American Are You Scared Yet by Elle Mitchell

Author:Elle Mitchell [Mitchell, Elle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Elle Mitchell

HEATHER: CONTESTANT

American Are You Scared Yet set

* * *

This maze is not what she expected. Heather had imagined treasure hunter style traps, racing from a large boulder or ducking from more arrows, but so far, she’s seen none of that. Maybe her competitors have been luckier, had it easier than her—jumping from stone to stone or avoiding evenly timed bursts of fire. But no, not Heather. Hidden blades slicing from within the hedges, and now this. At least she’s only found two. Could be the bonus of having an eidetic memory. The less wandering through wrong turns, the fewer traps you stumble upon. It’s logical, really.

Now, as ridiculous as it may seem, she is staring at a wall of lemons. It’s insane and odd and creative, but at least it will hurt very little for her. Luckiest and most bizarre trap ever.

It’s like an overzealous child’s bedroom. Above the hedge maze, there is a netting of some kind. From it, a low-hanging mobile of hundreds of juicy lemon slices await. Below, there are even more lemons mashed together to make a lemon road. It’s long, like the glass pit. Un-jumpable, sadly. Crawling would waste time, and with one slip, she might land on her side with a thud onto the floor of juice. She will just hold her hand over her one gash and carry on. If only she still had a jacket...

Got it. Heather offers her thoughts to the viewers: “I’ll just get through as quickly as possible.”

She knows what she is; she is a Final Girl, and she wants America to be cheering her on. She’s a nobody, a less-than, and definitely not a virgin, but she’ll make it to the end. When she’s the spokesperson for a drink she doesn’t consume and living in a house people will probably come to photograph, she wants them to say American Are You Scared Yet got it right.

To her right, she hears a thud, a rustle, then silence. It could be Vanessa, it could also be another part of the maze that no one mentioned. Because that’s a very real possibility, Heather keeps her eyes on the prize.

Holding her breath, she takes a step onto the lemon road and into the lemon mobiles until she is surrounded by hanging lemon slices on all sides. Her clenching hand burns more than the lemons might have, but she holds the wound tight to prevent even a drop of juice from sneaking in.

Heather moves through easily, like she’s a triangular knife slicing through birthday cake—until she hits the surprise center. Nestled in the dangling lemons are needles filled with neon yellow liquid hanging from stiff wire like pencil lead. They are like an art installation about street drugs, superhero serum, or a comic’s nod to science being out of control come to life. They point out in every direction and are completely unavoidable unless she is willing to press herself into the lemon road and crawl the rest of the way.

“Ground it is,” she says.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.