Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The day was easier with the support of my guys.
The flickers. The whispers. The clocks. They’re still there, gnawing at the edges, tick-tock-tick-tock, but less like fangs and more like bratty trick-or-treaters pounding on the door while the fog machine is running.
Annoying, relentless, but muffled under laughter and frosting fights.
Night has finally come, and instead of collapsing under the weight of the ticking, I find myself sitting up in bed with three sets of eyes on me, like a jury of monsters trying to decide if I’m fit to be unleashed on the public again.
Spoiler: I am.
“We’re going out tonight,” I announce, brushing cookie crumbs off my chest like battle medals.
“Out where?” Skully asks, already suspicious, already smirking like he loves being dragged anywhere I want to go.
“Festival,” I chirp. “Carnival. Amusement park. Whatever hell-on-earth Octoberfest nightmare they’ve got set up with fried Oreos and haunted rides. If my world’s gonna end in two days, we’re going out screaming with funnel cake in our mouths.”
Bonehead brightens instantly, like I offered him a chance to dine with God. “Me win prizes?”
“You’ll win me prizes,” I correct, poking his chest. “And maybe a giant stuffed bat with googly eyes, if you smash the hammer thing hard enough.”
Skully groans. “You’re gonna get us kicked out of somewhere else, huh?”
“Yes.”
Marrow, of course, smiles faintly like I just promised him a wedding under neon lights. “Then tonight we dine among ferris wheels, my love. A feast of sugar and noise.”
I clap, manic and gleeful. “Exactly! Tonight we out-party death. Halloween won’t know what hit it.”
Tick-tock.
The sound tries to carve itself into the moment, smug as a funeral bell. I bare my teeth at it. If it wants to play, it can eat cotton candy first.
Bonehead claps his hands, startling me out of the spin. “Carnival!” he roars, like he just invented it. “Smash games. Eat legs—turkey ones.” He beams, already on his feet, too big for this room, too full of life to care about time.
Skully flicks the imaginary ash off an unlit cigarette and smirks at me. “Hell’s fairground. Perfect. Nothing says romantic night out like carnies missing teeth and teenagers puking on the Tilt-a-Whirl.”
“Exactly,” I say, feral with relief. “If death’s coming, we’re greeting it with funnel cake and rigged ring toss.”
Marrow rises last, composed as a priest leading a procession. “Then tonight,” he intones, “we laugh beneath neon tombstones and eat sugar until our blood is candied.” His lips curve faintly. “A festival of defiance.”
I clap, manic, already digging through the closet for my bat-print jacket. “Yes! Costumes optional, chaos required. Everyone get your boots, your eyeliner, and your stomachs ready to sin.”
Bonehead whoops and nearly takes out the doorframe on the way out.
Skully groans but pulls on his jacket anyway, muttering about tetanus shots.
Marrow adjusts his cuffs like he’s preparing for a ball, not a midway.
And me? I paint on another layer of black lipstick so thick the night will have to work to kiss it off.
By the time we tumble out into the dark, the air already smells like fried dough and gasoline. It’s within walking distance, so I hook my arms through all three of theirs and drag them toward the lights, declaring loud enough for the night to hear: “Let’s go make death jealous.”
The fairground glows like somebody skinned a jack-o’-lantern and stretched it over the night sky. Bulbs burn too hot, orange and purple and acid green, strung in frantic zigzags above the crowd. Shadows jerk and twitch with every flicker, like the whole place is alive and convulsing on purpose.
The noise is a living thing. Metal clanks from the rides, hydraulics hiss, teenagers shriek like they’re being murdered for fun.
A speaker wheezes out warped carnival music, the organ notes bending into something half-haunted house, half-strip club.
Every bark from the game stalls blends into a chorus: Step right up!
Win a prize! Don’t be shy! The whole midway is yelling at me, begging me to bite.
I bite.
The air tastes like sugar rot and fried grease, like spun candy melting straight into cavities.
Cinnamon-scorched cider. Charred meat dripping fat onto coals.
A caramel apple cracks under some guy’s teeth nearby and the sound runs straight down my spine.
I lick my lips, already sticky just from breathing.
Bonehead stops under the entrance arch, staring at the plastic skulls nailed there like saints on stained glass. His whole body vibrates like he wants to charge the place headfirst. “Games,” he rumbles. “I want hammer game.”
“You’ll break records on that one,” I say proudly.
Skully’s gaze skims the booths like he’s casing the joint, lip curled, already mocking half the decorations without speaking.
“Nothing says seasonal magic like over-priced junk food and rigged games.” He shoves his hands in his jacket pockets, but the corner of his mouth twitches—he loves this, I know he does.
Marrow tilts his head up at the ferris wheel turning slow and groaning above the midway. Its bulbs strobe red-white-red like a heartbeat. His smile is faint, reverent. “A circle of fate suspended in the air. It’s beautiful in its corruption.”
Me? I want all of it. The lights, the noise, the smoke machines bleeding fog across the pathways. Every inch of it feels like my insides laid bare—cheap, overdone, ridiculous, alive.
Kids in glowing devil horns dart between legs. Couples clutch each other, squealing at the chainsaw actor stalking the crowd. The ground is tacky with spilled soda and trampled candy corn, my boots peeling free with each step.
I loop my arms through all three of theirs and drag them into the thick of it. The midway yawns open before us: booths lined with crooked grinning pumpkins, banners dripping fake blood, prizes dangling on hooks like slaughtered beasts. Plush toys, masks, a coffin-shaped pillow that calls my name.
“Welcome to church, boys,” I purr. “Tonight we pray with funnel cake.”
The midway swallows us whole. Every booth screams for attention, all flashing bulbs and screaming paint. Grim Reapers with plastic scythes wave from plywood cutouts. Cardboard coffins creak open on faulty hinges to reveal squeaky skeletons that sound like they’re dying of asthma.
We pass the food row first. Grease drips off corndogs like melted wax, caramel apples glisten red and glossy as organs, and the popcorn stand coughs steam every time the lid bangs shut.
Bonehead slows, eyes huge, staring at a fryer like it’s a wishing well.
“Eat first?” he asks, already halfway to climbing over the counter.
I tug him back by the apron strings he still hasn’t taken off. “Later. You’ll puke on the rides”
Skully keeps up a running commentary under his breath, flicking his lighter open and shut without sparking it. “Look at that, Baby—nothing says spooky like a funnel cake shaped like a ghost that got stepped on.” His mouth twitches, betraying the fact that he’ll eat six the second I’m not looking.
Marrow doesn’t bother with the food. He pauses in front of a booth where the prizes hang from hooks: stuffed pumpkins, neon bats with glittery wings, a coffin pillow trimmed in silver sequins.
His hand lifts toward it like he’s tempted to steal one, but he only murmurs, “A carnival of vanities…but even vanities can comfort the grave.”
“Exactly,” I chirp, grabbing his hand before he can drift too far into eulogy. “We’re here for comfort and chaos.”
We weave through packs of kids in cheap vampire masks and couples holding plastic cups of cider.
A scare actor with a chainsaw revs too close, and Bonehead roars back so loud the poor guy stumbles off into the fog.
Skully laughs until he chokes. Marrow just nods gravely, as though a duel has been won.
And then I see it. The hammer game. The big striped booth with a fake barker in a dollar-store top hat shouting into a megaphone about strength of heroes while a tower of lights waits to be rung.
At the top: the biggest, ugliest plush bat I’ve ever seen.
Black fur, plastic fangs, wings stitched crooked. My holy grail.
I stop so fast the boys nearly plow me over. I point, dramatic as a prophet. “There. My destiny.”
Bonehead follows my finger. His grin spreads slow, feral, teeth bared like the wolf who just found the flock. “Smash?”
“Smash,” I whisper back, reverent.
The hammer game carnie clocks Bonehead the second we stop—how could he not? My monster looms in the striped glow like a nightmare drafted into the major leagues. The guy clears his throat, puffing his chest, all false bravado.
“Step right up, big man! Think you’ve got the muscles to ring the bell? Plenty of fellas your size swing hard and come up short. Don’t want you embarrassing yourself in front of the lady.”
Bonehead tilts his head like a confused mastiff. He blinks, slow. The smile slips from his mouth. I can practically hear the gears grind in his skull: smash now or wait?
The carnie’s grin falters when Bonehead doesn’t answer, just stares with that too-wide, too-hungry look that means a booth might get flattened. The guy swallows hard, Adam’s apple bobbing like a trapped mouse.
“A bit slow in the noggin are y-”
Before he can fumble another word, Skully’s hand darts out like a thief. He plucks the megaphone from the man’s face with the kind of casual rudeness only he can pull off, flicking it to the ground with a cut of feedback.
“Hey, hey, cut the crap,” Skully drawls, his voice like ice. “Nobody talks shit to our Bonehead but us. Clear?”
The crowd of gawkers laughs nervously, unsure if this is part of the act. Bonehead beams, chest puffing out like he just got knighted.