Carnival After Dark

Mostly just an introductory chapter....nothing exciting.

Chapter 1:  Is it OK?

Winnie’s P.O.V.

“You’re sure it’s OK?” I asked nervously, hiding behind a dumpster.

“Winnie, you’re always so nervous,” Mike laughed.  “We aren’t going to get caught.”

“Yeah, that’s always what you say before you get caught,” I muttered.

“Lighten up.” Were the only words that Tori said.

“Well, is Johnny even here yet?”

“Shut up, Winnie, he’s getting here as fast as he can,” Mike said.

“It takes a while for everybody else to leave the park,” Tori declared.  “Johnny’s gotta make sure everybody left.”

“Sorry I’m late,” I heard a whisper behind me.

I about jumped four feet in the air.  I whirled around to see that it was just May.

“Don’t scare me like that!” I breathed.

“Sorry,” May giggled.  “Josh here was just late picking me up.”

Josh gave a wave of his hand at me.

In case you’re wondering, we aren’t hobos.  We’re teenagers.  And we’re about to sneak into a theme park.  Adventure Express, to be exact.

It was Mike’s idea.  It was always Mike’s idea.  Mike was one of those people who always invented the plans.  And always got caught.  Mike had blond hair that he had in a sort of spiky haircut.  I guess you could say he was the ‘leader’ of our pack.  Haha.  We aren’t wolves or anything.  Anyways, he was muscley and tall.

And Tori had black hair in layers and bangs.  Right now, she was wearing a silver sleeveless shirt, black leggings, and black boots with her hair down.  Now that I looked closer, she had caramel highlights.  Black eyes and smoky eye makeup.  She was the dark troublemaker one.   She was petite—short and skinny.

May was giggly and bright.  She had wavy brown hair down to her elbows.  Jewelry was her thing.  For example, right now she was wearing eight bead bracelets on her wrists.  She had blue eyes and was wearing natural-looking makeup.  She usually wore either sleeveless shirts or sundresses. And right now she was wearing a blue flowered sundress.  She was dating Josh….

Josh was the cowboy kid.  Haha, at least we liked to call him that.  He had blond hair with bangs sweeping to the side and dark brown eyes with jeans and a white t-shirt and cowboy boots.  And you wonder why we call him the cowboy kid.  He had a really deep voice….when he did talk.  And that wasn’t as often as Mike or Johnny, the blabbermouths of the group.

Johnny was working at Adventure Express as a part-time maintenance person.  It was the best job he could get.  He had black hair that he had swept to the side with super-pale skin and green eyes.  He was the type of guy who wore leather jackets, black, and band tees.  And he was about to let us into the park for a night of free rides with no lines.  I know, it was super-risky, but it was worth it for the rest of them, and I didn’t want to be a scaredy cat.

I was a natural blonde, though I dye my hair brown with dark brown highlights.  Nobody knows I’m a blonde, though.  It’s funny; most people WANT to be blonde. But I was fed up with all the blonde jokes.  So I dyed it.  My hair was stick-straight.  I had chocolate brown eyes, and I was tall and skinny.  I was wearing lack skinny jeans with a scoop-neck white T-shirt and long gold necklaces and black boots.  I had a bad feeling about tonight.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” I voiced what I was thinking.

“You ALWAYS have a bad feeling about things,” May said.

“I know, but this time I really think something bad IS going to happen,” I said.

“Shut up, Winnie,” Mike said.

“Somebody’s gonna hear us,” Josh agreed.

“I wish Johnny would hurry up and get here,” I said.  Boy, I was jumpy.

We waited in silence for a few more minutes, and the thread of tourists leaving trickled to a stop.

Pretty soon, all the lights went out and we saw the workers leave (excluding Johnny), and then the manager came out, the door locking automatically behind him.  As soon as his car was out of sight, we ran up to the gate where Johnny was on the other side.

“Here,” he said, slipping the keys through the space between the bars of the gate to Mike.  Mike looked confusedly at the big stack of keys.

“Gosh, how many keys do you need?” he asked.

“It’s the long skinny silver one,” Johnny sighed.  Mike found the right one and unlocked the gate.

“Hey, thanks, Johnny,” Tori said.  “For letting us in here.”

Mike tossed the keys back to Johnny once he got the door open, and Johnny said,

“I’m gonna go start up all the rides, you wait here.” He was out of our sight soon enough.

“How awesome is this?” May breathed.  “The whole place to ourselves.  What do you wanna do first, hun?  There are the roller coasters, Ferris wheel….”

“Whatever you want is fine with me, honey,” Josh said.  “Whenever you’re happy, I’m happy.”

“Fantastic!” I could tell May was practically itching to go on the roller coasters.  Adrenaline junkie.

“What about you, Winnie?” Tori nudged me.

“I don’t care.  We’re probably gonna be stuck with Mike and Johnny anyways, and you know them.”

“Oh, gosh,” Tori said.  “I can just imagine that thing that drops like five stories….what’s it called?”

“I don’t know….but I can guarantee you we’ll be forced on it.”

“That’s right!” Mike sang.

“Can’t wait,” I said sarcastically.

One by one, we watched the rides light up and play carnival music.  It sounded cheery and light.  The colored lights were stunning against the black sky.

May and mine’s parents though we were at Tori’s house.  Tori’s mom and dad really didn’t care what trouble Tori got into, and, against May and mine’s protests, Tori told her parents.  But instead of stopping us, they laughed and said “Have fun.”  Wow.

I don’t know what lie the guys told to come, but here they were, so it must’ve been pretty convincing.

Johnny came back after a while.  He bowed and said, “You’re free to go.”

“YAY!” May shrieked and dragged Josh with her to a roller coaster called Muerte.

“What does Muerte mean?” I asked Johnny.

“It means Death in Spanish,” he said.

“Nuh-uh.”

“Yes, it does.”

I know it’s superstitious, but I couldn’t help thinking that maybe that was an omen.