Masquerade

I was still at the back of the van, struggling to get out. I crushed my body at the rear window. My body was a jelly for a few seconds. Then, it became normal again. I've been doing the exact same thing for five times straight at that time.

Then, I got an idea. I used all my muscles to break the seat into two pieces. It took quite a while before I succeeded. I took the upper part and put my right hand inside the cover, making it a shield.

I began crushing my body, with the shield as a protector. The window cracked a bit. I smiled. I hurt my right arm. But, as long as my body's still okay, it didn't matter. As I was trying to repeat the act, I heard a honk. Nothing, literally nothing, was outside. So, it's definitely from the van. I turned my head around and saw the Devil at the driver's seat.

"You again? Shuck off!!!!" I shouted at him.

He threw a grenade to me and said, "Read your books or it'll blow off!"

Scared, I quickly grab the nearest book on my right, an old, dusty book entitled 'Masquerade'. I sat on the seat next to the damaged one and read the book right from the last page I read; page 135.

After reading it for a few minutes, I settled down and forgot about escaping the van. I continued reading until I reached a passage which was:

I was still at the back of the van, struggling to get out. I crushed my body at the rear window, hoping to break it and escape but it didn't work out. my body was a jelly. A few seconds later, it became normal again and I repeated the act a few times...

Yes. It was narrating what I just experienced earlier! Refusing to believe, I closed the book and threw it away. That was the moment I realized that I was no longer in the van. I was sitting on an old wooden swing. A playground lied before my eyes. It was not in good condition. The see-saws were rusty; the slide had a few holes here and there; the only thing left of the spring rider is the spring; and the monkey bars... the bars were not there anymore, they were on the ground. The playground which was once a colorful, cheerful place is now fade-colored and overgrown with weeds.

It was a cold night. The only thing I could see was the playground. Nothing else was there. I was like in a studio. When I tried to get away from the playground, I stepped on something. I looked at it. It was a Lego car. I looked around and I saw Nerf guns, Lego bricks, action figures and also some cakes, mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup, flour and pies lying all over the ground.

The slides, see-saws, swings, monkey bars and spring riders were all covered with maple syrup. Just then, a jet, the gemstone jet, which was on fire, fell from the night sky. As it touched the ground, everything collapsed right before my eyes.

I stepped back and tried to go away from the place. I accidentally stepped on a green Polaroid camera. A photograph came out of it. I took the photograph and I looked at it, which showed a hatching pupa and a glass of wine chained together, under the rain.

An invisible force pushed a baby's chair towards me. It stopped a few centimeters in front of my toes. My friend, Emily, suddenly appeared on the chair. The chair was suddenly caught on fire. She screamed in an extremely high pitch. I didn't do anything but just watching it. Slowly, the baby's chair was getting pulled by a quicksand. It was still on fire. I looked at the photograph again and threw it into the quicksand.

I whispered to myself, "Masquerade..."

Hangman is a paper and pencil guessing game for two or more players. One player thinks of a word, phrase or sentence and the other tries to guess it by suggesting letters or numbers, within a certain number of guesses.

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