Enter Here to the Carnival

[CarnivalBarker]

Hi all. I needed a place to put some thread ideas, pictures, thoughts, whatever. I figured I'd start my own lair as many have. So here I am.

 

[CarnivalBarker]

Story: There Isn't Home Anymore

Riley Kane thought she heard a sound. She pulled her pistol before edging around the corner. It was silent. There had been nothing. For years now, she could never be too sure. When she was ten, the lights went out in the city one night and never came back on. She had watched as raiders abducted men, women, and boys in the streets, from her perch on the 11th floor condo where she had been raised by her single mom and her older brother.

"Stay here," her mother said one night, after the raiding parties had seemed to have left. Water and food had been scarce, lasting only a couple of weeks, and her mother had decided something had to be found. It was the last time the children saw her. Days passed and then weeks, and her brother, four years older, determined to raise her as best he could, until he could get her out of the building, then out of the city to a safe place near the shore. He knew the value of a teen girl. And he knew the danger her very existence was to her and to him. And each day, after the rebuilding had begun, he went to the streets, volunteered for the occupying forces, earned a daily ration for a single boy, and returned home each night, often giving the ration to her while he hunted a rat, or perhaps a dog, to get himself by. At night, he taught her what he could, while also making sure her warrior and survival skills were passable. Again, there was only so much he could achieve.

When she was sixteen, Riley began to bleed. The blood was so bad, and from a place so unexplored, that her brother feared for her security. He had never raised a girl and didn't know what to do. He found a doctor employed by the new government, and plead with his sensibilities to help her without revealing her existence to authorities. Of course, fearing reprisal, after counseling them both and explaining what she was experiencing was normal, the doctor reported them both. Her brother learned of the call before anything could be done, and it was then that he whisked her out, in the dark of night, along the alleys and corridors, leading to the darkest edge of the burned out metropolis, to hide yet again. For two years, he served her and awaited her 18th birthday - the time she could be emancipated and no longer subject to become a ward of the state. And every night, from then until now, he and she together had fought off and hid from various raiders and city dwellers that would occasionally stumble onto their lair. It had never come that they had to fight the authorities, but she knew that, even at 18, she had value to powerful people in high places, and her survival, at least as she knew it, was not ever certain. Now, Riley walked quietly down the corridor, the burned out building crumbling as she searched for any sort of animal or rodent that she could bring home as their meal. The plan was to wait a few more nights, until the storms came, and the clouds darkened the city even more, and then they would leave....seeking a different life, a free life, near the coastal towns in California. But the plan exploded in an eruption of rifle fire and a single explosion that silenced everything and shook the ground beneath her feet. She braced against the wall as she soon heard footsteps clapping through the hallway. She pointed her gun a second before her eyes grew wide and she pulled it away from her target.

"Run," her brother said, racing in her direction.

"Where are we going?" She asked, turning as he ran past her.

"Just run," he said again. "We have to leave town."

"Now?" She asked.

"NOW." He had been surprised on their city foraging mission by a patrol unit policing the streets. After returning fire and realizing he would be overwhelmed, he flung a pipe bomb in their direction, killing the four men and, no doubt, setting off alarms at state police headquarters. They would have perhaps an hour to flee and, once outside the city, would face a test of survival they had never seen. She ran with him back to their building, careful to avoid the tiny, temporary lamps that the state now set up to provide minimal light in the blackness that had swept the East Coast through the Missouri River Valley. Once there, they both grabbed a few things, enough perhaps to last them a week, and not so much that they would travel heavy. She pulled a jacket on over her gear, then grabbed a small backpack along with her two .45s, one holstered on each hip, and covered by the jacket, as well as a simple 9mm handgun in a holster lower, on her right thigh. "Ready?" Her brother asked. She shook her head no. She was anxious. Maybe even scared. The city had been hell for nearly a decade, but it had been home. There wasn't a home anymore. And it was time to go.


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[CarnivalBarker]

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Jaime turned up the music when Derek came upstairs nearly an hour ago. There, she enjoyed the work that he could do with his hands and shivered every time he kissed her. The music was only to drown out the noise she might send through the party wall to the condo next door, where her brother lived. She had come to live in the condo across the hall from his only a week before, but already she questioned the wisdom of letting her parents talk her into moving nearby. Of course it was to allow her the freedom to go to college in the big city, but it was to keep an eye on her too.

"I'll call you this week," Derek said, the making out finally done, as she turned the music down at 2:25 am. Jaime straightened the long shirt she wore over the small, pink, bikini cut panties in which Derek had his fingers for the better part of the last hour. She had met him the night she moved to town, at a baseball game, and their first date, now ending, went much better than she had thought. But she wasn't sure he was boyfriend material, and having a good time did not mean he got everything he wanted, or that she would let him back for seconds. But being a good girl also didn't prohibit her from walking him out to the breezeway, putting her arms around his neck, and kissing him one last time before watching him walk down the stairs and out to his car.

When he was out of sight, she returned inside, closed the door with a bit more heavy of a slam than intended, then got ready for bed, a grin on her face from the good time she had been shown. Against her better judgment, she had let the older guy in her place, but nothing bad had happened, and she felt like an adult, no longer under her parents' watchful eye. The 25 year old man with the motorcycle and tattoos who had just left after making her body shiver only added to the allure of the story she would surely tell to her best girl friends...once she had them in the new city. Until then, the story was just a secret that she would keep from her parents' proxy - her brother who lived just next door.

 

[CarnivalBarker]

Make Me a Star

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Lindsay had talent, but she was no longer sure it would take her anywhere. At a very young age, there had been talk that she could be famous. She had landed a gig on a local variety show - singing, dancing, performing in humorous skits. But the old Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera model was just that - old - and in the mid-sized Texas city where she grew up, there simply weren't enough eyes for her to be seen and noticed. When she turned 18, she had gone to college in Dallas, Texas, hoping to get her shot - perhaps in country music, or possibly in local television as a journalist who then got discovered and taken to work at MTV or some similar cable channel. But midway through her freshman year, she decided that such a path no longer inspired anything in her soul. Without telling her parents, she dropped out of school, working instead as a waitress long enough to save some money to travel west. As soon as she could do so without being talked out of it, she told her parents to their great dismay. Her father was not supportive and simply did not believe in her. Her mother would always be her mother, but without her father's support, and money, she was truly on her own for the first time. Two days after letting them know, and departing with all of her things in two luggage bags inside her car, she found herself in a Starbucks in front of the Mirage hotel in Las Vegas, an unplanned breakfast stop on her way to Los Angeles. The early morning air was cool and dry, and the lights of the strip were unlike anything she had seen. Signs for attractions and shows were everywhere. Cirque du Soliel seemed perfect for dancers and athletes - she had run track with modest success in high school. She certainly had the look to work on any casino floor during the day while perhaps finding a job in any number of supporting roles for any number of shows here. She knew that famous people came to Vegas all the time, and she wondered if there was opportunity here as a stepping stone to whatever she might find in Los Angeles. She stood up and walked to a nearby magazine bin and found the Las Vegas Review publication before returning to her table. She thumbed through the magazine until she found several ads, one of which caught her eye:

Talent agency seeking female talent for high end casino staff and possible work in fastest growing attraction in Las Vegas. Agency will pay fees for all auditions and support marketing, while providing day time employment as desired. Our clients have been placed in nearly every show in the city including Penn and Teller, Beatles Love, 4 Cirque du Soliel shows, numerous permanent review attractions, and casino floor shows throughout the city and strip. Earning potential as high as your desire to work. Contact us with Inquiries at Las Vegas Premiere Talent Consulting - 555-2324.

The nice thing about traveling West with no specific plan was that she could afford an extra day or two to explore an option if it arose. Lindsay thought for a moment and looked at the clock. It was just after 8:00 am. She could continue to Los Angeles, take a waitress job, and never be discovered, or even work in the entertainment industry. Here, perhaps she could jump start a career and then continue to L.A. She picked up her phone and dialed the agency in the ad.

"Hi," she said, to the voice on the other line. "I saw the ad in the Las Vegas Review and wanted to find out more about the job."

 

[CarnivalBarker]

First Daughter

The girl sat in her study in the upstairs East Wing of the White House, and patiently listened to the questions, genuinely trying to provide answers, as the reporter on the other end of the line read them to her. The reporter was a fourteen year old girl from one of the local charter schools who was doing a feature story on the high school senior, and the topics largely focused on her recent announcement that she would be deciding what college she would attend in the coming weeks. While she hated any interviews, she particularly hated what she considered "charity cases," designed and requested by her mother for the sole purpose of making the first family look to be without chaos. This was a charity case. At the same time, she knew why it was necessary. And, for the most part, things like this made the regular media paint the picture of her as the good little girl the family insisted upon.

"Well thank you!" she told the girl reporter, sounding completely sincere while bulging out her eyes and mimicking the act of shooting herself in the head. "Well I hope your story goes well for you too." She rolled her eyes now and desperately sought to conclude the call. "Sure....I am happy to do any follow up you might need after I decide. Okay....thank you again. Goodbye." She put the phone down and sat silently for a moment, wondering what boring shit she would be assigned to do next. She hesitated returning to the First Lady's office. She did not need another earful from her mother. For the press and media, she could put on a sweet persona and often did. For the most part, they ate it up, doing nice feature stories and painting her out to be a nice girl. But there had been leaks to the contrary in recent years.

President Michener had been elected three years earlier, which meant the coming calendar year would be an election year. While he had no opponent from his party, he didn't need missteps by himself or anyone around him. Katie got it. For the past two years, however, she had been a heavy subject of his administration, rare for a President's child, who usually got left alone. At sixteen, Jonathan Timmons, the de facto lead of the world's hottest boy band at the time, expressed his thoughts that Katie Michener, the newly elected President's daughter, was cute. Being like any adolescent whose father was the most powerful man in the free world, she asked him to invite the band to an event at the White House. It was there she met her crush and it was shortly after that he invited her to the MTV Video Music awards. Against his better judgment, the President said okay and the "date" became a media spectacle. Afterward, the family values lobby promptly criticized her low-cut dress, called her a dirty girl, and spread the rumor that she and Jonathan, or JT, had been kissing backstage. While the rumor was not entirely accurate - she had actually been caught by her detail making out with JT, who was already 18 and nearly 19, on a couch in a green room with his hand beneath her clothes and a marijuana joint in an ashtray nearby - she nevertheless became something of a lightning rod for her father's critics, a target of desire for sick men who put countdown clocks online for the date she would turn 18, and an "it girl," carrying the torch for fashionable young women across America and also being something of a part time target of east coast paparazzi.

Now, two years later, scandal found her again. During a campaign event at Iowa State University with her family, she had been caught on an open mic nearby telling her mother she could not imagine ever going to school there, but that the boys there were hot. Middle American media took the comment as a spoiled little rich girl looking down on them and the public universities, while also once again branding her a dirty slut. Despite the President's spokesperson explaining that as his daughter she should be left alone, and reminding them that she was free to go to school where she wanted, the impact of the stupid story seemed to be a drag on her father's popularity rating. As a result, two days ago, her mother announced that her final choices for college included several public universities and that she would be touring them beginning over the coming weekend. The announcement came as news to Katie, who had long planned on going to Amherst in Illinois. She was set to leave tomorrow. She picked up the phone to the East Wing downstairs.

"Carla, I need to speak to my mother," Katie told the older woman who had been her mother's assistant for a decade and who had helped raise her.

"She's in a meeting, honey," the woman said.

"Well I don't give a shit," Katie said tersely. "March in there and get her out."

"Katie," the woman began. "You know I can't...." SLAM! Katie hung up and immediately stood to head there herself. She looked at the itinerary. The University of Texas. The University of Arizona. Southern Cal. Cal Berkeley. And the University of Wyoming. "Fucking Wyoming?! the girl said under her breath before slapping the paper down on the table before her. "This is bullshit." The public persona, the facade, was gone. She picked up the phone again.

"Daniel," she said to the family quarters assistant. "Have my bags downstairs in twenty minutes." She thought a moment. "Put them in my mother's conference room. Yes...just do it. I'll come get them. And have my detail meet me there." She hung up the phone again. She knew good and well if the assistant took her things packed for two weeks into the very conference room her mother was meeting in, her mother would no longer avoid the discussion that Katie wanted to have, out of embarrassment to her guests for the situation alone. The staff called this version of the girl "Dark Katie," because she was night and day different from the one in the media. Secret Service just called her "Prairie Fire." And she was about to leave on a very dangerous road trip for the administration. She expected her mother and father to meet her demands, as she stormed downstairs to force her mother to the table.

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[CarnivalBarker]

Freshman Year

It was 2:35 am. Katie looked at her phone once more. Still 2:35. Her head throbbed and she felt nauseous. She looked up and down the street, seeing only a few stragglers, usually couples, here and there, arm in arm, walking toward their cars. The clubs and bars had been closed for a half hour, and she wasn't sure which direction her dorm was.

Where are you? She texted her roommate, Samantha. She stood in the warm, summer night, awaiting a response. None came. She looked up at the sign of the bar overhead. It said "Roc's."

Where is the dorm from Roc's she texted. No answer came still. She looked up and down the street again. She saw a man leaning against a wall at the entrance of an alley, smoke curling up and away from him. She shivered. She saw two other guys walking across the street together at the nearby intersection. She didn't know who to trust. Her head still throbbed and she wished she had never taken a second shot from the cute guy her roommate had introduced her to, shortly before they both vanished from the scene.

I don't know where to go, she sent another text, the last one the authorities would recognize two months later when her phone was found in the glove box of an abandoned, stolen truck, three towns west and an hour away on I-40. She started to walk in what she thought was the general direction of the campus, her wedge heels clip-clopping on the sidewalk, threatening to roll her ankle each step of the way in her drunken state. A year ago, Katie had been the star volleyball player on her campus. At 5'8, she was tall enough to become all-state, but not tall enough to get a scholarship anywhere. Her grades were excellent and she had the world laid out before her, always the most likely to succeed. Now, she stumbled home on a Friday night, like so many college freshman all over the country - just another one of the girls, but separated now from the herd. She wondered if anyone was paying attention to her as car after car passed, as person after person walked the opposite direction or across the street in the now dead night. She looked at her watch again. It was 3:20. And she was lost.

Katie: http://thrivecreativestudio.com/wp-1234MBNKPT/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Kansas-city-senior-pictures_0186.jpg

Katie: http://thrivecreativestudio.com/wp-1234MBNKPT/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Kansas-city-senior-pictures_0191.jpg

 

[CarnivalBarker]

Shelby Mays was speeding, trying to get home in time to get to bed and still make it up for the early morning telecast. She'd only been on the job for six weeks and, already, she found it to be a struggle. She loved the morning team. The male and female anchors were friends, roughly her age, and with her doing weather, they made an excellent attraction for people up that early. The hours, however, were getting to her. In order to start on the air at 5am, she had to be at work at 4am and, with the commute, that meant she was getting up at 3. It didn't suit well with her lingering lifestyle of going out with friends and trying to meet a husband, which was all done well after 7pm, which was when her producer suggested the morning team get to sleep. As her mind raced, she saw blue lights in her rearview.

Shit, she thought. This won't be okay. An hour and a half later, she had finally been booked in to the county jail, changed into the grey jumpsuit reserved for detainees before they "earned the orange" with a conviction, and the officer beside her finally allowed her access to a phone to make a call in an effort to be bailed out. Her family lived on the east coast. She had come to this city, specifically for the job. She didn't have any friends she could ask for $7500. She felt defeated as she picked up the phone and dialed the only number she could think of, knowing there would be a price to pay.

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