Author's Game Entries

Audition Task: Come to the Fun House

One room, two exits, and three windows. Occupying it is thirty-one high schoolers; thirteen seniors, eleven juniors, seven sophomores, no freshmen.

As Nicola looks around the party from his comfortable spot leaning against the wall, he takes a tally of how many people showed. This doesn't bore him; in fact, he quite prefers to just stand by and be a wallflower than join the dancing crowd. The flashing lights and booming beat drops of the music are starting to give him a headache anyway... Does the DJ have anything other  than techno and dubstep?

Honestly, he doesn't know why he decided to come to this party, he doesn't even know who's hosting it. All he knows is that their parents aren't home, and that someone emailed him yesterday to demand he write a discriminating article about the party in the school paper, (most likely someone who didn't like the host.) It's really not surprising this is the only reason he's here actually, there's really no other reason he'd be invited to a party or even go to one otherwise.

Feeling his thoughts start to wander again, Nicola brings them back to here and now with a sigh. With the packed teenagers' body heat continuously raising the temperature, the room is starting to get fairly warm. Nicola flicks his pencil behind his ear and moves to fan the collar of his tee-shirt against his warm chest, feeling himself starting to break into an uncomfortable sweat.

It'd be fine if he was dancing, but he isn't, and because of it he's even more aware of the drips sliding down the side of his face. This feels like hell, why does he have to put up with this? ...No particular reason really, he realizes with a blink. Giving one last uncertain glance to the dance floor, he finally gives up on sticking around. Nicola slips out of the muggy room and into the cool hallway, bringing a hand up to run through his hair. Why people enjoy parties like these is beyond him.

He'd go into the kitchen to get something to drink, as he's grown somewhat thirsty, but he decides not to bother. He already knows the only things they have in there are half empty bottles of soda and a bowl of cherry punch that's most likely spiked. And besides, last time he checked there were only twenty-two cups left, there probably aren't even any left by now.

So he instead takes a left and sneaks out the the front door, shutting it softly with a click behind him. Oh wait, why is he being quiet? It's not like anyone would hear him even if he slammed the door. He finds this fairly amusing actually, and he leans back against the said door with a smile.

Taking in a welcome breath of fresh air, Nicola feels the cool night air against his skin giving a much needed reprieve from the heated party atmosphere. He's still smiling as he looks around the orange lit porch he's now occupying, and he allows his eyes to flicker upwards to the stars. In a little over six minutes, he's spotted the three constellations hidden among the sea of thirty-seven stars, the few not washed out by the porch light.

If not already obvious by now, Nicola enjoys counting. He hates math, but counting is nice; it makes him feel anchored to the world. He feels if he didn't he'd be blown away by the quickly moving storm of his own thoughts, as even he's aware of his own short attention span. Speaking of which, now that he knows the number of stars in the sky, can he remember how many problems he has left for his math homework?

The answer is most likely no, he can't. But this doesn't bother him at the moment, it's a Friday night so he's still got time. But... He realizes as he glances to his watch that it's almost midnight, meaning he should really get home. The thought of his mother yelling at him for being out this late isn't too appealing though, so why not stall a little while, he's still got time. Three hours to be precise, he notes with a pleased tap to his watch.

Nicola pauses for a moment in his thinking to do mental double take. Wait a minute, why is he even here again? Oh yeah, the article. He's probably not even going to write that actually, all the notes he took are stupid and boring. Heck, he wouldn't even read what he had to say about it.

What a waste of time, he dismally thinks as he slips his small flip notebook into his back pocket. He could have gotten that math homework done by now, but nope, had to go this party. Oh well, at least now he has an excuse to be out from under his mother's constant watchful eye. The sudden image of his mother constantly watching him with only one cyclops eye causes him to give a small snort of amusement as he unclips the rubix cube keychain from a belt loop on his jeans.

As he clicks the colored cubes of the keychain around, his thoughts absentmindedly slip back to the party. He can feel the booming of the bass even through the walls, and he momentarily wonders if he would get in trouble for fialling a noise complaint. This mental tangent is cut off before it really gets started though, as the sudden buzz of his iPhone startles him, almost causing him to drop the rubix cube.

He gives a surprised blink before he pulls out the phone, switching the keychain for the mobile device. He hadn't expected to get a text from anyone at this hour, though it's likely his mother. Pressing the home button to wake up the screen, he's surprised to find the notification against his Tetris background is different than he'd thought.

It's a text from the one girl in school he actually feared; Jessica Glenn. A lump forms in his throat as he skims over the message, the text reading:

Meet me in the carnival grounds in an hour. Sounds fun? No? That's a shame, because you don't have a choice; if you don't show, the whole school will know your secret.

Jess Xx

Nicola groans. He brings a hand up to rub his eyes tiredly, sliding his glasses up onto the top of his head. There goes being home before three am, there goes not getting in trouble. Goddamn it, does any kid in the damn school actually sleep?

He's tempted to just shoot back a text saying no, Jessica, I'm not going to the creepy-ass carnaval with you of all people at midnight. But that'd just make her angry. And there's no way Nicola can let her tell anyone his secret, he'd be mortified just to step onto the school grounds!

Maybe he can just pretend he didn't get the message... Or he got lost... Or he doesn't know where the carnaval is. ...No, damn it, that wouldn't work. She could see on her phone that he'd opened the message, and everyone here knows where the stupid Brimley City Carnaval is, even people who don't live here know where it is.

But why does she want to the carnaval of all places? That place is known as a Hell-Gate for a reason, does she have a death wish? Nicola doesn't particularly believe in all that mumbo-jumbo about demons and such, but he still has the common sense not to go there at midnight. What is she going to do, bring her ouija board along too?

Letting out a long drawn out sigh, Nicola pulls his glasses back down to quickly type a response, before slipping his phone back into his pocket and trudging off towards the carnaval.

Fine, he'd typed, but if we get axe murdered or sacrificed to satan I'm blaming you.