Once, the Carnival Came Through Town

This is a short story I wrote for a picture prompt contest on here. Its short and sweet.

That girl that you’re talking about, that one that you find standing outside staring at the stop sign, used to be a normal girl.  Her name is Sarah.  I went to school with her.  Now they just teach her at home.  You see, she didn’t always used to be like that.  You kids are all just new to this neighborhood, or too young to remember her before the accident.  She used to be a lot of fun, and full of energy.  She’s always been real pretty like she is now.  Everybody liked her, even the boys in my class, and this is when we didn’t even like girls.

 

You see, one year we had a carnival come through town.  All of us kids were very excited.  Most of us had never actually been to a circus or carnival.  I remember seeing all the big trucks and trailers come in one day.  It was a very exciting day.  We all had to go the very first day.  And boy was it all we hoped it would be.  Lots of rides and games, all ran by strange looking people who were missing teeth, and hair, and smelled a little bit funny.  They were all very friendly though.  Momma said they were country folk, and with all the traveling, they didn’t have time to see a dentist.

 

Oh, and then there was the food.  Lots of delicious food:  cotton candy, pizza, giant corn on sticks, and funnel cake.  But the best of it all were the shows.  The first night was just some dancing people.  It was neat, but it was still dancing.  The music they played on their banjos was fun though.

 

The next night was the magic show.  This was amazing.  Much better than the little tricks we do.  This was like real magic.  They made birds disappear, frogs reappear, and even made a coin appear right in my hand.  That’s how I got my lucky coin.  That’s how I know it has magic in it.  Oh man!  They even cut a woman in half and put her back together again.  Like she was Humpty Dumpty or something.  But this was nothing compared the last night.  The last night was the best.  The man that performed was the star and creator of the carnival, and had been doing his tricks for like 50 years!  He was a hypnotist.

 

Everyone was so excited, even the adults.  Not even on the first day were there so many people.  And for good reason.  He was amazing!  He seriously hypnotized people.  He made people act like chickens, and tell their most secret of secrets.  He made one old lady remember something she had forgotten from her childhood.  He offered her one hundred dollars if she could remember without being hypnotized, but she couldn’t.  Then once he hypnotized her, she remembered.  Then he asked for a little girl that loved kittens.  He wanted a little girl he said, because they were more impressionable and he was going to do a very tough trick.  He was going to make her obey commands, much like the others, but so well that they would even do something they never ever would want to do:  kill a cat.  Then he pulled out a cat, brought our friend Sarah on stage, and then showed us all a gun he had.  It was an old cowboy gun that he said was small enough even a girl could use it.  Then he put two bullets into it, and shot one of them to demonstrate that they were real in front of the girl.  He said that after he hypnotized the little girl, he was going to tell her to shot the kitten.  At that point, she didn’t want to do it any more, but he said she already volunteered.  Then he started to hypnotize her.  He became real sweaty, and half way through he stopped and grabbed his left arm.  He fell to his knees, and then someone yelled that he was having a heart attack.  He died right there on stage, right in front of Sarah.  She was real quiet and didn’t react at all, the medics told her to go sit down.  Even then she was acting strange.  Her parents thought it was just because she was shocked and scared.  But even know, she has never snapped out of it.  She hardly thinks for herself now, but she obeys any command.  If for any reason she wanders out side, she usually ends up at the street corner where she obeys the stop sign until her mom comes and gets her.  Her mom covers her eyes, and tells her to turn around and to follow her back inside.

 

That very night, the carnival packed up and left town before anyone could realize what had happened to Sarah.  Only the old hypnotist’s voice could pull her out of her trance, and he’s dead.  That’s why the town won’t let any carnivals or circuses come by any more.

Reviews

[A.C. Flanagan]

i'm gonna be honest here guys. I was a bit worried that the ending was exactly what readers would expect. i thought it wasn't going to be surprising at all. i was kind of worried about that. you sure about what you say?

[M. McDonnell]

You developed the narrator's voice very well. The story itself was interesting, and as Tru Knight said, not what the reader expects. I enjoyed this story a lot. (: Good work.

[Aislinn Gryffin ((Ashes..]

Great job. This was a very creative story and not at all what i had expected. Excellent job alltogether.