A few years ago, if you’d told Rowena Bimbury she’d be taking her only child to a traveling funfair, she’d have spat out her Chenin Blanc and laughed in your face. Perhaps divorce really does change people.
Still, it was an altogether hideous prospect. It would be loud and garish and full of people with “BMIs higher than their IQs” (one of Rowena’s favorite bon mots). And it was on the wrong side of town—the side with the estate and the big Asda.
But François was obsessed. Ever since posters started popping up around town proclaiming that Ol’ Deuteronomy’s Funfair was ‘Double the fun! Double the thrill!’, it was all he talked about.
Rowena knew the last year had been tough on François. He’d always been such a bubbly child. Not gifted, sadly, but with a wonderful curiosity about the world. He was constantly asking questions and testing out little theories. Questions like, “can I fit my entire fist in my mouth?” and “what do ants taste like?”. But since Tim left, he’d become withdrawn. He was only seven, but a world-weariness had taken root. It was nice to see him excited about something again.
She’d even spoken to Millie about it. Millie was a recent friend, a mum from school who’d gone through a similar thing. Millie thought the funfair could be a powerful bonding experience. “It’s so important you and François lay the foundation for your relationship as a two,” she said, presumably paraphrasing her therapist.
Of course, Millie could never fully understand what Rowena was going through. Millie’s husband hadn’t told her he no longer loved her. He hadn’t left her crying at the front door, watching the rear lights of his Range Rover Evoque dwindle into nothingness. Millie’s husband had died. There was no risk of her bumping into him in Waitrose with his twenty-three-year-old executive assistant, Melissa.
Still, François was the most important thing in Rowena’s life—maybe the only thing besides a big house and the imminent prospect of a lucrative alimony. He was the only person, including herself, that she loved unconditionally.
Even loved enough to take to a funfair.
***
When the fateful Saturday came, Rowena popped another hand sanitizer into her handbag and strapped François into the Volvo. Soon she was at the fair’s entrance buying two tickets from a red-headed, red-eyed teenage boy with a nose ring.
“I’m excited, Mummy!” François’ eyes darted back and forth as they crossed the threshold, the sound of three different Ibiza dance hits assaulting them at once. Rowena took a deep breath. She didn’t belong here. She wasn’t some godforsaken single mother from the estate, dragging her brat to the fair because she couldn’t afford a trip to Center Parcs.
“I want to go on this one!” François said, racing towards a waltzer-type ride called The Disco Twister. Its exterior was a fever dream of garish celebrity portraits—Elvis snarled next to a ghostly Michael Jackson, while a figure who could equally have been Marilyn Monroe or Margaret Thatcher bared horse-like teeth. Inside, lights flashed and smoke billowed—intentionally, Rowena hoped.
Rowena trotted after François, who had joined the short queue behind two teenage girls wearing pink plastic cowboy hats and not a lot else. One of them had a huge stuffed Minions toy tucked under her arm.
“You mustn’t run off like that, François!”
The girl with the toy mouthed ‘François?’ and the pair burst into giggles.
“Sorry, Mummy. I want to go on this!”
Before Rowena could respond, they were at the front of the queue.
“Two, is it?”
Rowena looked up—and froze.
The boy at the booth was the exact same one who had sold them their entry tickets just moments before. Same red hair, same bloodshot eyes.
“But you were just—”
“Didn’t mean to scare ya,” he said in a monotone. He cocked his head towards the entrance. “That’s my twin.”
“You’re identical.”
The boy’s expression didn’t change. “We are.” Something about the way he said it—too certain, too final—unsettled her.
Rowena swallowed and forced out a brittle laugh. “Gosh, is that a fairground thing?”
The boy blinked. “No. It’s caused in utero when a single ovum divides after fertilization.” Black pupils swallowed the color of his irises. “Two, is it?”
Rowena’s face burned. “Er—yes, two please.”
She shoved a £20 note through the little slot and hurried François up the steps. “Keep the change!” she called out, not looking back.
They clambered into the little round car. Another dance hit blared, a caterwauling singer warning everyone to ‘evacuate the dancefloor’.
“If only,” Rowena muttered as she squeezed her Mulberry handbag between Pilates-toned thighs. She tugged down hard on François’ safety bar, stopping just short of entirely cutting off his blood supply.
She glanced toward the ticket booth.
The red-headed boy stared back. He was smiling now.
The music skipped for a moment, repeating. “Evacuate—evacuate—evacuate…”
Rowena shuddered. She hoped the ride was more reliable than the sound system.
The music resumed, and the ride began to move, slowly at first. François bounced in his seat, waving his arms. His smile was wide, sunlight glinting off the silver of his braces.
“François! Arms inside the car!” She immediately felt guilty. This was François’ day. He was allowed to be excited. She hadn’t seen him this carefree since before Tim tore their little family apart.
“This is going to be fun,” she added through gritted teeth.
Their car rotated gently. It was almost pleasant. Rowena flexed her fingers on the safety bar, watching color creep back into the knuckles. See? Everything was fine.
Then, with a mechanical groan, the speed increased. “Oh, Christ!” The platform tilted, and the car spun faster and faster, until everything was a blur of neon.
François let out a delighted scream. “Mummy! This is amazing!”
Rowena gasped as the centrifugal force pinned her against the seat, chestnut hair flying into her face. François was in fits now, giggling uncontrollably between shrieks.
These days, Rowena’s idea of a thrill was downing a bottle of wine and anonymously posting one-star Google reviews on Melissa’s yoga teacher page (as well as being Tim’s executive assistant, Melissa was an aspiring yoga teacher, because of course she fucking was). But she had to admit, it was good to feel the wind in her hair.
Rowena threw her head back, laughing with François. A surge of love coursed through her at the sight of his chubby cheeks, flushed with excitement. The music thumped, the world spun, and for once, Rowena let herself enjoy the ride.
***
After that, the rides came thick and fast. They went on the teacups, a Noah’s Ark-themed swinging ship, and the Helter Helix, a helter-skelter with two slides that intertwined like DNA.
After they’d tumbled laughing down the slides, the pair went searching for their next thrill. As they walked through the fair, the sounds of music and screams ringing in their ears and the smell of fried food worrying Rowena’s delicate nostrils and exciting Francois’, Rowena began to feel uneasy.
She was no stranger to being noticed. She was attractive—tall and slim, with a voluminous mass of chestnut brown hair. And although she was no longer in the bloom of youth, her fanatical exercise regime coupled with the regular attentions of Dr. Susan Klein, MD had kept her looking fresh and, in Rowena’s view, at least somewhat desirable. But this was a different kind of attention.
She felt a swarm of eyes on her, roaming all over her, prickling her skin like bed bugs. Yet every time she turned to try to meet a gaze, there was no one looking—just the back of a head that may or may not have just turned or a body arched away from her. Barely perceptible evidence of an intrusion, like the tiny dung of cockroaches just scuttled off in the light.
Rowena held François’ hand tight, trying to shake off the itchy prickle of disquiet. He was oblivious, humming to himself, eyes like saucers taking in the wonders of the fairground.
Just then, a small shepherd’s hut caught Rowena’s eye. Written in an opulent gold script was, ‘Madam Irina, Mistress of the Cards’ and smaller, underneath, ‘Tarot readings. No refunds.’
“How fun!” Rowena exclaimed, pulling herself back into the spirit of things. She’d only had a reading once before, but it was one of her favorite stories. Years ago, she and an old friend had shared a bottle of Crémant at the bar at Selfridge’s and then visited the tarot booth downstairs. The fortune-teller told her to beware a blond male, and they’d found it hysterical because of Tim’s own flaxen hair. “If only I’d listened,” Rowena had been fond of saying as she laughed and playfully nudged Tim in the ribs.
If only she had.
Rowena and François stepped into the dimly lit interior. Candles flickered. A broad woman sat shuffling a well-worn deck of cards. Dark curls spilled out of a royal blue turban. A knowing smile revealed yellow, lipstick-stained teeth.
“Ah,” Madam Irina murmured. “Sit.”
Once Rowena had paid, Madam Irina began to lay the deck of cards face down on the velveteen tabletop.
Rowena leaned in conspiratorially. “I’m going through a bit of a transitional phase at the moment, so just looking for some reassurance, really…”
Madam Irina was impassive. “I tell what cards reveal,” she said, her Eastern European accent thick.
She indicated for Rowena to select three cards. The first depicted a woman blindfolded, surrounded by huge blades. The seven of swords.
“Oh, that’s a dramatic one! Is that good?”
Madam Irina ignored her, flipping the next card: the Five of Cups, a cloaked figure surrounded by goblets spilling crimson liquid. Understanding flickered across the fortune-teller’s face.
The final card showed a large horned figure. At his feet kneeled twin smaller figures, joined at the neck by a chain. The Devil. Madam Irina drew a long, ragged breath.
“What does that mean?” Apprehension crept into Rowena’s voice.
Madam Irina leaned closer. Her breath smelled of burger vans and nicotine. She spoke with a terrible urgency, “I see evil in house. Great evil”.
“Oh yes, that’ll be my husband. We’re separated.”
“Very careful you must be. I see blood. Pain. Violence. Fear—”
“Sorry, I didn’t know this was going to be all ooky and spooky,” Rowena interjected, gesturing at François who was just then intently excavating a nostril with his thumb. “Can we tone it down a bit? There’s a child present.”
Madame Irina shook her head solemnly. “I no more can change will of cards than snow leopard he can change markings.”
Rowena pushed back her chair. “Right, well, I think we’re done here—”
The woman grabbed her arm. Rowena gasped and tried to pull away, but the fortune-teller’s grip held firm.
“Evil in house”. Madam Irina’s voice rose, her eyes wild as she switched to her mother tongue, “Diavol această femeie îngrozitoare!”
“Get off me!” Rowena yanked away and the woman’s long nails scratched down her forearm, breaking the skin. Rowena grabbed François and rushed him out of the shepherd’s hut.
As they fled, Madam Irina’s gnarled voice followed, “No refund!”
***
Rowena was practically dragging François towards the exit. “Right, well, we’ve had a lovely day—”
“But we haven’t even done the funhouse or had any candy floss! Dad said you’d do this.”
Rowena stopped in her tracks. François gazed up at her with pleading, cow-like eyes.
“Okay, we can do one more thing. One!”
François’ gaze settled on the brightly colored funhouse. “That one!”
Rowena paid the attendant, a grizzled man with a huge beard and a faint smell of alcohol. They found themselves stepping into a stark labyrinth of funhouse mirrors. Alone but for their reflections.
François marveled at himself as he shifted in the glass, tall and thin one moment, short and squat the next. Then dividing into two, four, six—Françoises as far as the eye could see.
Rowena’s stomach burbled with unease. A metallic taste settled in the back of her throat. She had that feeling again. The feeling of eyes roaming over her in the darkness.
Something wasn’t right.
She turned to François—but he was gone.
“Come back here!”
She could hear the pitter-patter of footsteps ahead. But after turning corner after corner, there was still no sign of him. Just her own warped reflection.
She heard a distant voice. It was muffled and indecipherable, but it sounded scared.
“François!” Rowena picked up speed. And then—was that a small figure in one of the mirrors? But when she looked again, she saw only her wide eyes staring back at her.
She broke into a run.
“François! François! Franç—” CRUNCH. A sickening sound as she collided with the pane of transparent plastic. Her nose.
“Fuck!” She could already hear the pit pit pit sound as blood dripped onto her crisp white blouse. But there was no time to think about the pain or the dry-cleaning bill. With one hand clutching her crumpled nose and the other reaching out in front of her, she groped through the mirrored halls.
“Fwabwa! Fwabwa!” she screamed as blood oozed between her fingers.
Eventually, she reached the exit and stumbled, blinking into bright sunlight.
“Where’s my son?” she begged the attendant. He looked blank.
Rowena ran through the fairground. She saw families shield children from her, judging the flailing, bloody creature she had become.
“Are you okay, love?” A large woman wearing leggings and a bejeweled sweatshirt looked at her with concern. Rowena was too distraught to even judge.
“Have you seen a little boy?” Her voice trembled.
“Well, yeah, there are lots of little boys here. Can you be a bit more specific, love?” The woman smiled encouragingly.
“One who looks like he could be my son!” Rowena spat impatiently. “Look at me and then think, if you can, about what my son might look like. I’ll give you a clue; he doesn’t have a shaved head and he’s not wearing anything Disney.”
The woman screwed up her face. Rowena turned on her heel and trotted off.
“François! François, please!” The bright lights of the fair blurred as her eyes welled with tears. Her stomach ached. How could she have lost him? He was the only thing she had left. How had she ruined this as well? She let out a primal, guttural noise from deep within her, “My child! I’ve lost my child!”.
And then she heard it.
“Mummy!”
Looking up, she saw Madam Irina’s curls bouncing towards her, cigarette in hand. Holding her other hand and studiously nibbling candy floss was François.
“François! Oh, my François!” She ran towards him and scooped him up tight in her arms.
“Found him tryin’ to sneak onto the Waltzer. Little scamp!” Madam Irina chuckled in a cockney accent, leaning down to muss François’ blond hair.
“I was just so worried… But… your voice? I thought…?”
“Convincing, innit? Drama school, darlin’. Did a whole year.” The woman took a long, smug drag on her cigarette. “You oughta get that nose looked at, by the way. Looks nasty.”
Rowena smiled weakly and turned back to François. “Come on, let’s get home.”
***
The sun was low in the sky as Rowena drove. Her nose throbbed. François had fun though, and that was the main thing. He’d started to seem more like his old self. And perhaps they really had begun to “lay the foundation for their relationship as a two”, as Millie had encouraged.
All in all, it could have been worse.
Couldn’t it?
In the backseat, François gazed out of the window, glassy-eyed and muttering to himself.
“What was that, darling? I was thinking we could warm that leftover French onion soup on the AGA for supper?”
François said something she couldn’t make out.
“Or there’s vichyssoise if you’d prefer? We could have it with that nice crusty bread. You’ll have to speak up though, I can’t hear you over the air con.”
***
A little later, Rowena stood over the AGA, stirring a huge Le Creuset pot of French onion soup. She still hadn’t got used to only cooking for two. She’d changed out of her bloodied blouse into an aquamarine Lululemon hoodie, taken two Nurofen and put a plaster on her nose. François had gone straight to his room, no doubt tired after the day’s excitement.
She sipped her wine, exhaled deeply and reflected on what it was to be a mother.
She’d once read that motherhood is putting someone else’s well-being ahead of your own. And sure, it hadn’t all gone to plan, but wasn’t that exactly what she’d done today? She felt a tentative swell of pride. Her own parents had barely acknowledged her existence, let alone put her first. But she was doing it differently—and she was doing it all on her own. She took another large, satisfied gulp.
The soup bubbled. “François! Supper’s ready!”
***
“François!” Rowena called again.
She turned her head, still stirring the soup. “Oh, there you are. Would you lay the table, darling?”
François stared with wide, unblinking eyes, smiling with his teeth.
“Hail Moloch,” he said, flatly.
“Who? François, have you been watching those channels again?”
François’ pupils grew as he stared. Soon they swallowed his irises, then the whites of his eyes. Rowena, so used to her son’s big blue eyes that went so perfectly with his blond hair, found herself staring into two great unfamiliar pools of darkness.
That’s when she noticed the kitchen knife glinting in his hand.
Her chest tightened. “Put that down!”
François took a slow step forward now, his smile growing until Rowena could see both rows of his teeth. Until it was wider than she had ever seen it before.
She stepped backwards, leaning against the AGA. “François?” Her voice trembled. “Where are your braces?”
That’s when he pounced.
Rowena turned to try to run, but he was already on her, forcing the blade into her. again and again and again. Her aquamarine hoodie fast turned scarlet.
Rowena’s mind reeled, uncomprehending. “Please,” she said softly, tasting blood.
The François-shaped creature stopped stabbing. He held her pleading gaze for a moment. Then he spun her around so that she was facing the huge soup pot.
“Hail Moloch!” he spat.
Steam stung Rowena’s eyes as he pushed her face towards the bubbling surface of the bistro classic. She tried to brace against the AGA, but the blood loss had made her weak. And he was so strong. François wasn’t this strong.
The brown broth filled her vision, getting closer and closer.
“What have you done with my son? Where is—” But Rowena’s pleading was cut short as her head was plunged into the scalding, onion-y liquid.
***
Meanwhile, on the other side of town, the fairground people gathered by the darkened attractions. The man from the funhouse with the big beard walked around the perimeter of the group, lighting hundreds of candles that flickered and danced in the colorful shine of the rides. At the same time, another man—his exact double except with a huge handlebar mustache instead of a beard—circled in the other direction, lighting candles as he went.
In the middle of the crowd stood François. The real François. He was sobbing, hands trembling as he clutched his chest.
“Why you cry? You where you belong now.” Madam Irina sneered.
“Your other ’alf will be back in a jiffy. Just as soon as he’s finished with yer mum,” her cockney double added.
“Will be soon. She’s not the sharpest sickle in the shed. Blood sacrifice will not be difficult.”
The red-headed teenager from the entrance gave François a friendly punch on the arm. “You’ll forget her sooner than you think. I barely remember mine. Plus, I got a new best friend out of it.”
“Mate, you’re too cheesy,” his “twin” chimed in.
***
A little while later, François’ doppelgänger clinked his spoon against the now empty soup bowl. “Supper was delicious, Mummy.” He stood up from the kitchen island.
Rowena gave no reply. Her body was slumped by the AGA—red, boiled head, drenched in beef broth and bits of onion.
On the stove, a beige plaster floated lazily on the surface of the leftover soup.
***
The real François whimpered as the crowd around him grew. Two by two. Two bearded funhouse attendants. Two candy floss sellers with crimped blonde hair. A pair of ancient-looking women draped in furs in identical wheelchairs. And behind them, smiling and waving in matching floral blouses, two Millies—his mother’s friend from the school gates.
“I want my mummy.” But François’ pleading was drowned out by the cultists’ terrible chant:
“One of us now,
Two of you,
Free from ties that bind like glue.
For our Prince of Hell, Lord Moloch,
’Fy virtue and all goodness mock.
Double the fun and double the thrill,
We wait now for thy sacred kill.
And in His name we pray.”
Then, from deep in the night, François heard another voice, small and distorted, but unmistakably his own:
“It is done”.
