Chapter 16 Wren Arthur Survive the World’s Scariest Haunted House
Wren Arthur: Survive the World’s Scariest Haunted House
Arthur had half his hand inside the jar marked with a W. Wren’s jar, full of all her hopes and dreams and greatest adventures yet to come.
It was so strange for her, watching him feel around in there.
Those belonged to her! She felt incredibly apprehensive about what he might draw and how it might feel to watch him attempt something she had dreamed of for so many years.
It was a little like the time he’d come out of the bathroom after a shower wearing her robe because all the towels were still in the wash.
It felt wrong, but for some reason she couldn’t peel her eyes away.
“You can’t be serious,” Arthur said after removing a new slip and reading it to himself. “Survive the World’s Scariest Haunted House?”
“I remember that one!” she said. “I’d seen something on YouTube about this haunted house where the actors could grab you, throw you around, tie you up and put you in the trunk of a car, drive you across state lines. Basically do anything they wanted. You had to sign a waiver to get in.”
“And this is…something you wanted to do?”
“Back then. I’m a horror buff, remember?
” Arthur was decidedly not. He’d never been willing to watch the bloody slashers and borderline torture-porn movies she got such a kick out of, outside the one time he thought it might be a good idea to try to impress her early in their relationship.
The vision of him peeking out at the “safe” scenes from between his fingers probably had not exactly been a turn-on, and she never forced him to try again.
But whatever. He never saw the appeal in an adrenaline rush of fear or visceral disgust. Without anyone to share her dark, twisted side with over the years, it had atrophied into nothing more than a passing interest. Watching trailers for Saw movies and reading the occasional Stephen King.
“But the place turned out to be just a thinly veiled excuse for the owner to torture people and he went to prison.”
“Who could have possibly seen that coming?” Arthur replied. “So I guess this one is out.”
“Unless…” Wren trailed off.
“No, no unless. Can we please not? I’ll just pick something else.”
“You said you’d do anything. You said you’d be me. You promised.”
“But the place is closed! It’s not my fault I’m getting off on a technicality!”
She didn’t want to let him off that easy. And after just a little bit of googling, she was extremely pleased to find out that she wouldn’t have to.
“I’m starting to think this isn’t a legally binding waiver,” Arthur said.
They’d driven ninety minutes to the middle of who knows nowhere Maryland to attend opening night for Vicious Asylum, the only haunted house attraction that would be open this early in the season.
A large man dressed in a slaughtered pig mask had just handed Arthur a sheet of very official-looking paper to sign.
Upon closer review, it was all part of the act.
“I hereby certify that I am a very brave boy” and that the entertainment company would not be liable for any “willies, heebie-jeebies, or soiled underwear.” Arthur begrudgingly signed on the dotted line before the pig man violently ripped the pen out of his hands and roared a psychotic sort of wail directly in his face.
“How great is this?” Wren squealed, squeezing his arm with one hand. The other was cradling a very confused Ferdie, who’d come along for the ride as they waited in line with just a handful of other “victims,” as the signage called them.
“I really don’t get what you see in any of this,” Arthur said.
He looked up at the haunted house itself, designed to look like an abandoned hospital or an insane asylum.
Strobe lights and smoke machines were doing a lot of the heavy lifting here in creating the supposed atmosphere.
A few prop cadavers, gory-looking scarecrows, and spooky skeletons were scattered around as well.
“Too scary for you?”
“No,” he said. “Just a little campy. That’s what I’ve been trying to explain to you. It’s not that I find horror frightening; I just find it gross and cheesy.”
“OK.” She laughed. “Keep that energy up. I saw some of the clips from inside and I think you’ll be changing your tune shortly.”
They reached the front of the line. This would be Wren’s last stop. In her condition, going into the attraction would be too dangerous. Tripping hazards, jump scares. They couldn’t risk it. Surprisingly, she took the news well.
“Waiva’?” a bloody bride with a cleaver stuck in her head said, speaking in an old cockney accent for some reason. Arthur handed over the paper. “If you find y’ pissin’ yourself and want out, just say the safe word,” she said, fastening a red wristband on his outstretched arm.
“Which is?”
“Tortellini.”
He laughed. “OK, now you’re just making me hungry.”
Wren gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Good luck. I’ll see you on the other side…hopefully.” She threw in a spooky ghost noise for good measure, OoooOOooo.
“I think I’ll be OK.” He smirked.
He walked through a cloud of smoke hanging in the entryway and found himself in a dimly lit hallway, all black lights and bloody streaks on the walls. He now, finally, allowed his bravado to fall away. And he promptly, and quietly, freaked the absolute fuck out.
“Fuckfuckfuck,” he whispered to no one. He was scared shitless.
No, what was worse than that? He was petrified.
Could barely move. His legs were frozen in place.
This was an actual, literal nightmare. He was a man who feared rejection, failure, and the slightest intuition that someone might be mad at him.
Being hunted by a machete-wielding psychopath was more than his heart could possibly handle.
The worst part was, there was something he hadn’t told Wren: He had stacked the deck in his favor in order to end up here. He had chosen this. He had cheated.
The thing with Wren was that she wasn’t a reasonable person.
So when he went through her jar in secret after she’d fallen asleep the other night, he knew he would have no way out if he picked Get My Nose Pierced, Run a Red Light in Broad Daylight, Hold a Live Tarantula, or any of the extremely dangerous and expensive ones: Swim with Sharks, Go Cave Diving, Get My Pilot’s License.
There was a way to push himself out of his comfort zone and grow as a person and nurture his sense of adventure and spontaneity without dying, altering his appearance, or giving himself PTSD for life. (The tarantula, in particular, was a hard no.)
So he took a few—just a piddly few—slips out of the jar. He hid them deep inside his GRE study book, a brand-new addition to the house, which he had recently and quite conveniently placed on his nightstand.
Going through a haunted house at the time didn’t sound so bad, in comparison to some of the others, so he decided that one could stay. He realized only now what a colossal mistake that had been. He hadn’t expected it to be quite so haunted.
He tried hyperventilating, drawing quick, shallow breaths and rapidly blowing them out.
It didn’t help. Then he tried slowing his breathing down, taking in a big, slow lungful of air, holding it, then gently releasing it.
OK, better. His legs released, though they were still stiff and wobbly.
He took just one step forward. OK. Progress.
That’s when a grimy hand shot through rusty bars in the wall—a doorway, as if to a prison cell—with frightening suddenness. Arthur dodged the hand, then peered into the cell and found a cackling, half-strait-jacketed patient grinning at him.
“Hey, pal,” Arthur offered. “If you could tell me the fastest way out of here, that’d be super awesome.”
He was not going to use the safe word. He’d die of a heart attack in here before doing that, and there was a good chance he might just do that.
He’d never live it down with Wren if he ran out of here like a chicken.
He was supposed to be New Arthur. Not afraid of anything at all.
Living in the moment. New Arthur should be having a grand old time hanging out in a blood-soaked hallway with scratchy, old-timey music playing over crackly speakers.
The actor in the cell beckoned Arthur to come closer with a curled finger.
“I’m good. I can actually hear you perfectly from here. Any tips or secret shortcuts you can share?”
Maybe there was some way to appeal to the actor’s humanity to get him to break character. Any advice on how to avoid the jump scares and take the fastest possible route to the exit would be greatly appreciated.
Another come hither from the mental patient. Arthur took a hesitant step toward the bars, and that’s when the actor lunged at them, grabbing them with both hands and cackling in Arthur’s face. He took a quick step backward and nearly fell over.
“My fault. That’s my fault,” Arthur said after regaining his breath and soul, both of which had briefly exited his body. “Should have definitely seen that coming.”
He continued down the hallway. There were more cells like the first one, hands jabbing out at him, shrieking laughter emanating as he slinked along.
For now, he ignored them as best he could.
At the end of the hall was a cell slightly different from the others.
Darker. The lights barely reaching. And it was fully barred, like a jail, with a figure standing inside.
Arthur was shaking. Scared out of his goddamn mind.
Intuitively, he knew he was in no real danger.
The actors were all teens and aspiring thespians from the nearest small town, not demented serial killers.
But his body was fully immersed in the experience, screaming at him to run.
He tried to steady his hands and voice as he approached.
What was he even doing here? How did he get from wanting to take more chances in his life to signing his physical rights away to some carnival freaks?
He just wanted this to be over, for Christ’s sake.