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Another guy stepped up next to me before I could throw the fourth knife.
My cheeks warmed before I’d even looked over, pleasantly surprised to see it was the Bane-looking guy. He was staring at me again, his eyes as black as the mask covering his nose and mouth. Up close, I could see it wasn’t a Bane mask at all or any sort of faux respiratory unit. It was the lower half of a skull, painted black and accented with silver highlights to bring out the bony reliefs. It was actually way cooler than Bane, but for lack of any other name to call him, that’s what stuck.
Despite the fact he was still gripping the bloody machete at his side, I held one of the knives out to him.
He didn’t react to my silent offering. He didn’t even blink. He just stood there, muscular chest moving up and down steadily with each breath, all speckled with blood.
Shrugging, I bit my lip and turned back to the game. Well aware he was watching my every move from mere inches away, I took aim and hurled the knife. It lodged in the center of the dummy’s hairy chest; a rivulet of blood trickled out of the wound. I smiled at myself and turned—not to my friends—but to the masked stranger.
The corners of his dark eyes tightened. I sensed it was some sort of pleased emotion, though I didn’t know if it was amusement or if he was genuinely impressed. Either way, my chest puffed a little with pride. There wasn’t much for me to be proud of in my life, but my knife-handling skills (save for earlier that evening) were usually top-notch. Having a machete-wielding scare actor acknowledge that meant more than it should have, as if I needed any more proof of how pathetic I was.
Clearing my throat, I fired off the fifth one, not seeking anyone’s approval afterward.
The last two knives bristled in the center of the target’s chest, a steady stream of blood dripping from the wounds. They would’ve both been direct hits if the knives had been removed each time, but the waif of a man working the game had zoned out for most of it, looking more dead than alive.
After the last throw, the employee lifted a gnarled finger and pointed at the stuffed animals overhead. At a normal carnival, they would’ve been teddy bears and fluffy rabbits, all pastel and cute with bowties, but here they looked like they crawled out of a child’s nightmare. I didn’t care what prize I got so I gestured randomly. Maybe I’d be able to find a kid to give it to and not have to lug it around all night.
The worker pulled down the closest animal and handed it to me. It was a stuffed gray rabbit that looked like it had been to hell and back. A black patch was sewn over one part of its face, where an eye should have been. Red felt had been stitched in the center of its chest, two halves of a broken heart, lined with thickblack thread. It looked dirty and singed, like someone dragged it through mud before roasting it over a campfire, deciding to rescue it at the very last second. It was kind of cute, in an ugly sort of way. I smiled at the bunny until a wave of self-consciousness hit me.
Glancing up at Bane, I promptly wiped the look off of my face. The lights strung around the gaming area glimmered in his dark eyes, and I would’ve sworn that underneath that skeleton mask, he smiled too.
Without warning, his hand flashed out. He grabbed the green circle from around my neck and yanked it free in one swift motion. I jerked back, eyes wide. Before I could even ask what the hell he was doing, the masked stranger flung the necklace into the darkness like a frisbee and faced me again, pushing his shoulders back as if he expected me to fight him.
“What the fuck?” I furrowed my brow, waiting for an explanation.
“Come on,” Malcolm grabbed my sleeve and tugged me to the side, but I refused to budge.
Still without answering, Bane took a purposeful step back, as if giving me permission to leave.
I opened my mouth to speak again, to demand some sort of an answer, but Malcolm pulled harder, dragging me away from him while Taylor laughed and shook me by the shoulders.
“Dude, what the fuck was all that about? Hereallyhas a thing for you.”
“Tell me about it,” I replied, stroking the rabbit’s ears absentmindedly. I stole a glance over my shoulder, but Bane was gone.
Trying to shove him and the weird incident out of my head, the three of us played a couple more games, including a ball toss Taylor was determined to beat. Instead of knocking over milk bottles, though, it was a pyramid of skulls, all in various stagesof decomposition. Some were pure bone, yellow and brittle with age, while others still had chunks of hair or scraps of flesh clinging to them. With my rabbit in hand, I sat it out, using the time to people-watch. I was particularly interested in any sign of a tattooed guy in a mask, wielding a machete.
Being a former pitcher, it didn’t take long before Taylor won a giant stuffed snake. Draping it over his shoulders like a green feather boa, he grinned at us and nodded to another game stall. “Splat the rat?”
I looked over at the line, my nose wrinkling as much from the wait as from the concept of the game itself. The chorus of tiny squeaks coming from the cage at the worker’s feet made a shudder run through me. I blamed it on being in the food industry for so long, where rodents and insects were never a good thing. “I don’t know, man. I’m getting kind of hungry.”
“Are they usingrealrats?” Malcolm asked, his eyes widening, as a brown rat exploded underneath a heavy mallet, spraying the happy contestant with a shower of red droplets and chunks of fur.
Taylor shook his head. “Nah. They can’t be. You know those animal groups would be all over them. It’s just some really cool animatronic.”
“Maybe we should get something to eat,” Malcolm said, looking at me for backup. I nodded.
“Fine,” Taylor sighed, following us past the rat game and toward the scent of food.
Beyond the games, in what looked like the central area of the carnival, was a food court of sorts. It smelled like a bonfire mixed with a barbecue and a deep fryer. None of the tents had signs indicating what they were serving inside, but each had a display case of the food they had to offer. In keeping with the creepy atmosphere, it was all Halloween-themed varieties of the normal carnival food such as corndogs and churros. Malcolm grabbeda huge, brain-shaped pile of cheese curds while Taylor got the largest fried pickle I’d ever seen.
“I thought you said you were hungry?” Malcolm asked between bites of the disconcertingly squiggly pieces of cheese, glancing between my face and my hands as I passed the stuffed rabbit from one to the other while I vacillated between my options.
“Yeah, I just don’t know what I want,” I replied, the fucking story of my life. Forever caught in time and space, frozen by indecision and a lack of passion. Apathetic toward… everything. Deep down. Under the easy-going facade. It’s why I fell in love with horror movies to begin with—for an hour and a half at a time, they let mefeelsomething, anything, that was wholly different from my boring-ass reality.
Despite the fact the food area smelled amazing, my gaze skipped from one raggedy tent to the next, not seeing anything appealing.
The rotting clown from earlier popped up on my left out of nowhere. I jumped, furious that he’d caught me off guard. Any thought of food disappeared while my heart was lodged in my throat.
