Page 9 of His to Fear
I should’ve left the circus a long time ago.
I don’t answer. Instead, I approach her, all the while feeling the burn of the stranger’s touch on me.
Chapter 4
Nadia
The Hayride
The outside of thecircus has never felt as good as it does now. Screw the eerie atmosphere, it’s a relief just wandering out into the fresh air.
“I thought it was supposed to be scary,” Eveline pouts.
We reach the lit-up enclosure outside the circus tent, where fairgoers are gathered to get the stamps on their cards.
“It was way too easy,” Zack snickers. His hands are in his pockets, wearing that casual could-not-give-a-fuck look that’s typical for him. At least the few times I’ve met him.
“Sure…easy.”
My gaze can’t leave the tent we just exited. The words the stranger uttered still ring loud and clear in my ears, an echo refusing to go away. I’m mad at myself for being so affected by someone I don’t even know, and shame gushes through me, flooding my bloodstream with something inevitable.
The other fairygoers before us are all laughing amongst each other, seemingly at ease and not at all affected by whatever transpired. I can’t help but look around for the man I saw entering the circus before me, the one who definitely flirted, but I come up disappointed when I don’t see him.
Maybe he already left the area.
Shaking off my thoughts, I try to think of something else. We made it out of the first level. That’s something, at least.
When it’s our turn in line, we all receive a stamp from the attendant. Black ink seeps across the page, forming the words‘The Hellcus.’
“If you think that was easy, it was only the warm-up,” the attendant says with a mysterious smile.
“It wasn’t scary at all,” Eveline replies, disappointment seeping through her words.
“Just you wait. Blood comes to all who do.”
There’s an ominous tone in her words that none of the others seems to catch. I shift uneasily, suddenly feeling a prickling sensation at the nape of my neck. Someone’s watching me, but there’s no one around me.
“The next level is through this archway,” the attendant points toward the right, where an archway leads into the woods in the distance.
It takes us a few minutes to reach it, Zack and Eveline taking the front.
A loud, shredding scream rips through the atmosphere. The voice is hoarse and cracking at the end, fighting for purchase, and a shiver of coldness washes over me. I turn around, staring back at the circus tent with trepidation. At first, I can’t see anything, but I can still hear that scream. Like an animal being gutted from the inside out. Nausea overwhelms me, memories of that night filtering through.
But when I see a scare-actor chasing a few girls inside the enclosure of the exit, something inside me slightly eases and calms down.
Didn’t that scream feel too real?
Giggles erupt far in the distance, coming from the girls, and I’m forced to keep moving forward when Eveline drags me with her.
“We’re at a haunted fair,” she nudges my shoulder with a playful hint.
As if that makes the scream less real.
Jack-o’-lanterns line both sides of the pathway, with plasticskeletons hanging from the trees by invisible threads, adding an extra touch of Halloween.
I accidentally stumble into something sticky and clinging, threads of white weaving down from a tree. A spiderweb. A disgusted grunt slips out before I can stop it. Ugh, I hope it was just a prop.
“The only scary thing about that circus was the clowns and the jump scares. Otherwise, not so much,” Eveline continues.
