© 2011 Kelley Nicol
" In my small Midwest town parents have a story they tell all the children. It’s about a carnival that only appears on Friday 13th. No matter which month it falls in, no matter the year, every time there is a Friday 13th a tent is erected on the other side of the lake from our town. This carnival is led by a large clown who ushers people into the tent where they meet a horrible end, or so the story goes.I was terrified of clowns as I grew up, because of that story; all the kids in the town were. We never attended anything that had clowns, ever. Now I’m older, a teenager, I realize how dumb I had been as a child; our parents had only told us that story to keep us out of the woods. The lights we saw across the lake were probably just parties. In fact, just two weeks ago I was out at a party there. I could see why parents wouldn’t want young kids walking in on a bunch of teenagers drinking or anything else we did out in the middle of the woods. I mean, if we can be that bad on a normal Friday, it’s going to be worse on a Friday 13th.
It’s Friday 13th, a few of my buddies and I see the lights across the lake and get excited. We love to party, drink and hook up with random girls; there isn’t much else to do out here. We set off round the lake, walking the well-worn path next to the river, joking and talking about the different girls we hoped were going to be there.
