Our Grandfathers Were Right

“Alice! Reiner’s here!” 

I looked at my half finished makeup in the mirror. “Shit! Tell him my costume isn’t done yet!” I took out the red lipstick and applied it to my lips. I then picked up my curler and curled the ends of my hair, careful not to burn my fucking scalp off. Once done, I turned the curler off and stood up from the seat. I added the dark bow to my hair and stood up. I took one last look at my costume before heading downstairs.

Reiner and I, after several weeks of back and forth, decided on dressing like Gundham Tanaka and Sonia Nevermind from Danganronpa. Were we gonna look like total dorks? Absolutely. Will we be the envy of all of your friends? You bet.

When I got to the living room, I saw Reiner standing there, all dressed up in his costume. I was a bit surprised on how well he pulled off the wig, as a matter of fact, his whole outfit was amazing. 

He looked over at me, and immediately, his already pale face (much thanks to the makeup he was no doubt wearing) flushed. He examined my outfit, mouth open slightly. I stepped back a bit uncomfortable.

“Is it that bad?” I asked in an accusing tone. 

Reiner jerked himself out of it and quickly shook his head. “No! No, the opposite. You look,” he looked up for a moment, “Alice, you look beautiful.”

“Do I normally not look beautiful?” I joked.

Reiner’s mouth opened a bit more. “That’s not what I meant!”

I laughed and stepped up to him. I gave him a quick kiss before pulling away. “I’m joking, you look great too.”

My dad sighed happily and came closer to the two of us. “Let me get a picture of you two!”

Reiner and I moved together and put our backs to each other. We posed in the in game sprites for each of our characters while Dad snapped the picture.

“Now, let’s get one with my daughter and her boyfriend.”

I rolled my eyes and pulled Reiner in so we were side by side. I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed his cheek, Dad snapping another pic.

“One with both of you looking at the camera. Reiner, stop acting like she stinks, hug her like you love her.”

I rolled my eyes again and turned to the camera and smiled. 

“Don’t roll your eyes at me, I just want a picture of you before you’re all sweaty.”

Dad took the picture of us before finally putting his phone away. I pulled away from Reiner and grabbed my phone off the counter. 

“Where’s Adrian?” I asked, noticing my brother wasn’t there.

“He’s volunteering at a haunted house with Jay, he’ll be back later tonight,” my other, less relevant, brother Austin answered. 

“Oh, we should stop by to bother them!” Reiner suggested.

“That was the plan,” I said, “Ryver’s helping out there, too, meaning we absolutely must go there.” 

“Agreed,” Reiner said, “we should get going now, then. I want to get there before a bunch of drunk college kids take over.”

I grabbed my car keys off the key hook and turned to my family. “Bye guys, I’ll be back at around-”

“Before midnight!” I heard Mom yell from upstairs.

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” I mumbled. I took Reiner’s hand in mine and walked out the door. We climbed into my car and drove to where the haunted house was. We parked the car and went over to the ticket booth up front. Adrian was standing there, putting money into a small bin under the counter. He had a lot of heavy special effects makeup on, his left cheek looked like it was burnt off and he had a gash on his forehead.

“Wow, you almost look worse than usual,” I told him.

Adrian looked up at me and rolled his eyes. “I’m going to majorly break out later tonight.”

“Where’s your boyfriend?” Reiner asked, interrupting our conversation.

“Jay and Ryver are actors inside. They can’t touch the guests, but since they know you guys, they’ll probably go all in. They already harassed Landon and his sister.”

“I thought him and Chris were together tonight?” Reiner said.

“They are, Landon just came by earlier to give us money,” Adrian said.

“Oh, is this going to a charity?” I asked.

“Yeah, it’s going to help give hormone surgery and binders to transgender youth who can’t afford it or parents won’t buy it.”

“Aw, that’s sweet,” I said. I pulled out the money I had in my skirt pocket and handed it to Adrian. He took the money and exchanged it with two little ticket studs and a small paper with instructions.

“The paper explains it, but I’ll give you a rundown,” he started, “you have to find five stamps that’ll help fill in the blanks on the paper. If you find it all in under twenty minutes, you get a prize. Also,” Adrian glanced at a paper taped to the counter, “the actors in this haunted house are not permitted to make physical contact with the guests. It is asked of you that you do not touch the actors or props in the house in return. Any broken prop caused by yourself must be paid in full. The Kitagawa family is not responsible for any emotional or physical reaction you may have.”

Reiner and I verbally agreed to the disclaimer and walked away from the counter. We rounded the corner and walked to the entrance. We handed the person up front our ticket studs and walked into the house

Starting off, the interior design was incredible. The main lights were off and the lights that were there were from TVs, candles, props, and other secondary sources. I looked at the paper Adrian had handed us and looked at the first clue.

“It rests on the tree top, the wind causing it to sway in an attempt to soothe them to close their eyes,” I read.

“What the fuck,” Reiner said.

I repeated the blurb quietly to myself. Reiner and I started blinding walking around the large home, glancing around. There were mannequins placed against walls facing inwards, fake bloody handprints on door handles, but I haven’t seen an actor yet.

“Oh!” Reiner suddenly shouted, making me jump, “rockabye baby!”

“Uh?”

“The nursery rhyme! ‘Rockabye baby on the treetop, when the wind blows the cradle will rock’, there must be a nursery here somewhere! And the barcode is probably in a cradle!” 

I widened my eyes in surprise. “Wait you actually said something smart! Do you think it’s upstairs?”

Reiner shook his head. “They wouldn’t make us go immediately upstairs, look down the hallway.”

Reiner and I began walking down the hall, stoping at the first door. It was slightly cracked, so I gently pushed it open with my foot. In the room, there was a rocking chair in the corner with someone sitting in it, rocking it slightly. In the center of the room, was a small chair with a porcelain doll sitting in it.

I held Reiner’s hand and looked around the room. There was no cradle, or anything resembling a baby. We carefully shut the door and walked to the next one.

“Dolls freak me out,” I told him.

“I know, you can hold me if you’re scared,” he joked, pulling me against him.

Just as he did that, a loud groaning noise came out from the room we were just in. Reiner jumped and gripped my body tightly, staring at the door.

“Yup, that’s our sign to get moving,” I said, dragging Reiner to the next room. We opened the door just enough to peak inside. In the corner, I spotted a small rocking cradle. I opened the door the rest of the way and cautiously stepped inside, Reiner following close behind me.

We went over to the cradle and peered inside. There was a hyper realistic baby doll laying inside, holding a small teddy bear. On the bear’s band, there was a barcode. 

I put my hands up and backed up, pushing Reiner forward. “Nope, I’m not touching it.”

“Babe, it’s just a baby doll,” he said. Reiner recached in and carefully removed the bear from the baby’s arm and taking a picture of the barcode with his phone. We filled in the letters and put the bear inside. However, just as we turned to leave, the baby doll’s eyes shot open and it began screaming.

I let out an embarrassingly loud scream and grab Reiner’s shoulder. “Go! Go! Go!” I cried. The two of us ran out of the room slamming the door behind us. We rushed out to the main area where we entered, stopping in front of the TV. From where we now were, we could still hear the doll crying. I placed my forehead against Reiner’s shoulder and sighed. “I hate this, what the fuck is wrong this fucking family?”

Reiner placed his hand on my back and looked around. “One down, five to go,” he said, “what’s the next clue?”

I pulled the paper back out and stepped back form Reiner. “It just says, ‘grandma rocks’”

Reiner’s face paled. He nervously looked at me, his hands shaking. “Hey, baby, since I did the creepy doll, can you do that creepy old person?”

“It’s old woman, kick her in the hip and she’s down,” I told him, secretly fearing this myself.

“Okay, but this is a young person acting like a horror movie villain. Jay knows old people freak me out, so I wouldn’t be shocked if-”

“Jay is not going to dress like an old lady just to scare you,” I assured him.

“You underestimate the power of two male best friends.”

“You underestimate the extent of Jay’s fragile masculinity.” 

Reiner rolled his eyes and sighed. “Please?”

“Reiner, you’re dressed up like someone who believes he’s the king of the underworld,” I playfully bumped my body against his, “I’m positive you can handle this.”

Reiner chuckled and gave me a quick kiss. “Okay, whatever, let’s go.” 

Reiner and I went back to the hallway and went back to the first room we went in. I slowly opened the door, letting Reiner stand behind me. I glared at the porcelain doll and carefully walked over to the rocking chair. The chair was facing the wall, so I couldn’t get a good look at who was sitting in it. I peered over their shoulder to see, they were slowly turning the pages to a Bible. That’s when I noticed a barcode on the wall in front of them. I slowly took out my phone and took the picture. 

But, my dumbass forgot to turn the flash off.

The actor dropped the book and I heard a door slam behind us. Reiner and I spun around and saw the porcelain doll sat in front of the door. The both of us let out blood curdling screams, gripping on to each other. Reiner grabbed my arm and booked it to the door, pushing the doll aside with his foot.

“How the fuck did they make that work!?” I shouted. 

“I don’t know, but I think I peed a little.”

“Thanks for sharing.”

Reiner and I went back to the TV and jotted down the letters. I went to pick up the paper for the next clue, but when I reached into my pocket, it wasn’t there. Reiner looked at me, giving away that we both had the same thought.

“You know what,” Reiner put his hands up, “I’ll go and get it. I’ll be right back.”

“No, I can,” I told him, “I know what’s gonna happen now. We’ll just go in, find where we dropped it, and then leave.”

“Alright, let’s make it quick.”

Reiner and I went back to the room, this time walking in like it was no big deal. But, I then noticed the old woman in the chair, holding the paper.

“Great,” Reiner whispered. 

“Again, they can’t touch us, so I don’t-” before I could finish, I felt something cold against my leg. I looked down and there was that damn baby doll.

“Holy fuck! Oh my God!” I jumped back, knocking Reiner off of his feet. I tripped over him and fell on top of him. The door behind us shut, and at this point, I was convinced that I was going to die.

The doll hoisted up and shot into the air before landing on top of us. I let out the loudest scream any human as probably produced ever and attempted to kick the doll away from us. Somehow, the doll moved again, dodging my foot, as if someone was dragging it in that direction. Reiner wrapped his arms around me and crawled backwards against the wall. I pulled his arms off of me and rolled off of him so I was beside him. 

Suddenly, an idea hit me. I pulled my phone out and shined the flashlight around the doll. That’s when I saw it, a wire tied to the dolls arm, one tied to its neck, and anywhere else, like a puppet. I reached forward and tugged the wire holding it’s waist down, breaking it free from whatever was holding it. I got up from the floor and went over to the wheelchair. I swiped the paper from her hand before pulling Reiner out of the room.

When we got to the TV, we finally stopped to catch out breath. I leaned against the wall and took a deep breath in. 

Reiner looked at me with a mix of being impressed and surprise. “How did you even see that? How did you know there were wires?”

“How the doll moved, it was being dragged in directions,” I told him. 

Reiner let out a disbelieving laugh. He grabbed my face and kissed me roughly. “Alice, you’re a genius! That’s so smart!”

I shrugged my shoulders. “It’s just critical thinking.” I looked at the paper in my hand. “I’m fucking exuasted, I didn’t realize this house was going to be so much work. Let’s call it quits, we can go to my place and watch Hocus Pocus.”

“Yeah, that sounds great. Except, we should watch Ghostbusters instead.”

I looked at him in confusion. “Um, no? Hocus Pocus is infinitely better.”

“Yeah, if you’re six,” Reiner said.

I flicked his ear in annoyance. I dropped the subject, because I knew we were gonna end up watching Hocus Pocus anyways.

Reiner and I left the haunted house, turning around to go grill Adrian at the ticket counter. When we got close, we saw Jay standing there with him. 

“Hey,” I said as we got closer, “what the hell is up with the doll in the second room?”

Adrian laughed and looked at Jay. “Oh, that. Ryver, Venus, and Zachary did some of their movie magic stuff because, in Venus’ words, the actors can’t touch you but the props can.”

Reiner sighed and looked away. “That’s actually really clever.” 

“Yeah, I almost fucking pissed myself testing it,” Jay said.

“Reiner did piss himself,” I said, jerking my finger towards him.

“Alice screams like a girl!”

“Reiner pissed his pants!”

Reiner slapped a hand over my mouth and looked back at Adrian and Jay. “Don’t listen to her, she’s scared of dolls.”

After we finished talking with the two of them, Reiner and I went back to his place. We turned on Hocus Pocus and closed our night with cuddles and popcorn.