The Carousel
We used to go out to the abandoned circus by The Ridge when we felt brave, to party. It was a place that the adults had mostly forgotten or written off. Nature had started to consume it, and most of the time, it was covered in a layer of fog that only deepened the closer to midnight it got. But, it still had power and some of the rides still worked.
We sat in a circle, five of us in various stages of sobriety. Me, John, Alex, Natalie, and Amber. As always, I was the awkward one, the spare part in an already mis-matched set. I tried to ignore the kisses and making out, and downed more of my fifth. I wandered over to the carousel. There were so many superstitions about this damn thing. It was creepy to begin with, horses with peeling paint around their mouths, giving them otherworldly grimaces, not to mention the damn thing only ran backwards.
There were so many stories about people riding this thing, that never came back right afterwards. One version says that riding it for three backwards rotations will show you the way you die, another version says that it will show you a truth about yourself that you have suppressed.
Anyone who has claimed to ride it can only make it through two, and they don’t come back right in the head always after. Maria came back only able to hum a circus tune, and is supposedly still in the psych ward. Bruce came back crying black tears that didn’t stop for weeks. He doesn’t talk about the carousel anymore, or talk much in general anymore.
I watched the carousel, gripping my bottle so hard that it slipped from my hand. The clank broke my focus. I bent down to grab it.
“Whatcha doing, man? Are you gonna ride that thing?” Jason asked, slapping me on the back.
“It’s the only thing he’ll ever get to ride,” Alex said, kissing Natalie.
“Oh my gosh, you guys, we should ride it, together.” Amber said. She was so drunk, or high, or both.
“Is that a good idea?” I asked.
“I’ll let you do unspeakable things to me, if you ride this ride with me,” Amber said to Jason.
And that was all it took. The four of them got on the carousel.
“C’mon, this isn’t a good idea,” I called after them. But they weren’t listening. They were giggling laughing, kissing, then…screaming.
They were soul-bending screams, like something primal, only uttered moments before someone knew they were going to die.
After three spins, the carousel didn’t stop spinning, it spun faster. Faster than it ever should have been able to go.
Their screams pierced the horrible carousel music until It screeched to a stop. I lost count of how many times it went round.
I stepped forward on unsteady legs, my heart thundering. There were five people on the carousel.
Amber, her mouth was moving in a silent pattern of speech I had never seen before.
Natalie, her mouth kept opening wider and wider. The pop of her jaws echoed through the silence as they unhinged.
Alex, watched me. He looked normal until I realized his eyes were upside down and he was blinking all wrong.
Jason, he stared at me. His eyes were red, glowing. “You, we saw you. We saw what you become.”
I looked at the last person on the carousel - me. I smiled at myself, a hollow, sinister smile.
The carousel began spinning backwards again.
I still hate myself for running away and never looking back.
That was the last time any of them were seen. I was eventually cleared of any suspicion surrounding their disappearances and the police eventually marked it up to runaways, a group suicide pact, a tragic accident.
But I was never quite cleared in the eyes of the town, even in a place like Echo Ridge where people go missing all the time.
Only I will ever know what happened that night.
I’m reminded of it every night. I hear the music outside my window, I hear it in my dreams. And sometimes, I catch glimpses of them in mirrors or out of the corner of my eyes.
And, every time I catch my reflection in the mirror, it is always smiling back at me.
Malia
“I’m excited to meet your family finally,” Dave said, from the driver’s seat.
“Me too,” I said, tucking a lock of hair behind my ear.
“So, this is where you grew up?”
“Basically, in a field of fog and potatoes,” I said, laughing. “It’s nothing like your glamorous New York childhood. All we did was go to school, work on farms and party in the fields, but not past dark.” I wasn’t sure why I added that last part in. It was a stupid childhood superstition. But, what if it wasn’t? What if what happened to Malia was because of…
“Sometimes, I think I would have preferred this to rich, snobby kids. It’s more real.”
“It’s real alright,” I said. ”I couldn’t wait to get out of here and away from all this fog. Do you believe that we used to be afraid of it, growing up?”
“No way!” Dave said, shifting in his seat.
“I wish I was joking. And our parents played into the whole thing. They said at night, especially over by The Ridge, the crops grew too quickly, so quickly that you could hear them moving, creaking, and breathing almost. Some said there was a creature, a sentinel of sorts, that was there to guard the secrets of The Ridge. It would stop at nothing to make sure The Ridge stayed protected.”
“That’s kind of messed up,” he said.
“Tell me about it. But one night, a few of our friends went out and stayed out late, later than we were supposed to. My best friend, Malia, said she wasn’t going to listen to that stupid urban legend, and that it was probably just a way for our parents to keep us from drinking or getting pregnant. We stayed out past dark, and…” I couldn’t finish my sentence.
“And, what happened?”
I shook my head, unable to continue and also at a loss for words. Would he even believe me if it told him? “Oh look, The Ridge is there,” I said, pointing to the jagged rock. It was taller than anything surrounding, bearing down on the road so much that it dimmed the sun. My throat went dry and I pulled my eyes away.
“That’s a little ominous looking, I’ll give you that.”
I nodded. I ignored the creature that I knew lived within the stalks. It looked like a scarecrow. It followed the path of the car with its eyes that blinked sideways and wore Malia’s face.
Official reports cite five missing person in this case. And the only circus ever recorded as being in Echo Ridge was in the early 1950's. There was no mention of the equipment being left. The teenagers disappeared in 2015.
-E.W.
Local Lore & Oral Histories
Cross-referenced with missing person reports and verified. But the year is not correct on the reports.
-E.W.