Dark Ride: A Horror Story

It’s the last night of the Harvest Fair Carnival. The air is cool and the sky is filled with stars as Charlotte and her boyfriend, Mitchell, walk through the cemetery to get to the fair before it’s gone for another year. The moonlight illuminates the headstones with an eerie glow as Mitchell talks about The Doll House—a dark ride that hasn’t been seen in almost forty years but is featured at the carnival this year. He also tells Charlotte about R. Wodehouse, the notorious magician who is thought to be responsible for hundreds of disappearances in their town.

Charlotte wants to have fun with Mitchell but has bad memories of the fair—things that happened when she was a little girl. She’s hoping this year will be different, that she and Mitchell will finally have a nice time together—something that hasn’t happened for a long time. Unfortunately, everything changes when Charlotte sees a giant doll head looming over the fairgrounds at the end of the midway. The Doll House. It’s the main event as far as Mitchell is concerned, and she knows she won’t be able to avoid riding through with him.

Charlotte is wary as she approaches the building with disturbing images painted on the side and the creepy magician standing at the entrance. She’s frightened of the way he stares at her with his hypnotic, black eyes—eyes that draw her in and make it impossible for her to turn back. But Charlotte should be wary, because once she enters the world inside The Doll House—through the pitch-black hole of the gaping mouth—she realizes she may never leave.

Dark Ride: A Horror Story is a novella of 22k words. If a trigger warning is something you need, you’ll probably want to skip this one.