;) 

Please let me know if you enjoyed the chapter by voting & leaving feedback! I would really appreciate it! :))))

P.S- (The weird spaces? No idea. I'm also seeing a lot of italics that don't belong, so I hope it's just a glitch...)

P.P.S- PLAY THE MUSIC DURING THE CHAPTER. :D

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      Running into that funhouse definitely wasn't one of my best ideas.

            I pushed against dark, cramped walls, having no idea where to go or whether or not something would pop out. The constant sensation of anxiety settled deep in my gut, raising the hairs on the back of my neck, and escalating my pulse. I moved too quickly, too fearfully. Stumbling over myself in the dark, using and hands as guides like a blind person. I couldn't believe how stupid I had been, coming into the funhouse alone and unharmed. It was impulsive. However, if I hadn't come to save the kid, I would have regretted it immensely, especially if the kid had gone missing... or worse. Plus David, and all of the other people at the carnival were probably still unable to move, and I had to get Death to turn whatever he had done to them off.

            A brilliant white light flicked on ahead, and a black childlike shadow stood in front of it, waving at me. "Hey! Hey, don't move! I'm coming!" I hurried forward, when a gust of air smashed into my face, blowing my hair back at all different angles. Then another gust of air threw itself into my body, propelling me backwards. I pressed forward against the airstream, feet sliding frictionlessly along the ground.

             Evil laughter erupted from speakers around me. Startled, I lost my footing against the air, stumbling into thick curtains at my left, falling through them into another room that was so hot and dusty, it was hard to breathe. There was very little lighting, just like the last room, except for a single, intense light bulb, dangling eerily from the ceiling, creating stretched out, ominous shadows along the walls.

            I started to feel like I was dreaming.

            Get a hold of yourself. You need to save the kid from that monster.

            Masculine laughter filled the room.

            Death.

            "Show yourself!"

            "Give up now while you can," Death's deep, accented voice crept into my head like velvet.

            I ground my teeth together. "Let the boy go, Death."

            "I already did, he wasn't the one I wanted," Death replied, cheerful. "I got rid of him the easiest way I knew how..."

            My heart skipped a beat. "You didn't--?"

            "This is going to be fun." Death's laughter boomed, rattling my nerves. "Especially after I do this."

            Abruptly, a blast of compressed air hit me in the face, knocking me back. The wall gave out from behind me and I fell a great distance, crashing to the ground, hitting my head hard.

            Everything went black.

            I woke up in an awkward position. I was in room with crooked floors and neon lights, and I couldn't remember how I had gotten there. It was cold. So cold, that I could see my breath and my skin burst into gooseflesh. The room spun, even from the floor, like a carousel. I stared up at the ceiling, beginning to frown. I could no longer remember why or how I entered the funhouse, or even how much time I had passed.

            The last thing I could remember was everything freezing around me. David, sitting on the bench, unable to move.

            My heart clenched.

            "David?" I sat up, searching the room with my eyes. "David, where are you?"

            "You can help me, can't you?"

            I looked up towards the voice, finding a little girl with wavy blonde hair. She stood with her back to me, facing a mirror that didn't reflect herself.

            I kept my distance from her. "W-w-who are you?" I stuttered out, then slowly took in the room. "Where...am I?"

            The girl started to sob, covering her face with her hands, back still to me. "Mr. Wiggles is gone. The Bad Man took him!" 

            The Bad Man. 

            "Who are you?" I inquired again, more firmly. "Turn around and face me." 

            "I'm you!" the little girl sobbed, whirling around.

            I must have went as pale as White Out.

             To my utter disbelief, the girl's eyes were identical to mine, filled with tears, but her hair was blonde, which puzzled me.

            I shook my head, fighting the figment of my imagination. "You're not me. You're not me." I stumbled back against a wall. "You're not real!"

            "Of course I'm you! I'm you, before you died!" The little girl rushed towards me before I could get away, hugging my leg. "You don't remember me anymore, do you? I remember you. Death! That was his name. He's a bad man! He took Mr. Wiggles! He said--he said he was going to do awful things to him, just like he's going to do to us! He's evil!"

             A chill violently overtook my body. "'There is no peace,' says the Lord, 'for the wicked...' There is no peace,' says the Lord...." a distant memory whispered.

            A twinge of pain throbbed inside of my skull. "This can't be real. This is..." I blinked hard, head throbbing. "There's a reason why I'm in here, I just can't remember..."

            The little girl wiped at her tears. "All I wanted was Mr. Wiggles before I died. That's all I wanted! Here, I'll show you where I lost him! Where Death took him from me!"

            Grudgingly, I let the girl guide me into another part of the funhouse until we stood in front of a large spinning disk, still holding hands. While the disk was stationary, usually a worker would get on and sit in the center, then the operator would start the disk spinning, and people would be thrown off by centrifugal force, ending up against a padded wall. 

             "Faith!" my mother's voice shouted from all directions.

            The little girl and I whirled around at the same time, saying, "Mom?" "Mommy?"

             I grew more panicked. If my mother was here, that meant she was going to be in danger. But from who? "Mom, is that you? MOM!"

            "Jump!" my mother shouted.

            The lights flickered.

            "It's The Bad Man! He's coming! Quick!" Little Faith grabbed my hand, jumping with me onto the stationary disk. As soon as our feet touched the surface, it started to spin. Little Faith and I, unable to leap off, tried to hold onto the empty metal chair at the center, bolted to the floor, but the force of the centrifugal force started to become too powerful to hold on any longer, and our legs lifted upwards, bodies horizontal with the ground.

            "Don't leave me!" Little Faith shouted across from me, her chubby arms wrapped around the other armrest of the metal chair.

            "I won't!" But just then, my lands started to slip away from the chair with sweat, and the room kept spinning, and spinning, and spinning, until finally, I could no longer hold on. I let go, slammed into a padded wall so hard that I bit down on the inside of my cheek, and sunk to the floor. Blood filled my mouth. I spat, practically hyperventilating as I tried to catch my breath.

            The spinning device turned off.

            The room was now so dark that I could no longer see anything. Not even shadows.

            "Faith!" I bellowed, breathing hard, pushing myself off the ground, honing in on the darkness for a response. I couldn't tell right from wrong, real from not real. Everything was a blur, a dream-- a threshold through a mirror where life is only reflected and not really present. I felt like I was watching myself from a third perspective, dragging me feet along the wall of the room, feeling my way towards an exit.

            Little Faith and I had become separated.

            I pushed open a new door. Light streamed in.

            The door slammed, rattling my chest.

            I stood in front of a mirror maze.

            "Faith!" Little Faith shouted from a great distance. "Faith, help me! One of the gun men has me!"

            Gun men?

            "I see the other girl!" a man with a rough voice shouted. A bullet went off, shocking me for a moment. "Over there! Kill her! Kill her!"

            I whirled around, finding my reflection in dozens of mirrors. I couldn't remember even entering the maze. Had I? Where were they coming from? Where was I even at? A funhouse? Feet pounded on the floor to my right, then my left. I moved my head towards that direction.

             The same frightened, naive version of myself reflected back at me in every single mirror. 

            Except for one.

            At first, I thought I had been seeing things, but as I stared at one of the mirrors, I realized the reflection within it did not match my current position. The girl within the mirror had the same hair, eyes, and face as me, but they held a different expression, watching me with narrowed, angry eyes.

            She pressed her hands hard against the glass, starting me.

            The whimsical music around me changed to something more exotic. The girl in the mirror started to sway her hips back and forth to the music, sensually lifting up her shirt, swishing her long black hair, moving her hands up over her head, hips jutting out like a belly dancer. Suddenly, the girl, identical to me, stepped out of the mirror with her long legs, still using my body to dance seductively. Beckoning me forward with graceful, flowing hands, indistinguishable to mine.

            "Faith! Run!" my mother's voice shouted.

            The girl spun around, and just like that, her eyes had changed from a bright blue identical to mine, to two mismatched green eyes.

            The floor started to violently shake. I started to run, smacking into my own reflection in mirrors over and over again as the floor vibrated, sloppily making turns, shoes sliding along the slippery ground. I had the constant feeling that something was right behind me, and something was waiting right in front of me. Heavy feet pounding on the ground, gaining on me; cynical laughter.

            Bells jangled, followed by deep snickering.

            I knew that laugh, but I couldn't pinpoint it.

            Am I dreaming? I asked myself for the hundredth time.

            I heard men's voices again. This time, they were screaming my name.

            I lost my equilibrium, stumbling into a new disorienting room where I couldn't tell the ceiling from the floor. I slammed into something sharp. It was painful enough to make me clasp the area and inhale sharply. My hand instantly became wet with blood, so I kept it there, nausea building up in my gut. I moved quickly, touching the walls around me until I felt a gap in a wall and threw myself into it. There was a burlap mat beneath my feet, and the moment I stepped on it, it slid forward, and my body. I fell down a slide made of polished hardwood, screaming the entire way down. The friction of my arms, which weren't on the mat burned into my skin, and my limbs awkwardly crashed and slammed into crooked turns as the slide went further and further down.

            Finally, I reached the end of the slide and fell into a ball pit. Cradled. Safe. I don't know how long I lay in there, trembling wildly, until I finally started to get up.

            I clutched my head, blinking, disoriented, standing in the middle of the ball pit, wavering on my feet. Pain throbbed in different parts of my body. A black light went on to my left, highlighting a bloody smudge of my hand on my shirt. My arm had been bleeding previously, and now blood was all over my hands.

            My breath caught in my throat.

            Survival mode clicked into place. Sobbing, out of breath, and weak, I crawled out of the ball pit, stripped off my shirt, and gingerly slid it off over my injured arm. I left a camisole underneath, and tied the plain t-shirt tightly around my arm. That would stop the bleeding. 

            Spotlights activated, startling me, beaming their light at the center of the room on a stuffed scarecrow, lounging back in a giant black throne. Hay was scattered along the floor, and out sharply from the scarecrow's sleeves and pants. Like light becomes perplexing to a bug, the monster once again became a navigational lure, and I dragged my weighted feet closer to it. Steady, lifeless, it directed me away from the disorienting funhouse, the pain in my arm, the confusion, and beckoned me towards itself.

            It didn't look stuffed up close, but it still looked grotesque. A realistic rotted out face with sickly grey skin greeted me up close; clothing ragged and ripped. The scarecrow's eyes were sewn shut, with fake decaying blood bubbling out between its eyelids. One of its long arms dangled over the side of the throne, revealing long, black claws. In its other hand, which was neatly tucked inside of its jacket, was something I couldn't quite see.

            Not once, did I feel like I was doing something wrong or that I was being compelled. But I was, because when I moved around to the other side of the plastic cage, leaning in, squinting at the object in the scarecrow's large hand, I discovered exactly what it had been holding.

             I snapped right out of a stupor.

            It was Mr. Wiggles. My childhood teddy bear.

            Fear struck me hard.

            The scarecrow slowly tilted its head to the side, rotten flesh slipping off its face and onto the floor. Its mouth peeled open, and a low groan came from its lips. I didn't even think twice. I turned sharply around to run, smacking right into a wall that hadn't been there before. The room had shrunk until it was five times smaller than before, and there were no longer any doors. Horrified, I ran the perimeter of the small room, testing for a break

            The scarecrow came to life, standing on crooked limbs, ripping apart its plastic cage with ease. Mr. Wiggles dangled from its clawed hand.

            There was no way out.

            "Scarecrow, right?" I started, taking a step back. "From the Wizard of Oz? Maybe--maybe we can talk this out, I'm a big fan!" I sputtered out, pressing myself flat against the wall as the monster came towards me.

            "Fear devours you, and when fear devours you, I consume you..." the scarecrow gurgled out, brownish blood seeping from its lips. It hobbled towards me, smirking. "You're paralyzed."

            I pressed harder against the wall, helplessly awaiting my death. It was right. I couldn't run at it. I couldn't scream. I was absolutely paralyzed. Paralyzed.

            "I feed on your terror..."

            I closed my eyes right as its claws reached out towards me, and when I opened them, the scarecrow was gone, and I was somewhere else.

            It was dark, but I could make out the outline of walls, where colorful lights created different shapes and lines. The room was huge. The ceiling had to be at least two-hundred feet tall, with a beautiful stained glass ceiling that made me frown in confusion. There was no possible way that the funhouse was big enough to have a ceiling so tall.

            Or that it would have a cathedral...

            For a moment, I forgot about the scarecrow. I forgot about what I had been running from with Little Faith. I forgot about everything. I took a step forward, staring up in awe at the beautiful cathedral-like ceiling above me, wincing the further I walked into the center of the room. I had hurt my ankle as well, but I ignored it. The ceiling reminded me of the peaceful atmosphere of my church, and I suddenly felt as cradled and safe as I had felt when I had been in the ball pit.

            But as I stared up at the ceiling, my comfort and safety was stripped from me. Something massive and black crashed through the stained glass ceiling, plummeting downwards hundreds and hundreds of feet towards me. I instinctively threw myself backwards, shielding my head with my good arm, protecting my face.

             The object, which should have crashed to the ground, never made it, and when I finally peeked back up at the ceiling, the stained glass and the impossibly large ceiling were both gone.            

            "The Bad Man," a small voice whispered.

            I whipped my head to the right. Little Faith stood next to me, holding my hand. "That was The Bad Man," Little Faith whispered, cupping her hand over her mouth. "He's going to kill me."

            I gripped her shoulders. "You can't die. You're me."

            "You promise?" she whispered, her lip puckering outwards. "Will you help me find Mr. Wiggles--?"

            Little Faith's large blue eyes fell on something behind me and she screamed.                      

            The scarecrow stood behind us, clutching Mr. Wiggles in its hand, raising it out towards Little Faith.

            "Wiggles!" Little Faith tried to move towards the scarecrow, but I held her back, tightening my hold on her.

            "Leave us alone!" The scarecrow tilted its head at me, eyes moving rapidly behind its sewn lids, rotten flesh sliding off its face. My eyes fell to its arm, which was hidden hind the scarecrow's back, and I froze. What's behind your back?

            The monster revealed a shotgun.

            "NO!"

            The crack of a bullet pierced me ears. I dropped to the ground first, letting go of Little Faith's hand, wincing as my ears rung with damage. My stomach felt like it was literally on fire. I lifted up the material, finding no wound, but my scar was moving, like something was underneath it. And then, all at the same time, a bullet edged out of my stomach, breaking through fleshy tissue. I threw back my head and shrieked. Blood flowed freely from the wound; agonizing pain overtook me.

            "Faith!" Little Faith started to cry.

            The scarecrow shook with laughter, limping with crooked limbs towards Little Faith, raising the gun again. Another gunshot went off. This time, Little Faith let out an earsplitting scream. The scarecrow slowly made its way towards me, groaning. Little Faith had fallen backwards, slamming into a wall. As she slid down the surface, bright blood trailing down the wall.

            "NO!" I stared at Little Faith in horror, then started crawling towards her on the ground, pressing my hand against the wound on my stomach, wincing at the pain in my arm. I pushed through it all until I finally made it to her small, curled up body. Her body violently twitched as she tried to sit up. "This--this can't be real." I hovered over my younger self, not sure where to put my hands.

            "Help...me," she gurgled out, blood seeping from her lips. "Help...."

            The little girl's big eyes stared up at me, blood pooling around her body, and across the midsection of her dress. "We.....could have been.... normal." Her hair began turning black at the roots. She squeezed my hand, wincing in pain. "You...didn't....save. . ." Those wide, innocent eyes glazed over, locked on mine.

            Me, she never said.

            "I'm so sorry..." I hadn't realized my vision was blurry until then. That I had been crying, like I was watching a child I never knew pass away. Maybe I was crying because I was witnessing the day that I lost a part of myself forever.

            Knowing you could one day lose one day a part of yourself forever can be scarier than anything conceivable.

            One moment, Little Faith lay right in front of me, then the next moment, she was gone.

            I grasped at empty air, shocked. "Faith?"

            Deep, masculine, wicked snickering filled the room. "You know, in an evil realm, this would all be considered very naughty foreplay. Especially that whole 'bullet-coming-out-of-my-gut' thing. Definitely a turn on."

            Death.

            I whipped my head towards Death's voice, and there stood the rotting scarecrow, still holding a gun and Mr. Wiggles. The scarecrow was Death. He had been watching Little Faith and I like it had been a damn movie. Before I could react, he tossed Mr. Wiggles to the side, crossed the space between us in a millisecond, and stuck his fingers into the wounds on my arm and stomach, digging deep into my flesh with his nails like razors. As if I had been tranquilized, I couldn't fight against the monster's hold as his fingers cut through flesh. Blood spilled out from the wound, staining my clothes, but this time, I couldn't feel it....

            I couldn't feel...anything?

            "What did you do to me? Why can't I feel that?" It sounded like I was at the verge of losing it, and I was. "What...?"

            "The answer is so simple." The scarecrow absently played with his lighter, flicking it on and off. "You're dreaming."

            I stared down at my bloody hands. "I'm dreaming?"

             The scarecrow laughed, rotting flesh melting off its face. He released me, bringing his huge claws to his face, peeling away the rotting flesh, the ripped clothes, until I began to see the white and black makeup and clothes of the punk clown. A black Mohawk flung upwards as the clown ripped its hat and wig off in one final pull.

            "Or is it all real, and you're going insane?" Death inquired.

            "You..." I trembled out, shutting my eyes, trying to get my racing thoughts together. "You took the boy! Then you did something to me. You drugged me, didn't you? You...you made me forget why I was here. So, what? You could mess with me more?" Now I was enraged. "Tell me where the boy is! I know you have him!"

            He rolled his black eyes. "Who cares about the boy. It's all about me." The clown grinned, flashing fangs that made my heart race with alarm. "I'm the cute one."

            "Tell me where the boy is." It was hard to stand upright, my legs felt like soft ramen noodles, but I was determined and stood my ground. "Stop messing with me, and tell me where he is!"

            "Now, cupcake," Death began in a condescending voice, holding out his white clown gloved hands. "I know you're getting angry, but you're the one who keeps leaving your mind susceptible to me."

            I absolutely lost it.

            "Yousonofabitch!" I charged at him, but he disappeared, reappearing dozens of feet away, laughing. He pressed a flower on his costume, squirting water at my face. "Stop that! Stop! What is wrong with you?"

             Death stopped spraying the water. "Bad, cupcake."

            I wiped at my face, knowing my makeup was probably more ruined than it was before from sweating and running around the funhouse. " There's no possible way you could have--the girl--me? How did you possibly do all of that?" I shrieked at the top of my lungs, pulling at my hair, wanting to charge at him again like a bull. "What did I ever do to you to deserve what you just did to me?"

            "Um. I'm Death, and I hate you?" the clown remarked in an obvious way. "Look at that. A who, what, and how answer all wrapped up in seven little words." He carelessly lit a cigarette. "But TBH... that means, To Be Honest, you refused to sign my contract, and that made me mad. Therefore, I punished you, like the little naughty pet you are."

            "You made me watch myself die!"

            "Boo fucking hoo, cupcake."

            "You--ugh! Don't call me that! You did all of that because of your stupid contract! You have no ethics, or--or morals! How do you even live with yourself? You're insane!"

            "I know you are, but what am I?"

            "Ugh! I hate you!" Furious, I stalked towards him, smartening up when Death made no move to disappear again. He wanted me to come closer, beckoning me with his gloved finger all creepy-like.

            "Don't think I haven't forgotten that you're still afraid of me," he said dangerously, exhaling smoke. "You're just really good at hiding it, and pushing it to the side. But fear always comes back to haunt you."

            "Damn you, you supernatural--freak!" I hissed, chest heaving with rage. "Damn you, Death! Damn you for making me feel this way! Damn you for stalking me--!"

            Before I could finish, he exploded over my voice, "I'm already damned!" And the madness in his eyes alone  knocked me back to the ground in horror. He was extremely unstable. Calming down, he head tilted to the side, like an animal honing in on a distant noise. "Making you feel what way?" he asked innocently, softly. Then, dropping his deep voice even lower, he added, "Sexual?"

            I opened my mouth to say something sarcastic, but nothing came out. I was still trembling from him screaming like that, slowly moving away from him on the ground.

            "That's definitely why your cheeks are always so rosy around me," Death concluded, chuckling as his own observation, exaggerated clown mouth morphing into amusement. "You can't help but find me attractive, even as a clown. Who's the sick one now, Fate?" 

            His scythe appeared out of thin air.

            "Still me!" he chuckled. "Practice swings!"

            Whoosh!

            Death swung his scythe towards me, just beyond the fabric of my t-shirt.

            "Hey--!" I started.

            Whoosh!

             This time, his scythe had gotten so close, I had to throw myself back onto the ground.

            Whoosh!"

            His scythe landed vertically in the ground, right in-between my legs.

             “This blade is so dull looking,” Death complained bitterly, ripping his scythe from the floor, stroking his scythe. I stared down at the huge, gaping hole in the ground in horror. “I knew I should have sharpened you, Scytherella. When she's dull...she just doesn’t cut through flesh as properly." He shrugged. "Oh well."

            "WAIT!" I shrieked.

            His blade clung to the air, raised, ready to fall down onto my body.

            "You're not really going to...?" I swallowed hard. "Kill me with that thing?"

            "You're right, that's no fun. I'd much rather strangle you."

            His scythe disappeared.

            Now he was stalking towards me like a cat, until finally, he stepped hard onto my ankle, pinning me completely to the ground in agony. "Let me break this down for your human brain. You have one option tonight. And that option is to sign my contract. If you don't sign my contract, I'm going to tear open your body with my scythe and play Operation."

            "I like the fourth option."

            The clown raised an eyebrow. Standing over me, scythe now in hand, his black gaze was threatening and heated as he squatted over my body, clown face inches from my face. "And what exactly might that option be?" he asked slowly, nastily.

            Option one: Run at him and tackle him to the ground. (Not applicable being I was on the ground, and I was fairly sure he was three times my weight in muscle.)

            Option two: Embarrass myself even more and try exorcising him with random objects. (Possible...)

            Option three: Do a cart wheel, into a back flip, and smash his face in with my feet. (I couldn't even run to the bathroom without tripping sometimes.)

            Option four. The last resort. Fake him out, then run away screaming. (Couldn't hurt. Well, maybe it could if he catches me...)

            "I can read your mind perfectly," he reminded me, black eyes hardening. Behind the lingering scent of cigarettes, his breath was minty and cold. Cold, the opposite of how much heat his body was giving off. "I mean, it wasn't like you were making it too obvious that you were plotting against me, staring out into nothing and not saying anything for a minute and a half--"

            "If you can read my mind, then you already know what option I'm going to choose," I snapped. Lifting my head up off the ground, I made the distance between our faces, our lips, our eyes, even less. "Don't you?" I taunted.

            His gaze fell onto my lips. "I do."

            "Then which one is it? What am I going to do, Angel of Clown?

            He narrowed his eyes at me, clearly offended. "You're going to fake me out, then scream as you run away, Fate Willstupid."

            "Not anymore! Hiya!" I kicked out before thinking, nailing Death right in the crotch.

            He bared his fangs in an cold grin. "Good kick, mastermind. That was my thigh."

            "Hiya!"

            "Ooof!" Death's dark eyes crossed a little, and he fell to the side of me, clutching himself. "I hate humans!" he squeaked out, as I raced out of the room.

            I didn't make it too far.

            Black mist appeared in front of me, and before I knew it, I crashed into Death's hard chest. He blocked my way with his massive frame.

            "If you wanted to touch me down there, you could have just asked," he purred down at me. "Not that I'm complaining. I am a sucker for a little pain."

             I couldn't help but become fixated with Death's face up close. The clown makeup was so thick and exaggerated, that I still couldn't tell what features were his or the makeup's. His teeth, were they really fangs? Those claws were gone... Even his eyes didn't look normal from far away. Nothing like what I had been painting on my canvases.

            I was afraid to find out what was beneath all of that makeup.

            "What the hell are you looking at?" Death unexpectedly snarled, dropping his playfulness, shoulders hunching forward a little as if he was going to charge towards me. He loomed over me, muscular chest in my face. Clearly, someone didn't like to be stared at for too long.

            "Sorry," I blurted. "I was just...curious."

            "Curious?" God, did he have a way of making everything I said sound really stupid. Slowly, Death grinned like a cat, inhaled from his cigarette, then flicked it to the side, stalking towards me with his long legs. Instincts kicked in. I moved back, still on the ground, but he grabbed me before I could get away, standing me upright, holding my arms at my sides.

            I didn't fight him. He had me. Even a zebra knows when a lion has its jaws around it and its never letting go.

            "Curiosity. You know, it killed a cat one time." He inhaled sharply at my neck, a low groan in his throat. The little hairs on the back of my neck stood up. His throat vibrated with noises and he nuzzled my neck with his nose and warm lips. Suddenly, his fangs brushed the skin of my neck, voice low and rough, thickening his accent. "There's something unusual about you, Faith Williams." Slowly, torturously, the tip of his tongue dragged along my throbbing corotid artery. "And that's unfortunate for you, because I find the most unusual things in this world are the tastiest."

            My hormones were so conflicted. One side of me wanted to sucker punch him in the face now that he was dangerously close, the other part of me, the dangerous part, wanted him to keep nuzzling my neck because every part of my body was on fire.

            I still couldn't believe this was happening to me.

            The Grim Reaper was a freaking psychopath.

            But still unquestionably attractive.

            "Get off of me, Death," I finally snapped, and as if his name alone brought me back to reality, my spell lifted, and was able to move my neck away from his mouth, though I was still helpless in his arms, and I hated it. He was still squishing me against his muscles. Lord, was hard to fight someone when they had a really nice body. "You're a sick, twisted monster, and if you don't let go of me right now, you're only proving it more."

            He let go of me.

            "For the record, I let go only because you reek of human and it's burning my nostrils. Not because I was listening to you. However, usually you Catholics know just what to say to me to ruin my mood. It never fails, really."

            "Well, you're a big bully, and I'm not letting you overpower me with your...big body." I jabbed a finger in his face for emphasis, surprised that he didn't try and snap it off with his teeth. "And the last..." I took a deep breath, finding my courage again under his heated, weighted gaze. "The last thing I would do to myself is trap myself, get myself stuck with someone like you, by signing your stupid contract. I don't know what I have to do or say to make it any clearer. Whatever you want from me, whatever goes beyond the contract, you can't have it. I know you want something else from me. I know."

            Silence.

            We stared at each other for a long moment. The room started to shake. Our gazes never left each other's. Everything fell around, changing, until we were both back in the mirror maze, standing at the center of a cube-like arena with mirrors lining the walls. Our gazes never left each other's.

            Moving his hand in the air, his scythe appeared out of thin air. In an instant, Death dropped his expression entirely. "I want your human heart in the palm of my hand," he said.

            "What?"

  Death brought back his scythe and shattered an enormous mirror, laughing feverishly. "I want to destroy everything you love and care about," he continued, eyes dark and brooding, biceps flexing underneath his costume as he spun his scythe around in his hands. "And not because it's in my nature; because I can!"

            Whoosh!

            He swung out at me. I threw myself out of the way, falling back onto the ground.

             Death feld the tip of his scythe  so it hovered over my forehead. I was in far too much shock to move.

            Sweat bubbled on every inch of my body. "Listen, buddy--" I started shakily.

            "Buddy." Enraged, Death swung his scythe out again, slicing a bit of my shirt. "Buddy?!" he shouted, voice turning into incredibly ruthless. Unexpectedly, he gripped me by the shirt, dragging me with him through the mirror maze as I screamed and dug my nails into his arms.  

            "I'll give you buddy," he snarled.

            I kicked out, hitting his shins. I felt like I was kicking metal. "LET GO OF ME!"

            "Shut it, buddy. It's contract time." Just like that, my voice was gone, and I could no longer speak. Death pushed me roughly to the ground, straddling me, holding my arms down with his legs as I silently cried out. I immediately started paying way too much attention to the fact that the muscles in his thighs were clenched around my waist.

           Death took an ancient looking scroll out of his pocket. Flinging it outwards, he started to read through it. "It's so dark in here, even I can't see a freaking thing," he muttered under his breath, then took out his lighter and brought it to the scroll. "Ah...here we go. I am the Angel of Death, yadda-yadda-yadda...this contract binds you to my soul...yadda-yadda-yadda." He fingered a spot on the page with his clown glove. "This is where you sign."

           He took a quill out from the breast pocket of his clown costume.

           "You need to cut yourself and sign your name in your blood."

           I looked at him like he was insane. "Um, no!" I mouthed.

            His expression went blank.

            Holding me by the throat, Death lifted me up and smashed me back onto the ground, over and over again, until I saw black splotches in front of my eyes. He moved his face until it was centimeters from mine. "SIGN. THE FUCKING. CONTRACT!"

            Shaking my head, I trembled violently beneath him. "Never," I mouthed.

           He lost it.

             "Oh, buddy, how I am going to make you to cry, and cry, and cry, and cry, knowing you were born in this world alone." He leaned into me, lips lifted in a snarl. "You will always be alone in the world, helpless and defenseless. Don't you know that nobody could ever love someone like you? You're crazy, Faith."

        I shut my eyes. I'm not crazy.

        "I can make you afraid of your own shadow. I can make you believe that I'm the only one who can protect you from anything and everything evil in this world, when I'm the very thing always waiting for you within the dark. I won't stop until I get what I want. And what I want is for you to sit on my lap like a pet waiting on my every demand, obeying my every command. And it's only a matter of time until you do just that.You insolent little girl, you have no idea who you are dealing with. I'll make you believe you are better off dead in this world. If you think for even a second that you will get rid of me, think again. I'll cling to you like a leach, human. I'll drain you dry of every last drop of courage you have left. I'll ruin you. I'm not going to say it again. Sign. The. Contract."

            "Hello? Hello? Wake up!"

            Death lifted away from me, cursing loudly in a different language. "You have to be kidding me!"

            Invisible hands were gripping my shoulders, shaking me. They weren't Death's. They were much smaller and more delicate.

            The world faded away around me.

            * * *

            I woke up gasping for air.

            "Are you alright, sweetheart?"

            I couldn't lift my head up.

            "I'm Lauren. Don't sit up too quickly, I'm pretty sure you hit your head pretty hard. You wouldn't wake up before." A middle-aged woman squatted at my side, a cell phone in her hand. She told me where I was, and it all started to come back to me. "Do you remember what happened? Who you are? I haven't called an ambulance yet, there's no service in here. Here, give me your parents names just in case you pass out again. I'll give them a call."

            Panicked, I looked around, finding unfamiliar faces scattered around the funhouse with the same worried expressions that Lauren had.

            "Should we move her outside?" a man asked.

            "No, you're not supposed to move someone with a head injury," someone else said.

            "I'm Faith Williams," I began slowly, speaking to Lauren. "My parents...are Lisa and Henry Williams. I know what happened. I fell, and I must have blacked out when I hit my head." I tried to sit up, but the room spun too cruelly. "How...how did you find me?" I asked groggily.

            Lauren smiled down at me. "My son, Jonah, said you were in here and you needed help. He wouldn't stop crying until I finally gave in to him." A little boy, who had been standing behind Lauren, completely hidden, moved into my line of vision. It was the boy who had helped Death trick me into the funhouse; who held four multicolored balloons in his hands.

                        Jonah sucked his thumb, staring at me with large, haunting blue eyes that reminded me of Little Faith's...from my what, a dream?

             "I told Jonah we had to eat dinner before going on anymore rides, and he agreed, but when I turned my back for one second, he wandered off," Lauren continued to tell me. "I was panicking, I started to dial the police, but Jonah ended up finding me again all by himself before I pressed call." She laughed, stroking her child's back. "I guess angels do exist, after all."

            I stared at Jonah's multicolored balloons. There was a cupcake on one.

            Death hadn't killed the boy.

            He had bribed the kid with more balloons.

            "I guess you could say that," I finally answered.

            "I'll go try and get some service to call someone, I'll be right back," Lauren started to get up.

            "Out of my way! Out of my way!" Just then, David Star pushed past a crowd of people, entering the cramped funhouse. He was out of breath, sweaty, and visibly stunned when he saw me laying gracelessly ground. He no longer had his sunglasses on and squinted a bit painfully at a bright strobe light as he knelt on the ground across from Lauren.

            "David," I rasped out, eyes starting to weakly close. "David--"

            "Shhh, I'm here." David touched my forehead. "What happened to her?" he asked Lauren. "Is she alright? She's burning up..."

            Lauren told him, then grabbed Jonah and yanked him out of the room. "I'm going to call an ambulance, she just got really pale. Are you her boyfriend?"

            "Uh, friend. I'll stay with her." David ran a hand down his face, gripping my hand with the other. "Jesus, Faith. You scared the crap out of me. One moment, you were there on the bench next to me, the next...you just, weren't. It was the most bizarre thing... How the heck did you manage to do that?"

            "You wouldn't believe me if I told you." I smiled at him weakly, but on the inside, my chest was so tight that I was having trouble breathing. 

            I blacked out again.

                * * *

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