Chapter 21 #2
And me? My knees wobble. My heart does a stupid cartwheel. I press a hand to my chest like a swooning Victorian widow. “Oh my God,” I whisper, high and giddy. “He’s defending his brother-husband’s honor. I’ve never been so turned on in my life.”
Bonehead points at Skully, grinning so wide his teeth flash. “Best friend.”
“Shut up,” Skully mutters, but he doesn’t stop scowling down at the carnie. “Just play your game.”
I might die right here, under carnival lights, from horny delight and secondhand felony. What a way to go.
The carnie is pale, sweating through his cheap polyester vest, but he manages to croak, “Fine—fine, step up, big guy. One swing. If you can ring the bell, the bat’s yours.”
Bonehead doesn’t need to be told twice. He lumbers forward with the confidence of a man who’s never doubted a single muscle in his body. The crowd parts for him instinctively, like everyone just decided at once they’d prefer to live.
He picks up the hammer, and for a second I think the poor thing’s going to snap in half just from being held wrong. His grin is radiant, stupid, beautiful.
“Do it, baby!” I shriek, cupping my hands around my mouth. “Make that bell your bitch!”
Skully snorts, raising his voice above the buzz of the carnival. “Ladies and gentlemen, please remove your children from the splash zone.”
Marrow stands perfectly still, arms folded, but his eyes gleam like he’s watching a gladiator in the Colosseum.
Bonehead plants his feet. Raises the hammer. My heart hammers with him—tick, tock, tick, tock—until he brings it down with a roar that rattles my bones.
The whole contraption screams. The puck rockets skyward, slamming into the bell so hard it doesn’t just ding, it wails, like the sound of a church tower tolling at the world’s end. The crowd gasps.
“Yes!” I jump so high I nearly flash the entire midway. “That’s my boy! King of Smash! Champion of Fuck You Physics!”
Bonehead drops the hammer, chest heaving, sweat gleaming on his brow like he just saved civilization. “Pretty for October,” he pants, and then, with the dumbest, proudest smile, he points at the ugly plush bat dangling from the top hook. “Mine.”
The carnie nods frantically, climbing a rickety stool to unhook it. He nearly falls twice, fumbling to get it down. When he finally shoves it into Bonehead’s arms, it looks pathetic against him, like a toy mouse handed to a lion.
Bonehead hugs it anyway, eyes shining, then turns and presents it to me with both hands, like he’s offering tribute to his queen.
I scream. Actually scream. The kind of scream that makes strangers turn, unsure if they should call security. “I love it! I love you! I love us!”
I snatch the bat, clutch it to my chest, and kiss Bonehead full on the mouth, sugar-sweet air buzzing around us. The crowd whoops. Someone whistles. Somewhere in the back, a child cries.
Perfect.
We leave the hammer game in a blaze of victory, Bonehead strutting like he’s just been crowned Homecoming King of Destruction. I hug my enormous plush bat to my chest, its googly eyes wobbling with every step, and dare anyone to look at me without reverence.
The next row of booths is lit up in sickly green bulbs, all bottles and rings and promises nobody sane would believe. Ring toss. Classic scam.
“Absolutely not,” I say immediately. “These are rigged.”
“Exactly,” Skully purrs, flicking his lighter open and shut as he surveys the booth like it’s prey. “Which means I’m the only bastard here qualified to win.”
The carnie behind the counter is half-asleep, leaning on his elbow, expression bored. That won’t last.
Skully slaps a few bills on the counter, scoops up the plastic rings, and twirls one around his finger like a gunslinger.
The first toss clatters off the bottle neck.
The second ricochets so wildly it nearly decapitates a cardboard ghost. The third—well, let’s just say I’m about to start heckling when I see his other hand.
Sleight of hand, smooth as smoke. While everyone’s eyes are on the flying ring, his off-hand ghosts over the row of bottles and—plunk—a ring drops neatly onto the neck like it was always there.
The carnie startles upright, taking a cartoonish double glance. “Hey-”
“Shh.” Skully’s smirk could slice glass. “Did you see me cheat? No? Then it’s magic, Baby.” He tosses me a wink over his shoulder.
I shriek, clutching my bat. “You criminal! You delinquent! You absolute sex monster!”
Bonehead beams proudly, like he just trained him. Marrow sighs like the world’s most put-upon priest.
The carnie glares, but he knows better than to argue with the pack of us, so he grumbles and gestures at the prize wall. Skully doesn’t even look at me for input—he just plucks down a ridiculous oversized coffin pillow trimmed in silver sequins. He swings it into my arms with a flourish.
“For the queen of bad taste,” he says solemnly, mocking, adoring.
I collapse against it with a theatrical groan, half-burying my face in sequined death. “Oh, Skully. My little fraud. My felonious prince. I could cry.”
“Please don’t,” he mutters, smirk twitching, “I’m not carrying tissues.”
I clutch the coffin pillow to my chest, sequins biting into my cheek, and look up at him like he just handed me the moon wrapped in duct tape. He’s standing there all sharp lines and smug edges, lighter flicking open-shut-open like a nervous tic he’ll never admit to.
I can’t help it. I launch at him, coffin pillow and all, and mash my mouth against his.
He makes a startled sound—half laugh, half growl—and the lighter clatters to the ground. His free hand fists in my jacket, pulling me closer like he’s been waiting all night for me to pounce.
The kiss is messy, all teeth and smudge, his lip ring cold against my tongue. He tastes like sugar from the funnel cake air and smoke that isn’t even lit yet, like every bad idea I’ve ever loved.
Bonehead whoops like he’s cheering a touchdown. Marrow sighs, long-suffering, but I can feel his eyes on us, warm and heavy, like even he can’t look away.
When I finally pull back, Skully’s eyeliner is smudged worse, and my lipstick is a crime scene across his mouth. He licks it off slow, deliberate, just to make me whimper.
“Cheater,” I whisper, breathless, dizzy, clinging to the coffin pillow like it might keep me upright.
His grin is wicked, perfect. “Only when it counts.”
I want to eat him alive.
The coffin pillow is still pressed against my chest when Marrow clears his throat, low and deliberate, like he’s been waiting his turn in this carnival of idiocy.
His eyes are already locked on the next booth, where a row of tin crows leer from a painted graveyard backdrop.
The sign above drips neon blood: SHOOTING GALLERY.
“Oh, no,” I whisper, grinning. “We’re arming him.”
Bonehead perks up. “Guns?”
“Fake ones,” I reassure, though my stomach flips at the thought of Marrow with any weapon. He looks like he was born to duel at dawn. I slap down cash.
Skully leans in, smirking, “Please tell me Dracula’s about to flex his second-amendment rights.”
Marrow doesn’t dignify that with a glance.
He steps up to the counter, every motion measured, and lifts the rifle the way most men would lift a quill.
The carnie—older, slouching, clearly bored—starts to mutter through his pitch, but stops short when he sees the way Marrow’s fingers settle around the stock.
Elegant. Possessive. Like he’s greeting an old friend.
The first shot cracks, sharp and final. A tin crow topples instantly.
The carnie blinks. “Well—uh—lucky shot.”
Marrow’s mouth doesn’t move, but his eyes gleam. Second shot. Third. Fourth. Each crow falls with surgical precision, metal clanging against metal. By the time the gun clicks empty, the entire gallery is silent, every crow dead on the floor.
The carnie stares, slack-jawed. “Jesus Christ.”
“Not quite,” Marrow murmurs, setting the gun down like he’s laying a body to rest.
My knees buckle. I clutch the coffin pillow harder, eyes wide, heart beating like the bell Bonehead just rang. “Oh my God. I just came. Seriously, I did. You can check.”
Bonehead laughs so hard he nearly topples a prize rack. Skully groans, muttering, “Of course you did,” but even he’s smirking like he’s impressed.
The carnie, still stunned, gestures helplessly at the wall of prizes. “Uh…anything you want.”
Marrow turns to me, grave and courtly, as if we’re at some gothic auction instead of a cheap plywood booth. “Choose, my love.”
My gaze lands on the most ridiculous prize in sight: a massive stuffed raven, black feathers gleaming under the lights, red glass eyes staring like a demon. It’s ugly and glorious. “That one.”
Marrow takes it down himself, cradles it in both arms, then presents it to me with a bow like he’s bestowing a relic.
I squeal and practically climb him in public, wrapping my arms around both him and the raven. “You lethal, poetic bastard. Wanna stick your dick in me?”
His lips brush my ear as he whispers, soft enough to curl every nerve I own: “It’d be an honor.”
After a few more games—of course winning every single one—we’ve become a traveling circus of loot.
I’ve got my coffin pillow and a collection of new babies cradled in my arms, Bonehead keeps trying to balance the giant bat on his shoulder like a war banner, and Marrow’s raven glares out at passersby with its ruby eyes, catching the light like it’s possessed.
Skully mutters around the cigarette he can’t light, “Christ, we look like a yard sale after an exorcism.”
“Correction,” I chirp, nearly skipping. “We look like winners. But if we don’t stash this treasure soon, I’m going to have to choose between riding the ferris wheel and dry-humping these in public. Which, to be clear, is not off the table.”
Bonehead’s grin stretches so wide it nearly splits his face. “Dry hump.”
Marrow clears his throat delicately, like he’s pretending he didn’t hear that. “Perhaps there is…storage?”
And there it is: a row of dented metal lockers painted pumpkin orange, tucked between the funnel cake stand and a ride that looks like it might fling children off into the stratosphere. A sign blares: RENT-A-LOCKER: KEEP YOUR CRAP SAFE WHILE YOU SCREAM.
“Perfect,” I say, clapping my hands. “Our dragon hoard goes here.”
I pay for the largest one, give the key to Marrow, and open our new cave. Bonehead tries to cram the bat in first, but its wings catch in the door and flop out like a crime scene. He growls, shoves harder.
“Gentle!” I hiss, swatting his arm. “That’s my baby!”
Skully snorts, prying the bat free and folding its wings with a surprising amount of care.
“Unbelievable. We’re babysitting toys now.
” He shoves the coffin pillow in on top, then jams the raven in sideways, its glowing eyes peering through the slats like it’s planning a prison break.
I place the rest in as carefully as possible, but it’s still a tight squeeze.
Marrow slides the lock shut with a click, then presses the key into my palm. “Guard it with your life, beloved.”
“I’ll guard it with my boobs,” I announce, tucking the key down my bra. Bonehead cheers like I just made a touchdown. Skully rolls his eyes but mutters, “Fair system.”
“Now.” I spin on my heel, spreading my arms to the chaos of the midway. “Wristbands. Rides. Screaming until my eyeliner runs.”
Bonehead thumps his chest. “Roller coasters.”
Skully smirks. “Tilt-a-hurl.”
Marrow inclines his head, ever the courtier. “The ferris wheel at midnight, my love.”
I clap like a demented cheerleader, the key still warm against my skin. “Yes, yes, yes! Tonight, gentlemen, we don’t just ride. We ascend.”
Ride after ride, we burn the night down.
The coasters rattle and scream, and we scream louder.
The Tilt-a-Whirl spins until my vision goes static and Bonehead raises both hands like he’s summoning thunder.
Skully heckles teenagers from the top of the ferris wheel, his voice carried by the wind, and Marrow sits beside me murmuring about constellations that look like coffins.
We shoot through haunted tunnels where cheap animatronics lunge, and I shriek back at them so loud I make children cry.
We stagger out of bumper cars with whiplash and laughter, Bonehead so gleeful he accidentally rips the steering wheel straight off.
Every spin, every drop, every shuddering machine eats another piece of the tick-tock.
For a while, it almost feels like victory. My stomach churns, my throat is raw from screaming, and my eyeliner is a crime scene, but I don’t care. The clock is still there—always there—but it’s faint under the carnival’s roar.
We don’t stop. Not until our legs ache and our chests burn and the night itself feels dizzy from trying to keep up.
We stumble off the midway like survivors of a beautiful apocalypse, hair plastered with fog-machine mist, stomachs clawing for something solid. And then the smell hits.
The food row stretches out like a grotesque buffet—grease hissing, sugar burning, everything lacquered in butter and regret.
Funnel cakes stacked like snowdrifts, caramel apples gleaming like organs on sticks, corn dogs so long they look obscene.
Smoke curls from a grill where meat sizzles and spits, dripping fat that pops like gunfire.
“My cathedral,” I whisper, dizzy. “Take communion.”
Bonehead doesn’t even hesitate—he lumbers to the turkey leg stand and tears into one like he’s auditioning for Medieval Times: Apocalypse Edition. Grease slicks his jaw, and he beams like a saint gnawing on relics.
Skully raids the funnel cake stall, snatching the biggest plate, powdered sugar snowing down his jacket. He takes one bite, licks his fingers slow, and sneers, “Diabetes tastes amazing.” Then he smears sugar on my cheek just to watch me squeal.
Marrow chooses candy apples. Of course he does. He holds one aloft like a jewel, crimson shell gleaming under the neon, then bites through with a crack sharp as bone splintering. “Sweetness armors rot,” he murmurs, voice low enough to make me shiver.
I’m everywhere, devouring everything. Cotton candy dissolving like fairy wings on my tongue, fried Oreos that scorch my fingers, a cup of cider so hot it scalds my throat but feels holy going down. My hands are sticky, my lips stained, my chest heaving with sugar and laughter.
Somewhere in the din, I swear the tick-tock tries to rise again, but I drown it in powdered sugar and grease. Tonight, the only rhythm I care about is chewing.
Bonehead shoves half a turkey leg into my hands, grease dripping down my wrist. Skully stuffs a funnel cake at my mouth until powdered sugar coats my black lipstick. Marrow presses his half-eaten candy apple to my lips like a sacrament. I take all of it, greedy, feral, holy.
We are a mess of sticky mouths, smeared eyeliner and ruined dignity. Just four monsters gorging on October while time gnashes its teeth.
We are perfect.