Rewrite

• I don't know what will happen with the last chapter. It doesn't sound like it accomplished my goal, so I'll have to think on it. Thank you for your suggestions, but I don't plan on having it come earlier in the storyline. I might just cut it. We'll see. It is still canon, regardless.

• I added a short conversation between Riley and his friends about his parents to the RR version of chapter 62. People thought it was odd that they didn't talk about it, but I had planned on having the characters reflect on the subject from their perspectives during this storyline. I decided to add a little exchange just to hold things over. I will post it below.

• The next Post drops tomorrow.

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As I sat at the kitchen table, continuing a fruitless search for any information about the bowling alley from our outdated version of the Atlas, Kimberly, Antoine, and Dina approached me.

“Can we talk?” Kimberly asked.

“I’ll have to check my schedule,” I said, but I smiled so they’d know I was really saying yes.

“What do you wanna talk about?” I asked.

“We need to discuss what happened today at Carousel Family Video,” Antoine said.

I was puzzled.

“Hasn’t that been what we’ve been talking about all day? I mean, we’ve been planning this trip to the bowling alley since before we even knew what storyline we were looking for.”

They looked at each other with a concerned gaze that made me uncomfortable.

“We’re talking about that poster,” Kimberly said. “Why were your parents on a poster? Those were your parents, right?”

“Oh, that,” I said. I thought for a moment, then replied, “Carousel’s just messing with me. It has been since the beginning—talking about my grandparents, just teasing me, that sort of thing.”

“Why would it put a picture of your parents—and you—on what looked like a storyline poster? That is what we’re asking,” Antoine said.

I shrugged. “Like I told you, it’s just teasing me. It’s trying to lure me back there, so I’ll fall for whatever trap it was the crybaby warned us about. Just Carousel being Carousel.”

The others didn’t seem so sure.

“Well, don’t you want to know what’s going on there?” Antoine pressed. “Why would Dina’s son’s ghost tell you to go downstairs, but the baby warns you there’s a danger if you walk in that direction?”

“I don’t know why,” I said. “We won’t know until we try it, and we agreed to put it off. If we don’t pull the thread, the sweater stays together.”

“Just because we’re putting off actually going there doesn’t mean we can’t discuss it,” Antoine replied. “Was that a real picture of your parents—and you—on the poster?”

I nodded.

“We took it on a trip to Six Flags, or some theme park, maybe a carnival—I don’t remember; I was too young. But it was in our house, the picture. I don’t know why Carousel put it on a poster, but probably just to mess with me, like I’ve been telling you over and over again.”

They paused, exchanging glances again, which was really starting to bother me. They were acting like I’d been diagnosed with some strange, deadly illness.

“I thought you were an orphan,” Kimberly said. “That’s what Anna said—that your parents died.”

I didn’t talk about that.

“So, if you know, why do you need to talk to me about it?” I asked.

“Because we’re concerned,” Antoine said. “How did Carousel know you’d be drawn to a poster with your parents on it?”

“Because it’s human nature,” I replied. “If it had been a poster of your brother, you’d have tried to read what it said.”

“Yeah,” Antoine said, “but my brother was literally in Carousel and died here. Your parents died over a decade before we even got here, didn’t they?”

“I’m telling you,” I said, standing up from my seat. “Carousel just likes to mess with me. That’s why it talks about my grandparents. That’s why it got Dina’s ghost son to try to lure me into a trap—actually, I’m not sure what was going on there, but the point is, it likes to mess with me. I mean, it gave me my old TV just a few days ago.”

“Your old TV?” Antoine asked. “That’s why Candyman is in there, isn’t it? I couldn’t figure out why or how you got a movie from our world.”

“Riley,” Kimberly said, “why wouldn’t you tell us that?”

“I did tell you that I had one just like that as a kid. I don’t know if it’s the same one,” I said. “I figured the details could wait until we decided to act on it.”

“If Carousel is starting something—or if God forbid, a Narrator is doing this—we need to know. We deserve to know. Didn’t you think of that?” Antoine asked, coming around the table to look directly at me.

I had considered it. After all, Dina’s little premonition about going downstairs had come to her right after Project Rewind was completed, which just so happened to be around the time Silas Dyrkon had tried to trick us.

So, presumably, it could have been a Narrator.

“Well, thank goodness we didn’t go down those stairs. And until we do, we’ll never know what’s going on,” I said. “I mean, does knowing about it change any—”

“How did your parents die?” Dina interrupted. “That poster—it had this off-color warping effect like it was supposed to be spooky or something, but it just looked like a family having a good time. So I’m asking—how did your parents die?”

I really didn’t want to talk about it.

“Murder. Robbery gone wrong, maybe,” I said. “They were just… killed. I never got answers. The case went unsolved.”

Of course, I was both telling the truth and lying. I didn’t know why they had been killed or who had done it. I knew it was brutal. It was hard enough on my grandparents and they only saw photos.

All I remembered was that I was watching a movie when it happened, and my grandparents didn’t let the police tell me anything more than I already knew. I never asked.

And I tried not to remember. For so long, it had worked so well.

Talking about my parents was one of my weak points. I was crying by then, and I could tell the others felt bad because they stopped acting angry or inquisitive. I think Kimberly even tried to hug me, but I just went to my room.

I didn’t know why Carousel was teasing me about my parents, and I really did not want to find out.

I had lived with the unanswered questions surrounding their deaths my whole life, but I didn’t want to learn those answers now.

Not here.

Not in Carousel.