Cinnamon Roll Set Up (Cinnamon Rolls and Pumpkin Spice)

26. Georgia

Chapter 26

Georgia

I just want you.

I can’t get that thought out of my head. A few weeks ago, we were best friends who spent a ton of time together but didn’t think about each other that way. Now, we’re sneaking kisses in Dogeared’s back room and openly flirting with each other. It’s exciting.

Also terrifying. It’s a leap of faith, and part of me wants to take that jump—the other part of me wants to give in to my panic and run away to find safer ground. I’m not even exactly sure what I’m afraid of. I just know it’s right behind me, indistinct and ominous.

So why not combat those vague fears with more tangible ones?

We wander downtown’s streets hand in hand. We’ve finally entered our first fake fall, and it’s cool enough out that I need my sweater—a bold geometric pattern in burnt oranges and yellows. It whispers “fall,” where my more unusual sweater collection tends to scream it.

Speaking of screaming, the community center has reached maximum haunted house vibes. Doors are boarded up, tattered sheets hang from a second-story window as though someone tried to escape, and the occasional moan echoes from speakers in the eaves.

I want to high-five whoever’s behind the decor.

We get in line, putting us close enough to hear the real shrieks as groups move through the haunted house. My heart’s racing, but this way I can blame it all on my fight-or-flight instinct and not my very big, very unwieldy feelings for Miles.

“Have you been through the haunted house before?” he asks.

“I have, but they change it up each year. There’s the usual stuff, like creepy dolls and alien autopsies, but there’s always something new, too.” I squeeze his hand tighter. “Are you nervous?”

“No. I just haven’t been to one in forever.”

“Not a fan?”

He shrugs as we shuffle forward in line. “I used to go to the ones we had at school when we were little. Really amateur stuff. And I guess I went through a few in college. But not since then.”

“Then prepare yourself to be scared, sweetie.” I freeze, cringing inwardly. Also, probably outwardly.

Miles just grins down at me, his face illuminated in the streetlight behind me. “Never stop breaking rule number five.”

We move forward again and reach the ticket booth. The ticket taker’s in character just like everyone will be inside—he’s a freakishly gray corpse whose dialogue is littered with puns.

“Stay with your group, or you’ll face a grave situation,” he drones. “We accept cash, cards, and crypt ocurrency.”

Groans and chuckles move through the line.

“I’m not funny,” he says in monotone. “I’m dead serious.”

Miles leans close to whisper. “If he’s the opening act, it’s reassuring me that the main event won’t be too bad.”

“That’s exactly what they want you to think. They lull you into a false sense of security, and then—” I bring my free hand up to his chest to scare him. I get a fistful of pec, which I don’t regret, but he doesn’t even flinch. He just stares down at me. “It’s better when they do it.”

“Not to me.”

After a while, we’re finally allowed through the doors. They keep us in small groups of about ten, probably so we feel more isolated. Really drive home the spookiness.

The first room is a parlor filled with—I called it—creepy dolls. Some have heads that turn to watch us pass, some have red eyes that light up. One is telling us the history of the Abandoned Manor, and I’m focused on the menacing marionette when a full-sized doll lunges at us from the shadows.

I scream, plastering myself to Miles. Handholding won’t be enough for the rest of the evening. Jump-scares always get me. I’m laughing between shrieks, though. That doll’s makeup is really believable.

The next room is decked out like a fancy lounge, with drinks and plates of food set out as though it was just packed with people who have mysteriously disappeared. In the back, a man dressed in black hunches over an old piano, playing a tune that’s just off-key enough to jangle my nerves. When he turns and smiles, revealing fangs, we all scream and rush out.

The spooky factor ramps up with each room we explore, revealing the “manor’s” sordid history. The deteriorating furniture and deepening dark is almost creepier than the monsters that pop out of every corner. The ghouls become more supernatural the deeper we get into the haunted house, and I’ve lost the storyline entirely—I’m going from one scream to the next, laughing at myself in between.

Every step of the way, I cling tight to Miles. It’s for self-preservation, I tell myself. A horde of vampires open their coffins, and I press my face to his chest. Self-preservation. We escape a particularly evil set of clowns with my arm wrapped around his waist and my hand on his very nice stomach? That, too, is self-preservation.

We reach a hallway that’s in near-total darkness. Our group stumbles along, everyone alternately laughing and startling at nothing. Sometimes the suspense alone is enough to get a scream going. We’re funneled through a long hallway, and by the time the light of a fake moon shines on us, we’re deep in a pretend cornfield.

My breathing stalls. Then speeds. A logical voice tries to argue that this cornfield is just as fake as every other scene in the haunted house, but it’s drowned out by my brain’s fear center. And that part’s telling me to run.

I guess I make some kind of sound because Miles nuzzles his face against my ear.

“I’ve got you.”

I can barely hear him over the spooky soundtrack of crows and owls they’ve got washing over us.

“Maybe that’s all that will be in here—crows and owls?” My voice is thin and shaky, but I have to talk it out. Otherwise, I’ll start remembering all my worst, most vivid nightmares of running scared through fields just like this. “I could beat up a bird if it came down to it. Maybe not a guy in a bird suit, but I think if?—”

Every last thought in my head shatters. There’s a scarecrow in here. He’s hanging limp from a stake, and obviously his fabric face and straw hair aren’t real. His lopsided hat is genuinely stupid. It doesn’t matter. It’s my childhood nightmares made real.

He lifts his head.

“I can’t do this.” I spin out of Miles’s arms and try to backtrack the way we came, but “ghouls” block the path.

“Can I please get out? ”

They don’t say anything, just lift their hands and point behind me. This ride only goes one way.

My breathing’s coming too quickly now, my heart lodged in my throat as I pat down the fake cornstalks all around us. This is the community center. There’s got to be another exit somewhere. Or a way past this scene and into the regular activities rooms that must still be here.

A scarecrow springs out of the cornstalks right next to me, and I scream. It’s only a dummy, but that doesn’t soften the jagged edge of fear that’s slicing me in half.

This time, no self-conscious laughter follows the fright. I’m running on nothing but terror. I spin straight into someone’s arms and scream again.

It’s Miles. He’s holding me, soothing me, but it’s too late for that. Just past him, the scarecrow has climbed down from his stake. He’s moving toward us.

I need to get out .

Miles pulls me away, urging me through the room so we can complete the maze of haunts and be done already. I turn away from the scarecrow and follow Miles’s lead—I don’t need more nightmare fuel.

Something runs along my arm. I glance down, and my stomach turns to ice.

It’s the scarecrow’s burlap hand. The thing’s right next to me, laughing behind his sewn-on grin. I scream again, batting at it, but it doesn’t move.

Suddenly, Miles is between us. “Back off.”

The scarecrow gestures with its arms as if to say “Make me,” and lunges for me.

Miles stiff-arms him like Iron Man blasting away bad guys, making the scarecrow take a step back to avoid getting hit. “Get out of her face. Now.”

I’ve never heard him threaten anyone before, but it’s seriously effective. The scarecrow mumbles, “Take a joke, man,” and turns his attention to the people behind us.

Miles pulls me close into his side and leads us through the cornstalks. When we reach the next “ghoul” between rooms, he takes charge. “Let us out.”

The person lights up a glow wand and leads us to a side door. “No refunds, no returns,” he says, opening it out onto the small garden area next to the community center.

It’s disorienting to go from a fear-filled room back to the real world so suddenly. Lamps in the garden illuminate us, and people wander around just half a block away on the main street. No ghouls, no frights, no cornfields.

That doesn’t stop me from throwing myself the rest of the way into the safety of Miles’s arms. I burrow in close, letting his reassuring words and gentle hands on my back soothe away the fear.

“I’ve got you,” he says over and over again. “I’ve got you.”

Once my heart rate’s down to normal and my brain’s no longer telling me to Run, run, run! embarrassment worms its way in. I mean, I just very thoroughly freaked out during an event I suggested and essentially dragged him to.

I pull back enough to see his face. “We can all agree this date was a total disaster, right?”

He laughs, but traces soft touches along my hairline, his other arm still tight around my back. “I wouldn’t go for the haunted house again, but I wouldn’t call it a disaster.”

“Name one good thing that happened tonight.”

His mouth quirks the smallest amount. “I’ve got you in my arms.”

“Rule number eight.” I flex my fingers against his waist. “Next time, though, let’s skip the haunted house.”

He nods. “That’s rule number nine.”

“I need to sit down for a minute.” I don’t trust my legs right now. We move to one of the benches in the garden space, and I blow out a breath. “You were kind of scary back there.”

“Scarecrow scary?” He sounds almost sad, and I realize how that might have come across. Like maybe his behavior contributed to my fears.

I turn as much as I can to face him on the bench. “No. More like…’touch her and die’ scary. It’s a good thing.”

Ten minutes ago, I wouldn’t have listed that as one of my top-tier micro-tropes, but it’s up there now.

“That’s pretty close to what I was thinking.” He presses a kiss to the side of my head. “I’m sorry that triggered your old fears.”

“Me, too. Not how I imagined our first date going.”

“How did you imagine it going?”

Whatever actual plans I might have had are hard to remember when his gaze falls to my mouth. “I mean, we would definitely be our goofy selves.”

His gaze holds steady. “Check.”

“And we would have fun because I always have fun with you.” My answers are getting breathier by the second, but I have very limited defenses against his intense focus on my lips.

“I always have fun with you, too.”

Oh, good gracious, does he have to use that deliciously low voice?

“And at the end, we’d definitely have a kiss.”

His gaze snaps up to mine. “Are we at the end?”

“We can kiss in the middle, too.”

He leans in just enough to graze his lips over mine in a tease that lights up all my nerve-endings.

“Rule number ten,” he says before closing the distance again.