That night is a celebration, the local fairground awash with neon bulbs, candy floss stalls, merry go rounds and toffee apples glistening. Dinah watches the sugar dripping an opalescent brown from her apple, reflecting the dark red heart within; the fire of the funfair. A membrane pulsating with the strength of life. There is an unmistakable smell. A smell that lingers even when all else has died down, when the laughter has retreated, the clowns gone home, the stalls emptied and desolate; and as the darkness descends, the horses eerie in the moonlight. It is this smell, which draws her to the fairground in the first place. It is the smell of childhood.

Tony points at the soft toys rotating on their hooks like fish in the market. Almost close enough to touch. “Go on, pick one.”

Dinah laughs, raising an eyebrow. “You're going to try?”

“No” he shakes his head. “Do I look like I can throw basketballs through hoops, and shoot glass bottles? I'm no performance monkey.”

“Then who?”

Peter turns from surveying the fairground, and stares at the basketball Tony is offering to him like a trophy in his long arms. “It's rigged, but I guess you have a chance. Albeit a slim one.”

 “Fine.” Peter says finally, rising to the challenge. “But firstly,” he looks Dinah fully into her large doe eyes, a question rising to his lips.

“Yes?” She wonders if he will kiss her, right in front of Tony, in the middle of the fairground, certainly he is so close, she can feel the warmth emanating from his body like a burning ember...

It is barely a whisper. “For luck?”

Before she can reply, Dinah feels a lurch, as fingers grab her hand and pull her from the warmth of her imagination and into the cold, sharp air by the Ferris Wheel, carried on the tide of the girls' energy and innocence. She watches as Kary and Violet board the roller coaster, her hands suddenly laden with bags and water bottles, and god only knows what items of food they had bought over the course of the evening. One final night, before the fairground moved on to another town.

The movements from the individual stores captivate Dinah. The spinning wheels of fortune, the thump of sandbags hitting walls, children screaming on a ride called The Gorgon’s Revenge.

Capsules like berries, black, yellow and red loll by Dinah’s feet, little metal gumdrops. She deposits the belongings by the fence and picks them up one at a time, rolling them backwards and forwards in her palm as they clink together. Like a wave of dead ladybirds. Strange, she wonders, what are they doing here? She scans the stalls, but there are no jars of candy anywhere. More apples line up like levers, bright red and glistening. She follows the gumdrops, like a gingerbread trail to the edge of the merry go round, where the vibrant line of colour stops, abruptly.

Before she knows it, she has gone through the barriers of the merry go round, following the line of people rushing to pick a horse to ride, as if her feet are not her own. Carried on a beautiful, wonderous fantasy. She finds herself choosing a horse with a luscious gold mane, red roses climbing up it like ivy. 

Dinah considers how great a reel this would make, captured forever; and as she takes out her phone, she starts to feel lulled by the flashing lights, the tempo of the music, like childhood; the rise and fall a harmony so comforting…her eyes huge, reflected in the mirrored panels…as the merry go round continues to drift, round, round, round….

Suddenly, there is a hush, then a rush of sounds, the carnival lights too bright, the roller-coaster thundering its track along her sensitive ears. Every sense is highlighted, increased; and the laughing. The laughing is the worst of all. From the clowns, the witches, the circus tributes. It does not matter where.

Just that it is, it exists and Dinah cannot get rid of it. In the mirrored panels, she sees a face staring back. It is not her own.

Her skin pools with icy sweat, as the mask grins luridly, beckoning with one horribly withered finger. Its skin, greenish white, tinged with purple. They’re coming…a whisper brushes past, so faint it could have been an echo.

“It’s just a trick,” she repeats. A mantra. “Just in my head,” but despite this, she tears herself away, running back to the railings like a frightened hare and feeling just a bit sick. When she turns back to the merry go round, the corpse is gone. 

*

She can tell the boys have been productive. Peter steps forward, brandishing not one, but two giant soft toys. “I took the liberty of getting you a turtle and a hedgehog, your highness. And you better keep them forever, cos trust me when I say this, the guy at the stall did not want to let them go.” He piles them on top of her until with laughter, she is hidden from view.