From her seat, she watched as the homeless man waved goodbye. His hood was back on and though she’d already seen his face, she had a hard time convincing herself he hadn’t changed forms somehow, not a man anymore but something else.
The car sped off into the tunnel, the figure replaced by shifting darkness.
***
Regina turned the key and started the car. The dashboard lit up and music began blaring. It sounded better than any stereo she’d ever owned. She turned down the volume and tried to ignore the rental car employee as he spat out details about the vehicle.
“You got yourself all-wheel drive, six-speaker sound system, and auxiliary input for your phone right beside the cup holders.” He spoke too quickly as if he was new to the job and wanted to make a good impression. There was a couple inside the office, walking around impatiently. He kept looking toward them.
“I’ll take it,” she said, adjusting her mirrors.
“That’s great news.” He wrote something on his clipboard. “Are you interested in our extra insurance policy? It covers all scratches, big and small.”
“Is that necessary?”
“Depends on where you’re going.”
If you only knew. For a moment, she was back at Dream Woods, not as a visitor but as a new hire. Regina Michaels, Ride and Attraction Safety Coordinator, a fancy title for She Who Fills out Paperwork and Attends Endless Meetings.
And reports directly to The Director of Theme Park Operations, The Director for short.
Her pulse began to pound. Just thinking of his face, the way he’d stared at her with those hypnotic eyes, the way he’d smelled like something she couldn’t quite pinpoint, something rotten and stomach-churning.
Something like death.
“Sure, I’ll take the coverage but if you don’t mind, I really am in quite a rush.”
The man nodded quickly, writing at a frantic pace and eyeing the couple through the windows every few seconds. He handed her the clipboard, had her sign several safety agreements that she didn’t bother to read, and ripped off her copy of the paperwork. “When do you expect to return the vehicle?”
She thought about that and without knowing or understanding why, she began to feel sickly. The trip did not feel like a quick visit but rather an extended stay. If Dream Woods really had opened up again she needed to assure it got shut down for good this time. A place like that could not be allowed to open its gates again, no matter the cost.
“How about one week?” she asked.
“That sounds good, Ms. Michaels. That should come out to five hundred, including the deposit.”
“Fine by me. Anything else? I should get going. I don’t want to be late.”
“That’s all.” He stepped back while she closed the door and leaned in the window one last time. “Take care of yourself.”
He didn’t sound worried, she told herself. He couldn’t detect fear in her voice or her eyes. There was no way he could know where she was going.
She smiled, nodded, and backed out of the spot and into the street.
It was a four-hour drive—five with traffic, though it was Saturday morning. She at least had that going for her. But why rush? What would she do when she got there? She could not just charge in with guns blazing.
They would not let her.
They might even know she was coming.
She rolled up the window and turned on the air conditioner. The Lincoln tunnel was two miles ahead. There was still plenty of time to turn around. She didn’t have to do this based solely on an advertisement that may or may not have been a hallucination. Perhaps she’d finally lost touch with reality. The book had taken its toll on her, had caused some already loose part of her mind to come unhinged. She ought to give her therapist a call and ask for an increase in her prescription. But she had planned on making a trip to Dream Woods either way, no matter how painful it would be. She could not finish the book without visiting at least once more.
She made a promise to herself as she neared the tunnel.
If the park was closed when she got there, she would take some pictures, write a few notes, and get the hell out of there.
But if it truly had opened back up for business, if Dream Woods had somehow returned, then she would buy herself a ticket and she would enter its walls for the first time in thirty years.
Then she would burn the place to the fucking ground.
Chapter Ten
The scenery would have been much better without the pounding in Vince’s head. He’d wanted to get an early start, grab some breakfast and make the most of their first day at Dream Woods. But he’d had a few too many beers with Frankie the night before and it had been impossible to open his eyes this morning, even after his alarm had sounded.
Come to think of it, he didn’t remember a damn thing after leaving the restaurant. Something told him he ought to be embarrassed, that perhaps he’d done something foolish, but he waved the thought away, sipped his coffee and stood on the balcony, watching the park come to life.
It was ten-thirty and already the place was packed, though it looked a bit emptier than yesterday. It was Saturday after all. Plenty of families had probably taken off for a day trip. Give it a few hours and there would be even more screaming kids.
You could not have asked for better weather. The nearest cloud was miles away, passing over the mountains, and the temperature was quite possibly perfect.
Dream Castle looked good enough to photograph and slap onto a postcard. It shimmered in the sunlight and he could not help but think there truly was something magical about it. He snapped several pictures but none seemed to capture the moment.
There had been a note from Audra on the coffee table when he woke.
Meet us at the restaurant. Tried to wait for you.
He had not liked how quick and unaffectionate it had seemed, mostly because it matched how she had spoken to him these last few years. He stared at the note now and crumpled it, telling himself to think positive. This trip was for their benefit. It would bring them together. It had to. Because the alternative was losing her and he didn’t want to think about that.
He popped two Advil, washed them down with coffee. It was strong and delicious and probably gourmet on account of the fancy machine in their room. Vince once again smiled at the thought of being upgraded. He felt like a VIP, a valued customer of the Dream Woods rewards club.
It was almost like they’d known he was coming to visit.
He washed his face, threw on a new shirt, and headed downstairs.
Audra and the boys were at a table near the spot where the stage had been erected last night, though it had since been disassembled. Audra was chatting with Sandy and Frankie, who nodded and waved at Vince, his faded tattoos making his skin look bruised from afar. Those will be my arms someday, he thought.
Vince waved back. He felt late to the party, like his parents had grounded him and he wasn’t yet supposed to come downstairs for dinner. His face flushed a bit.
“You look like shit,” Frankie said, patting him on the back.
“You do look like shit, Dad.” Tim laughed.
Vince eyed his son before turning to Frankie. “I guess I don’t have the drinking skills I once did. You would think all that time playing in bands would have trained me for the rest of my life, but a few beers in and I feel like I’ve been on a bender for a week.”
“Your wife here thought you’d never wake up,” Sandy said. She was checking her blood sugar, though Vince wasn’t sure why she bothered. The way she drank and smoked, it wouldn’t matter if her insulin was in top shape for the rest of her life. She was going to die young.
“Did you eat?” Vince asked Audra.
She nodded. “Tried my best to wait. The kids were hungry. Andrew was getting cranky. Nothing new there.”
“I’m just tired is all,” Andrew said, not looking up from his DS. He eyes were two dark circles, like he’d been up for weeks.
“I’ll just grab a muffin in that case,”
Vince said. The thought of food made his stomach groan but not in hunger. He promised himself he would go easy on the booze tonight.
“You sure?” Audra said. “It’s going to be a long day.”
“Exactly and we’re already late.” Vince stood up, ordered a muffin at the counter, and headed back to the table. “I’ve waited almost thirty years to say this. Let’s go see the dinosaurs.”
His heart skipped, mostly from excitement but there was a tinge of fear as well. He remembered how realistic they’d looked last time. It had likely been the power of childhood. Everything seemed real when you were a kid. But those raptors—he shook his head and took a bite of his muffin, recalling how scared he’d been then, certain they would come to life before his eyes.
And crush him alive in their jaws before they tore him apart.
Slowly.
He’d swallowed a chunk of muffin down his dry throat. Perhaps the power of childhood had not entirely left him after all these years.
***
Their first stop was the log ride. Tim begged to go there. They would have the entire day to dry off, he’d said. And besides, it was the closest attraction. Why not make their way around the park in order? They could cover more ground that way and they were less likely to skip out on anything.
His parents saw no problems with his plan and Andrew said he didn’t give a shit where they went, so they had stood in line for twenty minutes before they made their way toward the ride and were strapped in by the automatic metal bars.
The water was blue. Too blue. He knew it was the chemical stuff they dumped in to make the mosquitoes stay away, just like they did at the mini golf course back home, but this was a different shade, deep and almost comical, like a clown had dumped his reserve of cotton candy into it when no one was looking.
And where had said clown gotten the cotton candy? Why, from the vending machine down the hall from their hotel room of course.
Tim winced, thinking of the choices, candies and desserts that could not have been real. Maybe he had recently taken up sleepwalking without knowing it. Maybe he had walked to the vending machine but he’d been midway into a nightmare when he got there. If he went back there right now he would see Coke and Pepsi and Milky Way and Snickers, brands he recognized and did not remind him of his condition.
Not a condition, he thought. It’s a disease, one that kills people when they get older or at the very least takes away their eyesight and gives them white splotches all over their skin. You’re going to look like a leper someday.
Tim gritted his teeth, felt like crying.
Stop thinking that way. This is a fucking vacation.
Andrew slapped him. Tim nearly jumped out of his seat and silently thanked the inventor of safety bars. “What the hell was that for?”
“You going deaf now too? Mom asked you to take your hat off five times. You going to do it or not?”
“What’s it matter?” Tim took it off, curled his finger around the brim, and placed it onto his lap.
“It’ll fall along the way,” his mother said. “By the looks of it, this ride goes pretty high. Isn’t that so?” She turned to his father.
“From what I remember it’s the highest log ride I’ve ever gone on. And I’ve gone on plenty.” He winked at Tim and smiled. He looked badly hung over. Tim had yet to thank him for rescuing him last night from the brands that did not exist.
Exactly, he thought. They don’t exist, so stop trying to tell yourself otherwise.
A couple and two children sat in the car behind the Carters. They screamed suddenly and Tim whipped his head around, thinking something was wrong. He saw that they were laughing and cheering, not scared or frightened. The ride had begun to move, he realized. He was on edge, needed to calm down.
There was a buzzing sensation from below as the ride increased its speed, unseen gears turning. He watched the preternatural blue water as the log moved slowly forward, past a fake forest scene, with rabbits and deer and foxes and—
And a large bear with jagged teeth and jutting googly eyes protruding so far from its skull they looked more like appendages, slimy worms crawling outward.
Tim tensed, crumpled his hat so that the brim bent unevenly. He wished he could remove the bars holding him in place and jump overboard. But the thought of swimming in the cotton candy water did nothing for his nerves. He imagined his skin bubbling off as he paddled along, bits and pieces of him melting away as if the water was not water at all but some sort of sugary acid.
They were within several feet of the bear now.
His father pointed and cheered. “There he is, the one and only Sebastian.” He nodded toward the bear. “It’s good to finally see you again.” He sounded younger than Tim and Andrew, a boy about to tell Santa what he wanted for Christmas this year.
His mother rolled her eyes.
Sebastian from the signs scattered around the park? No way in hell. That bear had been goofy and harmless, nothing like this one. Were his parents really laughing? Didn’t they see this furry thing was unnatural, something that didn’t belong in the landscape? The animals surrounding it were animatronic but the bear itself was flesh and bone, and it looked hungry.
Five feet now. Tim was ready to scream.
Three feet. He grabbed the metal bar, pushed upward with all the strength he could spare. It didn’t budge. If anything it felt tighter around his waist.
Two feet. There was something in the bear’s hand now, something that looked like a needle, the kind Tim used for his insulin, only three times as large. The liquid inside was not insulin. It was a familiar shade of cotton candy blue. The bear was going to inject him. He could feel the acid flowing through his veins. It would wipe out his diabetes in one swoop, along with every major organ.
One foot.
The burning would be more painful than anything he could imagine, worse than his slow descent into diabetes hell, worse than knowing his body was going to slowly fall apart by the time he was forty, even worse than knowing his parents hated each other.
His dad cheered, as did everyone in the logs behind them. The bear’s eyes receded and his face became fabric, as did the rest of him. He was just a man in a costume now, the one from the signs around the park, the Dream Woods mascot.
It was Sebastian, not some beast that wanted to torture Tim and his family.
The ride increased its speed and began to climb upward. Tim turned around and watched Sebastian, waiting for him to transform again but he remained a mascot for the entire time, waving and nodding at cheering families until he disappeared as they turned the corner.
The log cars climbed higher still so that a good portion of the park was visible. It would have been beautiful were it not for Tim’s pounding pulse that boomed in his ears. He could see every ride and attraction and every mountain peak in the distance. He thought about how long it had taken them to get here, how far away this place seemed from home. He recalled looking at his house and feeling like it was for the last time.
As they began to descend, he winced at the drops of water splashing onto his skin. He prepared for the burning sensation, for the acrid smell of burning flesh.
But the sensation and the aroma did not come. His skin was wet but there was no pain. It was not acid, just food coloring chemicals and water.
“There’s something wrong with this place,” he said, more to himself than anyone else.
His mother and father didn’t hear him. They were shouting and laughing together, a rare occurrence. They almost looked happy. “Almost” being the key word. Give it a few hours and things would be back to normal.
Andrew turned toward him. “You got that right,” he said.
“You feel it too, don’t you?” Tim’s hands fidgeted with the hat. It had become warped beyond return, no longer wearable. He’d have to throw it away when the ride was finished.
Andrew was about to say something when the car slowed and locked into place. The bars lifted and they all stood.
Tim was fi
rst in line to leave.
Chapter Eleven
Andrew did not want to go into the Haunted Tunnels.
By the looks of it, neither did Tim. He was shaking, looked almost sickly, the way he got when his blood sugar was messed up and when he needed more insulin. But their mother had already checked Tim’s blood and had shot him up with his medicine. It wasn’t his diabetes causing the reaction, Andrew realized.
It was fear.
His brother was scared out of his mind.
Andrew could not blame him. Dream Woods had seemed creepy before they’d even arrived, given the tales he’d heard in school, which were starting to seem less fictional, but when they’d first entered the gates, the place seemed harmless enough. He could have almost believed the stories were just stories until last night.
Until he’d known someone was at the door.
Until he’d known someone was watching from the castle.
That’s how it felt now, like there were eyes scattered about, countless unseen observers waiting for the opportune moment to strike. He felt surrounded.
From the outside, the Haunted Tunnels should have seemed cheesy. The exterior was a large building made to look like a mountain with twisting mineshafts inside. Generic scary music played from unseen speakers, the breeze distorting the sounds so that they seemed more like white noise. In the middle was a moving mechanical skull with brightly lit red eyes. Fake mist and fog blew from its open mouth. Two crisscrossed pitchforks lay behind it, forming an X. The skull wore a yellow hard hat with a flickering light on the brim.
Despite the thing looking like a cheap Halloween decoration, Andrew still wanted to turn around and head back.
But back where? Certainly not to the hotel room, and certainly not anywhere else in the park.
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