“What if it’s not, Jess?” Noah said gently. “What if you lost six hours? I don’t think that makes you guilty. I think you witnessed something horrific and blocked it out.”
Jessie stared through the tent husk. I hadn’t remembered that man calling me Matchstick before. What if there is more to that night?
“How about we do a walk-through together? Being here might trigger some of those lost memories. If it doesn’t, at least you can say you tried to make sense of it.”
Jessie nodded, but as she walked to the tent, everything began to spin. Her legs buckled beneath her and another memory sparked.
With agility, the man who’d called her Matchstick maneuvered himself in front of her. “Augustine Montvale, is the name, and you, my dear, are exquisite.”
“That’s a fancy name for a carnie.”
Laughter and cheers erupted from the tent. Someone would hear her if she screamed.
“I am the prince of carnies, the owner of all you see, and would be honored to give you the VIP experience.”
He was certainly going a long way to impress her. With a sardonic smile, she pointed to the snow-covered land. “I see the field. You telling me you own the grass?”
“For you, I would claim ownership of the stars.”
Augustine might be a liar, but so was she for posting that selfie without going inside. Jessie looked at the distant fencepost she’d leaned against for the past hour. The silhouette she longed to see remained absent, and a fresh gust of wind made tears stream and her face prickle with numbness. It did look warm in the tent.
“Perhaps we could go in,” she conceded. “Just for a few minutes.”
Warmth seeped through her snowflake speckled glove as she accepted his hand, and the two crunched over the snow and through the entrance.
“Are you ok?” Noah had hold of her elbow, steadying her.
“It snowed that night. There was a man, Augustine. He wanted me to stay.”
“Augustine the ringmaster?”
“I think so. That’s who he said he was.”
Shaking off the wave of dizziness, Jessie appraised the ghostly Big Top. I did go in that night. All this time, I was certain I went straight home. Noah trudged inside, and with a deep breath and fluttering in her stomach, Jessie followed.
There was no warmth to be found within. Noah’s flashlight was the only thing to cast out small patches of shadow. The benches, haphazardly stacked, lay over one another with a few ends angled as high as Jessie’s head. Jessie ran her fingers over the damp wood. Are they causing the smell? No, they accounted for the musty aroma, but couldn’t take the blame for the sickly scent of rot.
“When did you spot Trev?” Noah asked, making Jessie jump. “You must have seen him here, arm around Stacy, enjoying the show.”
“I didn’t, I mean, I don’t think I did.” He ditched me for Stacy? Jessie had liked Stacy, admired her even from a distance, but she didn’t like the idea of being Trev’s second option. Second option? More like last option. Who knows how many people he asked?
No longer circular, the ring was an odd-shaped void of earth surrounded by debris. Jessie felt strange stepping into it. Laid wooden boards still marked walkways around the ring, keeping the viewing area separate. A large, toppled chair lay in the ring’s center. A throne—a pair of thrones, she thought, lifting it, seeing the velvet backrest and carved arms. She searched for a second one, and when she found it, aided by Noah’s light, another memory triggered.
The crowd silenced as Augustine pulled Jessie into the ring. “My beautiful guest of honor,” he announced, leading her to the thrones. The cheers, the applause, all those eyes on her, made Jessie sink into the chair and wish for it to swallow her up.
The sandy ring burst into color, and a disembodied voice boomed, “Prepare to be amazed. Look on in awe at the most magical show on Earth!” With the many eyes no longer focused on her, Jessie dropped her guard and did just that.
A trio of lithe performers danced around the ring incorporating gymnastic twists, back flips, and spinning jumps worthy of the Olympics. For the finale, two of the acrobats tossed the third high in the air, and she grasped a lowering swing. Contorting her body back and forth, she propelled through the air, and the two below vanished in a vortex of smoke.
“How did they…?” When Jessie looked at Augustine, she found him staring at the show with as much wonder as her. Augustine’s eyes had been gray, hardly a noteworthy feature, but in this strange light, they shone a piercing blue. He not only exuded charm, but youthfulness.
Before he caught her eyeing him, she turned her attention back to the mesmerizing trapeze artist and—
Jessie clasped her hands over her mouth as the acrobat slipped from the trapeze in a tumbling freefall. At the last second, the woman stopped mid-air and gracefully walked up invisible steps, leaving a glittering trail of dust behind her. Skating and twirling, she ended her aerial display with a floating curtsey.
“I didn’t see the wires at first. And the smoke machines, pockets stuffed with glitter. I actually thought there was magic here,” Jessie said, looking up for the trapeze, though if it still hung there, the gloom consumed it. “That somehow reality had ceased to exist, in a tent, in the middle of a field in Gloucestershire.” She shook her head and breathed a laugh. “I was so stupid.”
Noah righted the thrones and with Jessie’s direction, dragged them to the edge of the ring where they’d sat in her memory. He sat down in one and motioned for Jessie to sit in the other. “And that’s when you saw Trev?”
“No, I don’t think—” Jessie’s head throbbed with searing pain. What came next wasn’t a complete memory.
Trev caught her attention and sneered at her—a wounding look of disgust and pity.
From the corner of her eye, she saw black smoke creeping down the tent walls.
“Smoke goes up, not down!” Jessie found herself screaming, but as she took in her surroundings, she realized the bright tent walls were dark. Deeply inhaling through her nose, she sampled many unpleasant smells, but none of them resembled smoke.
“You ok, Jess?” Noah asked.
Jessie nodded, smiling at him. “Yeah, just felt like I was choking for a minute, but it’s passed now.”
“Maybe this isn’t such a good idea. I think we should come back with some professional help, someone who can guide you through this.”
“You mean like a shrink?” Jessie had worked her way through the local mental health team, and specialists brought in from around the country. There was this cold, dispassionate curiosity they all had, even the ones she’d initially liked. “I’m not seeing another shrink.”
Noah tucked some of his messy hair behind his pointed ears.
Cute, Jessie thought. Like elf ears. A strong sense of déjà vu washed through her. Noah’s features morphed into Augustine’s. I liked him, this carnie of tricks and lies. I really liked him.
The memory faded, leaving Noah eyeing her with a puzzled look. “Have I got something on my face?”
“No.” Jessie smothered her smile. “You reminded me of someone for a moment, that’s all.”
Noah patted her arm, and the ring lit up.
Jessie couldn’t pry her eyes away from Trev as he stroked the curve of Stacy’s face and kissed her cheek. He did the same to me in the cinema, begged for my number, told me he’d never fallen for someone so quickly before, Jessie thought. But his mouth now mimed the same words to Stacy.
Though vaguely aware of the trapeze artists, all three swinging through the air, Trev had Jessie’s gaze and was putting on a show just for her.
A loud pop, a gushing splatter, then a thud, snapped Jessie’s head back to the show. She turned in time to see the second acrobat explode, spilling a torrent of blood into the ring. The torn up body landed on the gore. The last terrified figure hung from the trapeze, gaping at the mess below. A second later, her flesh tore open, too fast to mouth a scream, too fast to switch that fearful expression to shock. When her bo
dy hit the ground, joining with the entrails of her troop, the industrial lights shattered. But Jessie swore the mingled remains squirmed in the darkness.
She’d seen the images of these acrobats before in her nightmares, woken drenched in sweat and fear. The crime scene photos they kept shoving in my face caused those nightmares. But she didn’t believe that was true anymore.
“What is it, Jess?” Noah said, his wide eyes pleading with her to share what she’d seen.
“I can’t—”
A flurry of images assaulted her mind.
Black smoke cascaded down the walls. Terrified people tried to cross it, to leave this tent of nightmares. Jessie watched a man put his arm through, only to wrench it back, stripped to the bone. Others ran at it and dropped away—skeletons nestled in a half-shell of flesh.
Augustine slapped at Jessie’s hand. “Your name, your name,” he spluttered, his eyes wide and pleading. Water filled his mouth and more spilled out with every exhale. Jessie tried to help him, but his throat was brimming—he was drowning.
Screams and carnage flooded her head. When she opened her eyes, Jessie found herself crumpled on the ground. “Noah?”
At the far side of the tent lay Noah’s discarded flashlight.
“Noah,” Jessie called again.
How long was I trapped in that memory? It seemed like a moment, but it took longer than that to cross the ring, navigate the benches, and reach the back wall where the canvas was at its barest and the night sky showed through.
The flashlight was resting on a huge pile of illegally dumped rubbish—broken furniture, black bags, rotten food. That accounts for the smell, at least. The beam lit up a newspaper, and when she lifted the flashlight, the newspaper came away with it, stuck to its head. Jessie peeled it off, tossed it away, and swept the beam around the Big Top.
“Noah!”
Torn sheets of canvas slapped on the frame, wind rustled the lighter rubbish on the pile, and the flashlight cut out.
“Come on,” Jessie said, slapping the flashlight, but it wouldn’t turn on and the darkness entombed her.
This isn’t safe. I’m not safe.
Steeped in blackness, the entrance was far from view; past this disarray of benches, past the darkened ring that so easily strummed her memories to life. Jessie peered over the mound of rubbish to the large hole in the back of the tent.
I can climb out, run across the field, and the next, and make it to the road.
Jessie froze. “Hello? Noah?”
The canvas stilled. Not even the slightest breeze touched Jessie’s skin, yet something moved, rustling paper and plastic packaging on the heap. Jessie begged her legs to move, but the hopelessness of her situation glued her feet to the spot. Making it out of the tent wouldn’t save her.
The majority of people died here, but not all. Many died on the rides or painted the snowy field red. Jessie couldn’t shake the crime scene photos she’d seen from her head, picturing which tormented fate would mirror her own.
Poor Jessie, no one’s going to miss you; the big girl, the redhead. Augustine never liked you. He felt sorry for you. Jessie tried to quiet the self-loathing voice—I am worthy of love, my size doesn’t matter, my hair is my best feature—but it persisted. The voice lost words, becoming a tight knot of dread and shame.
But this wasn’t her self-loathing talking. Something else drove these thoughts. Jessie screwed her eyes shut, letting out a yelp as a can clattered from the heap, landing on her foot. She could sense a presence moving right beside her.
A hoarse whisper slid into her ear. “Need a date, Jessie?”
“Trev?”
Jessie prized open her lids—then snapped them shut. Easing them open again, she took in the sneering, glowing figure floating before her and whimpered. Trev’s right eye swung, connected to its socket by a single frayed thread. Deep wounds marred his flesh. Torn open from the inside-out. A claw protruded, point first from the cut on Trev’s cheek, like some kind of beast tried ripping its way out of him.
“You did this, Jessie.”
“How could I—?”
“You did this!” he screamed, his body turning to mist and rushing her.
Just my imagination. Not real, not real. Before she could react, more of the past stole her conscious mind away.
Augustine lay drowned at her feet. Bloodied corpses covered the ring and piled on one another before the perimeter of smoke. The screams all around were no less desperate, but fewer voices gave them sound. Phone lights cut beams through the darkness, though not enough to light up the cavernous space.
Trev crawled through the dead and dying, reaching a hand toward her. Jessie didn’t know how to help, but giving in to her instincts, reached out for him. Something moved beneath his clothes. A fist-sized bulge pushed out his taut skin until it ruptured. Claws! A clawed hand ripped through, and Jessie looked away.
Everyone was so desperate to leave by the entrance no one had noticed the curtain of smoke parting at one spot at the back of the tent. Jessie ran for it. The tent, pegged tightly to the ground, had little give. Jessie eased under the canvas, keeping her arms tucked in tight to avoid the smoke pouring on either side of her. Any second that curtain will come down, cutting me in half, she thought, but there was no other way, and judging from the pushing on her feet, someone else wanted out too.
The thought of the smoke coming down on her like an acid guillotine followed her into the empty Big Top. She pinched her legs until the skin bloomed before accepting they were still attached.
“Hello,” she said. “Noah?”
“Where’s the…?” Jessie dropped to her knees and swept the wooden boards. “I had it, right here.” Her voice trembled as she searched for the missing flashlight. “No, no, no!” She was alone in the dark. Burying her head into her knees, Jessie wept.
“Jess, where are you?” Noah’s call sounded far away.
Jessie stiffened and wiped away her tears. “I’m here, Noah, I’m here!” She scrambled over the rancid heap and through the frayed canvas. “Noah!”
The field and crumpled rides lay lifeless. The only thing to move through this wasteland was a distant beam of light. “Noah!” Jessie screamed, squinting to make out the figure holding the light.
The flashlight stopped, holding a steady beam. Jessie ran past the toppled Ferris wheel. From the corner of her eye, Jessie saw it upright, spinning out of control, coming off its rig, and slamming the cars into the dirt. Other rides moved in her peripheral, tossing people high in the air, or crushing them in their metal arms. Jessie kept her eyes on the flashlight, desperate not to have these fleeting images manifest another debilitating memory.
The maze of mirrors, seriously? As she neared, the beam of light left the sign and traveled inside.
“Noah?” Jessie swallowed hard and eased through the entrance.
They said they found my DNA on a corpse in here. Reflection after reflection lined the walls, though only those closest were lit up enough to show her haggard face. The flashlight beam refracted off the mirrors, creating a diffused light.
“Noah?”
“Through here,” he called.
Jessie turned a corner and found the officer kneeled down, examining the shards of a shattered mirror. “What are we doing in here? Why did you leave me in the tent?”
“Jess, that was an hour ago. It’s like you were sleepwalking. I shook you, but you wouldn’t respond, so I went to get help, but…” He hung his head for a moment. “Then I came back to check on you, and you were still zoned out but in a different part of the tent, so I grabbed the flashlight and came back out.”
“Did you flag down a car? Get hold of someone?” Noah stayed quiet. “Speak to me!”
“I… I don’t want to scare you, Jess, but I couldn’t leave the field. It’s like there’s a force all around, pushing me back.”
“What do you mean, a force? You’re not making any sense.”
Noah stood and looked her straight in the eye. “When I came
here a week ago, there was nothing left. No tent, no rides, all that stuff got cleared after the investigation. Just an empty field with a pile of dumped trash.” He slumped to the ground, picked up a large mirror shard, and frowned at it.
“So what are we doing here? The maze of mirrors can’t get us out.”
“It’s strange, but I think it can. This place is a puzzle, right? So maybe if we go through it, we can leave the field.”
“Let’s go to the fence together and—”
Jessie’s throat constricted. Her red hair lightened to blonde in the mirror and her features morphed into someone else. As the world faded, she saw a familiar face in place of her own.
An hour passed of half watching the performance, while exchanging words and smiles with Augustine. She was wanted, listened to, contented. Her daydreams ranged from plucking up the courage to swap numbers with him to packing up her life and following the carnival. But whenever her eyes strayed to Trev, she was filled with doubts. Hadn’t he made her feel the same way? Called her his queen, consumed her every waking moment from that first date?
Trev whispered something to Stacy, pointing at Jessie, and they both fell into a fit of uncontrollable laughter.
The image shifted. Jessie was looking up at the fair from the ground, with the tent canvas weighing on her back. Someone pushed on her feet, and Jessie belly-crawled arm over arm across the snowy grass.
“Jess!”
A blonde head appeared under the marquee where Jessie’s feet had been moments before. Jessie grabbed Stacy’s outstretched hand and dragged her out.
“Come on, I’m parked this end!” Stacy sprang to her feet and pulled Jessie through the rides and screaming people. Whatever was happening in the Big Top, was killing people out here too.
A scream grew in volume. Stacy jerked Jessie out of the path of a figure, hurtling through the air. As the woman crashed into the ground, still clutching the safety rail of a ride, Jessie heard bones crunching inside of the thud. The woman looked at Jessie pleadingly, mouthing words and dribbling blood.
“I can help,” Jessie said with tears in her eyes.
Dark Carnival (A Horror Anthology) Page 19