The abandoned carnival sat on the edge of town. The rides still creaked on windless nights. Faded music drifted through the trees after midnight. On moonless nights, the oldest warning was whispered: If you see the clown in black... you will be dead by morning. Of course, when Ethan’s grandma whispered the warning, he laughed. He was bored. Restless. So, he ventured out to the edge of town. "This?" he scoffed, sweeping his flashlight across a collapsed ticket booth. "People are scared of Halloween decorations." Footsteps echoed from the Hall of Mirrors. He swung his flashlight in that direction. The yellow beam landed on a figure. A clown. It sat motionless on a wooden chair beneath a sagging circus tent. Its white face gleamed in the darkness, red nose bright beneath hollow eye sockets, and a grin stretched too far beneath a tattered black hood. "Guess the town’s ghost story got a budget," he muttered. He walked closer. The stillness was suffocating. Even the insects had gone silent. Reaching out, he poked the clown's shoulder. Solid. Damp. Sticky. He chuckled. "I can't believe people are afraid of—" CLICK. His flashlight died. "Oh, come on." He slapped it against his palm. Nothing. Then... A soft sound. Heh... It was barely audible. A breath that almost sounded like laughter. He froze. The flashlight flickered back to life. The chair... Was empty. His stomach dropped. He spun around. Nothing. Only torn canvas swaying gently overhead. Then he heard it again. Heh... heh... Behind him. He whipped around. The clown stood three feet away. Close enough, Ethan could smell rot and old sugar. It hadn't walked. It hadn't made a sound. It was simply there. Its grin seemed wider now. Screaming, he stumbled backward. The clown didn't chase him. It only tilted its head. Waiting. Ethan bolted through the tent, crashing into rotten support poles. He burst into the moonlight, gasping. His car waited just beyond the rusted Ferris wheel. Safety. He sprinted. Halfway there, he risked a glance behind him. Nothing. His lungs loosened. Then... A reflection caught his eye in the driver's side window. The clown stood directly behind him. He spun— Nothing. Heart hammering, he laughed nervously. "I'm losing it." A hollow laughter filled the night air. The reflection laughed. Its shoulders shook violently. Its mouth stretched impossibly wide until the jaw cracked downward with a wet pop. Blackness poured from its throat like smoke. The reflection slowly lifted one long finger. Pointing... At him. Realization struck too late. The hand rested on his shoulder. Ice-cold fingers tightened. A raspy voice whispered beside his ear. "I’ve been lonely. Now I have company."

Gerald felt the mattress compress. “Happy birthday, Gerry Boy!” the clown shouted. “Can you believe it? A teenager now! Pimples on the way, hair popping out in weird places, girls suddenly making you sweat and…” Gerald kicked out as the covers were pulled down. “Beat it.” “No chance.” “Big test at school today and I gotta sleep.” “Yeah, like sleep will help you pass math. Nope, we got stuff to do.” The clown rhythmically slapped Gerald’s hip harder and harder. Gerald tried to retrieve his covers. “Knock it off! I don’t want to play games.” “No sweat. As of now, you’re too old for games. You’re ready for the big boy stuff.” “What are you talking about?” “Ever since you made me your imaginary friend when you turned three, we’ve done all the kid games. I’m sick of it. You’re thirteen and I’m…well don’t worry about how old I am. It’s time to grow up into a man, Gerry Boy…er…Gerald.” “Then I should be sleeping like a man,” Gerald turned over. The covers were yanked down quicker this time. “Get up, you little son of—uh—Gerald.” Gerald looked over his shoulder. The clown was bigger now, standing at the foot of the bed, its head bumping the ceiling, its silly painted-on smile was now an evil grin. It tipped the bed and threw Gerald hard against the wall. “I’m not taking crap from you anymore. Get off the floor and act like somebody.” Gerald shook as he got to his feet with the help of his desk. “What is your problem? You’re going to wake up mom and dad.” “YOU are my problem. We’ve only got a little while to get you into shape. Your destiny isn’t going to wait much longer.” “Destiny?” The clown chuckled. “Yeah, and it won’t happen overnight. You’ve got a whole lifetime to live in just a few years. By the time you’re all up in the news, you’ve got a few animals, a couple of kids, and eighteen adults to murder.” “What?” The clown paused. “Well, okay, a couple will be maimed and in wheelchairs, but why quibble about stuff like that?” “You make it sound like I’m a serial killer.” “Now it’s sinking in! You think I’ve been hanging around all these years because you’re adorable and I want a friend? Give me some credit. Okay, we’ve got plans to come up with. You know, like what drives you to incinerate your parents in your childhood home.” Gerald made for the door but was suddenly tied and gagged. “Come on, Gerald. Let’s get this worked out before I wipe your memory of all this so you can look suitably stupid to the jury. And I can finally get my wings. And horns.”

The wind rips at her torn clothes, lashing her face, dragging the tears away into the frigid air. Rain drizzles, dreary, dragging the chill deep into her bones, jarring against the burning in her thighs and her feet as she runs. Bloodied and muddied, she’s barefoot, but seems not to notice as she races through the fields towards the house. This region is sparse. Mostly fields and woodland, with only the odd house every few miles. Where she came from, it can’t be said, her dishevelment such that you couldn’t tell if she had been lost out in the darkness for minutes, hours or days. Though it is dark, a faint light at the house from an upstairs windows acts as a beacon, drawing her nearer. The grass gives way to paving and she stumbles under the new, unseen terrain. Slowing only a little, she throws herself towards the heavy door, hands scraping across the splintered wood, hunting, searching, wild and desperate. Her finger catches on a loose screw, and she cries out in pain. In frustration she throws her frail, exhausted body against the door again, and once more, throwing everything she has at it in the hopes it will be enough to attract whoever lives within. Panting hard from her exertions, she slumps against the door, close to falling down, before a crack of pale light trickles out from around the edge of the door. A shuffle, a thud, a scrape of metal on metal and the door opens slightly. It unbalances her, and she falls, catching herself on her knee as a soft gasp sounds, the door opens wider.Suddenly warm hands are on her arms, steadying her. A short, pink woman, emerging from the relative warmth of the old stone house to help her, guiding her back onto her feet. Babbling, all the time babbling, worry trilling in every word. Indoors now, she sits on a threadbare armchair, eyes squinting against the light that illuminates her sorry state. The pink woman fusses around her, babbling all the while, trying to help, to find out, to do something. She doesn’t react to any of it, slowly blinking the water from her eyes, her breathing slowing down to match the rhythm that pulses through the pink woman’s touch. Slowly as the panic and the flight leave her, she begins to process the feelings in her own body, as it defrosts in the warmth of the pink woman’s home. Her wrists and ankles burn with blisters where they were chained. Her eyes, tired and struggling with the light after so long in the dark. Her lips are dry, her mouth parched, her belly empty. It has been so long since she fed. She licks her lips, eyes fighting the fatigue to lock on to the pink woman’s bare, tender neck. It has been such a very long time since she fed.