beyond what was right in front of my face.

Something touched my fingers from below, soft and furry, as if a dog had randomly wandered by. I jerked to the side, yanking my hand upward for safety. A low growl rumbled behind the red fringe. The hair on my arms stood on end.

The guts swung wildly, ripping out of the ceiling by something big tearing their way through.

The sound of a knife slicing through the air ended in a high-pitched yipe and a painful snarl. The snarl ended abruptly in a wet gurgle. A rush of bright red liquid seeped over the floor, creeping closer to my shoes.

I scrambled backward, following the tug on my sleeve. Malcolm, eyes wide, yanked me through the last few feet of entrails.

We crammed into a narrow hallway next, single file, like chattel on the way to the slaughter. Tight turns and low lighting meant there were ample places for the actors to hide. Malcolm screamed more than once as an invisible panel slammed down and the actor lunged at him, dirty nails and bloody hands swiping at whatever they could reach. Even Taylor jumped a time or two as he turned a corner, running into some hideous creature waiting in the dark.

“What is that?”

Taylor asked, stopping to poke a pile of sludge oozing out of one of the walls.

“Don’t touch it!”

Malcolm snapped, right as Taylor leaned forward.

The black sludge sprayed out, coating Taylor’s entire face in a thick ooze. He screamed. Malcolm screamed. And I swear I heard an evil laugh rumble in the walls around us.

I shoved Malcolm forward into Taylor, herding the two of them to the end of the hallway.

We spilled out into one of those huge, spinning tunnels. Black and white stripes swirled around us in a dizzying pattern, a narrow glass walkway stretching across it.

“Oh my God, it reeks!”

Taylor said, slumping against one of the non-moving walls. He wiped at his face frantically, flinging bits of goo off of his fingers and smearing the rest on his jeans before going in again.

“You wanted interactive,”

I reminded him, trying to help scrape some of the crap off of his face. It smelled like the scarecrow out front. Like dirt and putrefaction. I shuddered to think what they’d used in the concoction.

“After this, can we please leave?”

Malcolm asked, hugging the deranged stuffed rabbit to his chest like a little kid who just woke up from a nightmare.

“Yeah. I’m beat,”

I agreed, hoping Taylor would be on board after getting sprayed with whatever the fuck that was.

“Ugh, fine by me,”

Taylor said, wiping the back of his hand across his eyes one more time.

“Ok. Let’s get through this, then.”

I took over as the leader, stepping out onto the narrow bridge. The swirling colors made my eyes hurt and I wobbled more than once, thrown off by the spinning around me. I finally closed my eyes and darted forward the rest of the way, waiting for my friends at the end. “Close your eyes and run,”

I said. “It helps.”

Malcolm sprinted across the platform, Taylor hot on his heels.

We entered another narrow hall that did not look promising. Wooden slats covered the walls on either side of us. As soon as we walked in, frantic screaming erupted. People were packed in on both sides, their hands outstretched through the gaps, clawing at the air.

“Please! Help us!”

a woman shrieked through her sobs.

“Let us out!”

a man on the other side shouted.

There was no escaping the hands, no matter what you tried. They scratched and clawed at us as we ducked and bobbed, darting through the twisting hall as quickly as we could. The shouting and the sobbing grew louder, more desperate, chilling me like a cold sweat. I couldn’t hear myself think. I could barely breathe.

One man grabbed the back of my coat and hauled me against the wooden slats. Hands clutched at me from every angle, groping, clawing, tearing at my clothes. People screamed and pleaded, begging for help, for rescue, even as they clung to me, pinning me in place.

It was too much. Too real .

Forgetting my friends, forgetting everything, I ripped myself free and bolted.

I slammed through a door at the end of the hall and went flying. Sprawling in the center of a dimly lit room, I swore and pushed myself up onto my hands and knees. Lifting my head, I got to my feet unsteadily and looked around, momentarily stunned by the near-silence after the deafening hallway.

I was in a room full of ornate, arched mirrors, all ringed in a circle. It looked like there might be different passages, shooting out in all directions like a wagon wheel, but that wasn’t possible. The funhouse wasn’t that big. Was it?

To make it even more disorienting, the very center of the room was turning in a slow circle, not enough to make you sick, like the spinning tunnel, but enough to play tricks with your eyes. Thankfully, the screaming had stopped, replaced with a soft, haunting piano music.

I closed my eyes and held my head in my hands, taking a moment in the relative peace to get a grip. I was tired, that was all. That’s why I’d freaked. This was, without a doubt, the best haunted house/carnival thing that I’d ever been to, but I had seriously underestimated how intense it would be. Sleep was all I needed. I could wake up the next morning and put this whole experience behind me.

Opening my eyes again, I looked behind me, trying to figure out where the door had been and why Malcolm and Taylor hadn’t joined me. Maybe they’d found a different way out of the hallway, like they had earlier in the mannequin room.