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Smoke whirled around Frank as he stumbled through the hall of mirrors, alone in the oppressive noisiness of the haunted house. His reflection shattered into millions as he turned the corner to face a broken mirror.
"Oh no," said a girl's amplified voice. "You broke the mirror. That's seven years of bad luck." Two bloody hands slammed against the back of the broken mirror as it turned suddenly transparent, revealing the girl's grinning, bloody face, glass sticking out of her forehead.
Frank yelped in surprise and turned another corner, back into the maze. The smoke grew heavier and heavier as he wandered, until suddenly the mirrors dropped away and he found himself in darkness that was almost pitch-black compared to the bright lights of the mirror maze. The short, grubby man waiting in the room politely waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness before knocking on a heavy-looking door and letting it creak open.
"Welcome," said a voice from the gloom. "I wonder how I can treat your sickness." A light clicked on over a young woman strapped to an ancient dentist's chair, her arms, legs, and forehead fastened securely as she thrashed and moaned. "Poor thing, her heart is broken. Looks like I'll need to fix it." A nurse stepped into the light, her old-fashioned white dress stained with blood and her hat secured primly to the top of her hair with bobby pins. She dragged behind her a creaky stand covered in gleaming scalpels. As she inspected them, Frank noticed two things.
First, the group of strangers he'd entered with had moved on, and he was alone with the actors.
Second, the nurse was beautiful. She was just a few years older than him, and the lighting made her glow. It wasn't the first time Frank had fallen a little bit in love with an actor in a haunted house, but as she picked up a scalpel and plunged it into the patient's chest, Frank wondered how inappropriate it would be to ask for her number.
As the patient screamed and thrashed some more, the nurse tutted at her, pulling the scalpel out of the long cut and reaching in to pull out the patient's slimy heart. "I don't think she can be fixed." She turned to look at Frank. "What about you?"
The rest of the dim lights in the room switched on, revealing a row of rusty hospital beds, mostly occupied by patients completely covered in their sheets and completely still. One was empty, the covers pulled back, waiting for its occupant.
"Can you get better? Or will you only get worse?"
Behind Frank, there was a sudden ruckus, what sounded like multiple people shouting and banging. He jumped and looked around. In the corner of the room, four large dog cages sat huddled together. Three had people in them, the source of the noise. The other's door hung open, waiting patiently like the bed.
"Do I need to put you in there until I have time to put you down?"
Frank turned again to find the nurse much closer to him, her smile almost kind apart from the splatter of blood across her face. Frank's heart raced.
"You're beautiful," he said stupidly.
Her smile grew, and she advanced on him. "The cages for you, then."
"Run!" shouted the woman strapped to the chair. Frank took her advice and bolted for the far door.
❦❦❦
Frank posted a review of the haunted house on his blog. This one was a fundraiser for a local rec center, staged in their gym, and he gave it five skulls out of five. It was one of the better nonprofit haunted houses he'd seen recently. Definitely better than the same one last year. The design was top tier, and the special effects were mostly very good. They'd reused a lot of props from past years, as always, but some of them Frank had barely even registered as the same things.
There were a fair number of haunted houses in the area, and every October, Frank liked to boot up his WordPress and dutifully review as many of them as he could make it to. He usually didn't revisit a house within the same year, but here he was on the rec center's Eventbrite page again.
❦❦❦
Once again, Frank found himself alone in the mirror maze, his reflection distorting and warping in the chipped full-length mirrors. Blood poured down the ones at the beginning of the maze before it faded into a bright, almost cheerful mirror maze. It could have been a normal Hall of Mirrors if it weren't for the haunted house din that echoed from every corner of the unrecognizably subdivided gym, groans and moans and screams and wails.
"Oh no," said the girl behind the mirror. "You broke the mirror. That's seven years of bad luck." She slammed against the back of the broken mirror and sneered at him. Frank jumped even though he'd known it was coming.
The door into the hospital slammed shut, and the patient on the chair began thrashing in the darkness.
"Welcome," said the nurse's voice from the gloom. "I wonder how I can treat your sickness." The light over the patient turned on, illuminating her terrified face as the nurse's heels clicked on the floor towards her, almost inaudible under the noise. "Poor thing, her heart aches for her lost love. I've already taken care of him. Looks like I'll need to fix her next." The nurse stepped into the light, looking just as beautiful as she had a few days ago. Frank watched her inspect her scalpels before she picked one up to cut open the patient and pull out her heart. "I don't think she can be fixed. What about you?" She turned to look at Frank.
Frank stood up straight and stuffed his hands in his pockets, trying to look at least somewhat respectable.
The nurse smiled at him, warm and bloody. "You're back. I like you. I knew you wanted to go in my cages."
"N-no," said Frank. "Not really."
"I know you can't be fixed. You need me to strap you down and cut you apart so I can put you back together like a puzzle. Poor thing, you won't survive that." She stepped closer and reached out to almost touch Frank's cheek with her bloody hands. Frank shivered. He had to look up at her, and-
The patients in the cages behind him began banging on the bars and shouting. Frank jumped out of his skin. "Run, run!" one shouted, and he did.
❦❦❦
It was another day, and this time the actor playing the girl behind the broken mirror was different. The same scare had managed to get Frank again, though, and as the doorkeeper let him through the creaky door into the hospital, his heart was pounding.
"Her heart is heavy with grief," said the nurse this time. "Her girlfriend has died. But she doesn't need to worry. I'll cut the ache out of her." She stepped into the light, and her scalpels glinted on their tray. She picked one up, studied it, and stabbed the screaming patient, pulling her heart out of her chest. "Oh, poor thing. I can't save her." She put the heart back into the patient, now still. "What about you?"
When she turned to face Frank, she clearly recognized him immediately. This time, the smile was somehow both genuine and wicked. "Welcome back. What's your name?"
"Frank," said Frank, his palms sweating. He wiped them on his jeans.
"You didn't think me cutting you apart was enough, Frank? You want me to vivisect you for the students, don't you?" She stepped back this time, gesturing at the chair and the dead patient atop it. "Come on, take her place. I'll call the medical college, and they can look at your every bit while you feel every second of it."
Frank's cheeks heated. That sounded good, so fucked-up and good, and when the prisoners banged on their cages and the patient on the table gasped at him to run, his heart was pounding for a totally different reason than fright.
❦❦❦
The girl behind the mirror was the original one again, and this time she seemed to recognize Frank, a little genuine smile playing across her face as she banged on the mirror. She drew her thumb across her throat and mouthed, "You're dead," which was different. Many of the actors in the earlier rooms were already beginning to recognize him as well, giving him extra ad-libbed lines and getting a little closer to him than they had before. Frank liked it. He'd have to start repeating haunts more often.
The patient was putting her heart into it today, literally, thrashing and moaning in more agony than before.
"Look how sick she is," said the nurse. "Her heart is broken. Look how much it hurts. Do you think I can fix her?" She stepped into the light, tidy and beautiful as ever, inspected her scalpels, and cut into the patient, who screamed a truly artful scream. She pulled out the heart and studied it. "It beats in my hand... incredible. But I can't fix it." She dropped it, and the patient twitched, moaning, and finally stilled. "What about you?" She turned and smiled. "Frank! Frank, you really want me to keep you, don't you?"
Yes, thought Frank, and made a little noise.
"What will it be today? A lobotomy? Plasticizing your body while you're alive?" She stepped towards him, and Frank was helpless. "Or maybe you can give me your number so I can truly diagnose you."
Frank's heart leapt, and he must have looked elated, because she laughed at him.
"Oh, Frankie, I don't think you can ever be cured. Give your number to the orderlies at the end of your trip. Tell them it's for Nurse Gerard. We can set up a private consultation. You need all the help you can get."
Gerard... that was a man's name. Frank started to worry about his mistake, but then the banging on the cages behind him scared the shit out of him, and he decided it didn't matter.
❦❦❦
November 1st was cold and windy. Inside the coffeeshop where they'd agreed to meet, Frank unwound his scarf and jacket and other jacket and piled them on the back of his chair before sitting down with his latte.
Gerard was late, but they'd told him that would happen, so Frank sipped his latte patiently for ten minutes until the door jingled and they finally appeared, wrapped in a long black coat and brown scarf. Frank waved, and they smiled back, going to order coffee first.
"Are you glad it's over?" Frank asked once they'd put their coffee down and started taking off their outer garments.
"Not at all," Gerard said vehemently. "I'm tired, but I love working the haunt every night. I can't wait until next year. I didn't tell you - I was the set designer this year, and I already have so many ideas for next year."
"That explains wh-" Frank choked a little bit as Gerard shed their coat, revealing the crisp white nurse's dress underneath. There were almost no bloodstains remaining, but a few little drops of red speckled their torso artfully. "Jesus fucking Christ."
Gerard smiled at him, and Frank felt their scalpel dig into his chest, making its way to his rabbiting heart. "I believe we have a cure to discuss, don't we?"