The Carnival

Relina, a small child, unsuspectingly enters a funhouse which she had been waiting to go in all day, but quickly realizes the terror held behind its doors.

The Carnival

By

Eden Thomas

 

                The carnival was a sea of lights and excitement.  People were everywhere; on rides, at cotton candy stands, running to catch up with their families.  Everything seemed to be spinning around nine-year-old Relina like a whirlwind.  A smile began to form around the delicate corners of her mouth as she set her eyes upon the one ride she had been waiting for; the fun house.  She let go of her mother’s hand and began running towards it.  She was like a moth, and the fun house was her flame as their bright, spinning colors drew her in.  “Step right up, step right up,” the bizarre clown began saying as she approached the door.  “Come one, come all!  Beyond these doors lives a world beyond your wildest dreams!”

                Relina gazed up at him, examining for a moment the strange form his face had taken from the makeup.  He did not look like an ordinary clown, his makeup was much darker.  Where most clowns she had seen had bright, vibrant colors on, this one had darker hair and clothes.  Its makeup seemed as if it were melting off.  Maybe it was put on like that on purpose?  She did not know.  All she knew was that the more she stared at him, the more distorted his features seemed to her.  She gazed back at her mother and called for her.  She did not answer.  “Mommy!  Mommy!” Relina kept calling, but it was to no avail.  The clown bent down into a position that did not seem humanly possible.  His legs were much too long to bend like that, she thought as he touched her back, rubbing it up and down in a soothing gesture.  He pulled a shiny, golden ticket out of Relina’s hand.  “Go inside now, she’ll be right behind you.” he told her in a high-pitched voice.

                With a slight shove from the humanoid clown, Relina entered through the doors of the funhouse.  Inside the doors, everything was painted bright, loud colors in swirls and designs.  In front of her was a tunnel made of red plastic and she noticed the other children crawling through.  She decided to follow them; they would know where to go.  She began to make her way through the plastic tunnel, and with every step forward the tunnel was becoming darker and growing smaller.  She couldn’t see the other children now, but could hear their laughter up ahead.  It sounded as if they were out of the tunnel now.  She picked up speed, feeling a strong need to get out of the tunnel before it could close in on her any further.

                Once she finally made it out of the tunnel she found herself standing in a hall of mirrors, each one a different shape and color.  She could still hear the children, but not see them.  How did they get so far ahead of her?  She began her journey through the hall of mirrors, looking in each one as she passed them.  Some made her look older.  She looked beautiful, a true vision of loveliness.  Others distorted her image to that of a monster; scarred, hideous, sallow, deformed.  The ones at the end of the room were the worst.  They made her look fat, wrinkled, and old.  In some of the mirrors towards the end she didn’t even see herself, just blackness; a blackness that seemed to surround her and terrify her, a darkness that wanted to consume her, to take her with it and never let her go.  In some of the mirrors she saw strange men whom resembled people she could only vaguely remember; people whose faces seemed to bring about disgust and fear in the back of her mind.  She decided to press forward into the next room.

                The room she entered now seemed to be a maze of some sort.  Something about it frightened her.  She did not know why, but she wanted to turn back, to go back the way she came.  She knew it was impossible.  She did not hear the laughter of the other children now for she had spent too long in the hall of mirrors.  Alone, she pressed onward through the maze.  She heard voices and footsteps behind her, but they did not seem to be those of children.  They were much too heavy, and the voices accompanying them much too deep.  She moved faster now through the maze, but kept coming to dead ends.  She started to turn around, but was frozen by fear.  One of the men she heard had found her.  She stared up at his eyes.  There was something inhuman about the way they stared back it her.  In that man’s eyes were the same blackness she had seen in the mirror.  She wanted to scream but could not find her voice.  The man reached for her, but she slid through his open legs and started off running through the maze.  The man was calling her name now, his voice sounded like a wild animal growling to establish dominance.  She ran as fast as she could away from the pounding footsteps of the man.  She knew there were others, and she prayed that she would not find them.  She was sobbing now, and her vision was beginning to blur, yet she could not slow down, she could not stop.  She knew she had to find a way out of the maze, to find her way out of the funhouse whose siren’s song called her to the doors like a stranger with candy beckons to an innocent child into his van.

                She kept running until her feet felt like they were a few steps ahead of her body.  She knew if she didn’t slow down she would fall, yet if she didn’t keep going, she would be found.  Light was pouring out of a door ahead and she knew the next room had to be better than this one.  She pushed herself forward, lunging toward the doors.  As soon as she fell into the brightly lit room she no longer felt threatened by the men.  She could not even hear them anymore.  Something about this room seemed different from the rest of the funhouse.  The funhouse had been a place of fear from the moment she was outside with the clown.  Now, in the brightly lit room she felt calm, serene.  She sighed in relief and began to look around.

                This room resembled a child’s bedroom.  The walls were done in pastels, the bedspread a baby blue.  Everything about this room seemed to ease the tension she had carried with her through the other rooms.  She sat down on the bed to catch her breath.  She began to hear the laughter of the other children again.  They weren’t too far ahead of her now.  She decided it would be best to go through to other rooms to catch up.  As she got back on her feet, the room began to change.  The bright light that seemed to radiate from the room vanished and everything became night.  Shadows were cast around its walls and the fright she felt crept back inside her.  The children stopped laughing again, and she began to hear the voices of the men.  They would be coming for her now.  She held her breath as she stepping over the threshold into the next room.

                What she saw before her didn’t scare her…yet.  It was a giant winding staircase, the kind that some funhouses have that feel like that are about to collapse underneath you.  Relina did not have a problem with this, yet she wondered where it would lead her.  She made her way up the stairs, watching her step so she didn’t fall.  She wanted to run.  The footsteps were growing closer.  She picked up speed and made it to the top.  She found herself at the apex of a huge slide.  The other children were at the bottom.  She then noticed an exit at the bottom of the slide that the other children were going through.  This excited her.  She could finally leave this place.

                She waited for the last child, a chunky boy with red hair and freckles, to go down the slide.  Without another thought, she lifted her hands to the sky and slid down the long, winding green and yellow slide.  She began to giggle uncontrollably on the long ride down, butterflies flying about in her stomach.  She was almost out of this nightmare.  She got to her feet and followed the other children out of the funhouse.  She opened the exit door with enthusiasm, hoping her mother was waiting right outside the door, but when she was finally out the door, she saw no one.

                The carnival was deserted, the rides, loud and buzzing earlier now looked old and broken down.  There wasn’t another soul around for miles.  She was alone.  Her mother had left her.  “Mommy?” Relina shouted tentatively, but the only response she heard was the echo of her own voice through the vacant park.  Then she began to scream as strong arms pulled her back into the funhouse.

Author's Note

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