"The Last Ride at Spreepark":
I’m 90 years old, and I never thought I’d be crawling through a rusty fence into an abandoned amusement park, but here I am, heart pounding, breath shallow, squeezing between the twisted metal like some sneaky teenager. Spreepark. Just saying the name in my head brings a flood of old feelings I can barely stand to hold back. This place used to be magic — our family's favorite corner of Berlin. Back when the carousel spun and the Ferris wheel lit up the night sky like a beacon, calling out to every laughing child and every weary parent desperate for a little slice of wonder. Now, it's a graveyard of memories, swallowed by weeds and rot, the thick smell of rust and damp earth clinging to everything like a shroud. It's 2013. The world has moved on. I guess, in a way, so have I. But before my time is up, I needed to come back. Just once. Just to feel it. To see if the echoes of laughter still lived somewhere under all this decay.
The summer evening wraps around me, warm but heavy, the air thick like it's waiting for a storm that won't come. The sun hangs low, a molten smear against the hazy sky, casting long crooked shadows over the crumbling entrance booths. My cane sinks deep into the soft, broken ground with every cautious step. I shuffle forward, feeling the tug of the earth, as if the park itself wants to pull me down into its forgotten bones.
The Ferris wheel looms ahead, its skeletal frame silhouetted against the fiery horizon. Red paint flakes like dead skin from the beams, and the little gondola seats sway back and forth in the lazy evening breeze, creaking with a sound that stirs something deep in my chest. For a moment — just a heartbeat — I swear I hear the high-pitched squeals of my grandkids, their tiny hands sticky with melted cotton candy, their faces flushed with joy. The memory hits me so hard that my throat closes up. I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand and press onward, toward the carousel where we used to spend whole afternoons riding in endless circles.
When I find it, it’s like looking at the ruins of some long-dead kingdom. The carousel is broken, sagging into itself like a tired old man. The horses, once proud and fierce, are faded to ghostly pastels. Some are missing ears, or legs, their wooden bodies cracked and flaking, their painted eyes dull and lifeless. I reach out, brushing my fingertips along the cold, splintered wood of a nearby horse. Its mane, once vivid with gold leaf and deep blues, is now nothing but chipped paint and sorrow. "We had good times, didn't we?" I whisper, my voice breaking the thick silence like a pebble tossed into a still pond.
I'm lost in the swell of old days when a low murmur pulls me sharply back. It’s faint, but distinct — voices, coming from the direction of the old funhouse. I turn slowly, peering through the dim light. The funhouse looms crookedly, its bright colors long since bled away, leaving only blistered paint and shattered mirrors that catch the last light and scatter it into broken shards. My stomach tightens. Probably just the wind, I tell myself. Maybe some kids sneaking around like me, looking for a cheap thrill in the ruins. But the voices grow clearer — men, talking low and fast, the sound sharp and urgent.
I creep closer, each step a careful negotiation between my fear and my foolish curiosity. The ground is littered with broken bottles and splintered wood, the remains of a party or a hundred parties long gone. The murmuring sharpens into words, and I see them — three men, standing in a tight circle under the dim halo of a flickering lantern hung from a rusted beam. They're rough — their clothes dark, their faces harder than the bark on an old oak tree. One of them clutches a duffel bag, and when he unzips it, the glint of plastic-wrapped bundles inside catches my eye.
My heart stumbles in my chest. Drugs. It hits me all at once. I'd heard the stories about Norbert Witte, about the cocaine hidden in carousel parts, the fall from grace that dragged this place into ruin. And now here it was again, a new chapter in an old, rotten book. I need to get out. I need to get out right now. But my legs have turned to jelly.
I start to inch backward, trying to make myself invisible, but my cane betrays me — the metal tip taps a loose scrap of iron lying in the grass, and the sharp clang slices through the air like a gunshot. The men freeze, heads snapping up.
"What was that?" Scarface hisses, his scar catching the light like a blade.
"Probably nothing," says Buzzcut, glancing around, but his hand goes to something tucked in his belt.
"No," says the third man, his voice low and certain. "Someone's here."
I flatten myself against the crumbling funhouse wall, the peeling paint rough and sticky against my back. I clamp my hand over my mouth, willing my breath to disappear. They’re listening now, the silence so deep I can hear the pounding of my own blood. After what feels like hours, Scarface mutters, "Let's just finish and get out."
Their voices pick up again, hurried, tense. I ease back, slow as a dream, but my foot finds a root, and with a loud, awful crack, it snaps under me.
"There!" Buzzcut barks. "I saw something!"
Panic detonates in my chest. I turn and run — or something like running, my cane barely brushing the ground, my old knees screaming in protest. Behind me, I hear the thunder of boots, the angry shouts of men who don't want witnesses.
"Get her!" Scarface roars.
They know it's me. They saw me. Oh God, they saw me.
But Spreepark is mine. I spent a thousand hours here with the people I loved. Even ruined, even broken, I know its hidden corners. I veer left, dodging under the broken arch of what used to be the swinging ship ride, my breath coming in ragged gasps. I push through the overgrowth, my hands getting scratched by wild brambles. In the distance, the old river gate calls to me, half-swallowed by vines.
"You can't run forever, lady!" Scarface howls behind me.
My lungs are on fire, my heart a frantic drumbeat against my ribs, but I don't stop. I don’t look back. I can hear them stumbling, cursing as they trip over the debris-strewn ground.
The fence by the river looms ahead — a sagging chain-link mess, rusted but standing. I grab it, my old fingers finding desperate strength, and start to climb. My skirt snags on the wire and rips, but I don't care. I'm halfway up when a hand clamps around my ankle.
"Got you," Buzzcut snarls, yanking hard.
A wild, terrified strength floods me. I kick back as hard as I can, my heel catching him square in the face. I hear the wet crack of his nose breaking and his howl of pain as he falls back.
I throw myself over the fence, landing hard on the gravel with a shock of agony that shoots up my side. The world blurs for a second, but I get up, staggering, waving my arms at the first headlights I see.
The car screeches to a stop, dust clouding around it, and a young woman leans out the window, her eyes wide with concern. She's got short brown hair, wire-rim glasses slipping down her nose — couldn't be more than thirty.
"Are you okay?" she calls.
"Men… in the park," I wheeze, clutching my chest. "Drugs. They're after me."
Her eyes go even wider. "Get in! Hurry!"
I practically collapse into the passenger seat, my whole body trembling, and she peels out, throwing gravel behind us.
"I'm Anna," she says, glancing at me, her voice tight with adrenaline. "What the hell happened?"
I tell her everything, my voice shaking, barely believing it myself. She listens without interrupting, her knuckles white on the steering wheel. "I'm a journalist," she says finally. "I've been working on a story about drug activity around here. You just blew it wide open."
She drives me straight to the nearest police station. The officers are skeptical at first — a 90-year-old woman sneaking into an abandoned amusement park? Sounds like something out of a bad novel. But Anna backs me up, insisting they check it out. Hours later, we hear back: they caught the men. Caught them red-handed with the drugs still packed up in that duffel bag.
That night, back in my tiny apartment, I sit curled in my favorite chair, a chipped teacup shaking in my hands. Anna calls to thank me again, her voice bright with excitement. She says my story might be the missing piece she needed to expose a whole operation. I smile a little, even though my body aches from head to toe.
Spreepark. I went looking for a piece of my past — a carousel ride, a flash of joy — and I found something else entirely. Darkness, yes. But also, somehow, a new chapter. A reminder that even at 90, there’s still fire in these old bones. There's still a fight left in me yet.
"Action Park: The Summer I Learned Fear Was Real":
I was sixteen when I went to Action Park in the summer of 1985. My buddy Mike had been hyping it up for weeks, calling it the wildest place in New Jersey, the way he said it like he was bragging about surviving something. “It’s got slides that’ll make your heart stop,” he said, grinning like he knew something I didn’t. I’d heard stories—people getting hurt, rides breaking down, horror stories whispered like urban legends—but Mike brushed it all off like it was no big deal. “Don’t be a chicken, Alex. It’s just fun.” I wasn’t so sure. Even back then, there was a gut feeling gnawing at me, telling me to stay away. Looking back now, all these years later, I wish to God I’d listened to it.
We got to Vernon early that morning, the air already thick and sticky, clinging to our clothes like a warning. The park sprawled out in front of us, loud and chaotic, a mess of bodies and noise—kids screaming, music blaring from battered speakers, water slapping concrete. The smell hit me first, a sharp, chemical sting of chlorine, baked into the humid air and mixing with the oily sweetness of sunscreen and something sour lurking underneath it all, like spilled beer left to rot. Crowds shoved past us at every turn, the kind of pushy, frantic energy that felt more desperate than excited. Some folks walked by with bandages on their arms or knees, sporting bruises and scrapes like badges of honor. I nudged Mike, uneasy. “Why’s everyone banged up?” I asked. He just laughed, that same fearless laugh he always had when we were kids doing something stupid. “It’s Action Park, man. You don’t leave without a story.”
We headed for the Alpine Slide first, a twisted, rickety track carved into the side of a hill, the kind of thing that would never pass inspection today. You rode these flimsy plastic sleds with a brake lever that looked like it had been salvaged off a shopping cart. There was a sign near the start that said, “Control Your Speed,” but half the letters were worn off, the whole thing sagging like even it had given up. We waited in line, the sun beating down, the scent of melting asphalt filling my nose, and I overheard a guy behind us talking to his friend. “My cousin did this last week,” he said. “Broke his arm when his sled flipped.” His friend snorted like it was a joke. “Sounds about right. Welcome to Action Park, where every ride comes with a side of pain.” My stomach twisted hard, and for a second I thought about turning around. But Mike was already shoving me forward, eyes lit up like a kid at Christmas.
When it was my turn, I climbed into the sled, gripping the brake lever like it was the only thing standing between me and death. At first, it wasn’t so bad. The sled jerked forward and picked up speed, the track groaning under me. But pretty soon, the bumps got sharper, the turns more violent. Every crack and rut in the concrete rattled through my bones. I yanked the brake, trying to slow down, but it barely responded, the lever shuddering uselessly in my hand. I flew around a corner and caught a glimpse of a girl up ahead, limping off the track, her knee bloodied and raw, her mom yelling furiously at a teenage worker. “This is dangerous!” the mom screamed. The kid just shrugged, looked like he wanted to be anywhere else. “Ma’am, she should’ve braked better,” he said, and then turned away like it wasn’t even his problem. My heart hammered in my chest. I clenched my teeth and rode it out until I hit the bottom, sled skidding to a stop with a sick lurch. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely climb off. Mike bounced off his sled a second later, laughing like a maniac. “That was awesome! You look like you saw a ghost.”
“That wasn’t fun,” I muttered, still staring at the girl who was being led away, her face twisted in pain. “That girl got hurt.” Mike just waved it off like it was nothing. “She’s fine. Come on, let’s hit the Cannonball Loop next.”
I didn’t want to, every nerve in my body screaming to get the hell out of there, but somehow I found myself following him anyway. It felt like the park was daring us to keep going, like it had some kind of pull you couldn’t fight even when you knew better.
The Cannonball Loop looked like something out of a nightmare—an enclosed waterslide with a full vertical loop, like a Hot Wheels track built by someone who hated kids. It towered above us, this ugly metal snake baking in the sun. The line was suspiciously short, and when you’re sixteen and stupid, you don’t realize that short lines mean something’s wrong. As we waited, a guy stumbled out of the landing pool, blood trickling down from a gash on his forehead, his swim trunks torn at the knee. “Damn slide slammed me into the wall,” he grumbled, his friend handing him a towel like it was no big deal. I turned to Mike, my throat dry. “This is a bad idea.” He rolled his eyes at me, that same stubborn grin plastered across his face. “Don’t wuss out now.”
When my turn came, my heart was thundering so hard I could feel it in my teeth. I climbed the ladder, the metal so hot it burned the soles of my feet. At the top, a lifeguard barely older than us stood slouched against the railing, chewing gum and looking half asleep. “Keep your arms in, or you’ll get smashed,” he said lazily, like it didn’t really matter either way. I barely had time to process it before he shoved me into the chute.
The ride was instant chaos. I shot down into total darkness, the walls closing in so tight it felt like I was being swallowed. Then the loop hit. My body slammed against the side of the tube so hard it knocked the air out of me. Water blasted into my face, choking me. For one awful second, I thought I was stuck, pinned against the side by the centrifugal force. Then, just as suddenly, I was spat out into the pool, coughing and gasping, my shoulder screaming from the impact. Mike came through a few seconds later, coughing so hard he looked like he might puke. “That was intense!” he choked out, but the color had drained from his face. He didn’t look like he meant it.
The air around us felt heavier now, like the park itself was pressing down on us, waiting for the next stupid kid to take the bait. Everywhere I looked, something felt wrong—kids crying, parents yelling at apathetic staff, a teenager limping toward the first aid tent cussing up a storm. The vibe wasn’t fun anymore, if it ever had been. It felt desperate. It felt mean.
We drifted toward the Wave Pool next, trying to shake it off. The place was huge, churning with artificial waves that looked more like a storm than a pool. It was packed, wall-to-wall bodies bobbing and thrashing like they were fighting to stay above water. The smell of chlorine was eye-watering, and the water itself was murky, almost brown. I didn’t even want to think about what might’ve been floating in it. We waded in, getting knocked around almost immediately by the brutal waves. A little kid nearby got sucked under, his dad lunging after him, panic ripping through his voice. “Stay close!” he screamed, his arms thrashing.
I grabbed Mike’s arm, fear rising up in my throat like bile. “This feels dangerous,” I said, yelling over the roar of the water.
“Nah, it’s just waves,” he said, but even he didn’t sound like he believed it.
And then it happened. A whistle blew, shrill and urgent. Lifeguards scrambled to the edge of the pool, shouting for everyone to clear out. People clambered up the slippery sides, slipping and falling, panicked whispers spreading like wildfire. I turned just in time to see two lifeguards diving into the deep end, disappearing under the water. Moments later, they resurfaced, dragging a limp figure between them. They laid him out on the hot concrete, a crowd pressing in. One lifeguard dropped to his knees and started CPR, counting out loud, “One, two, three...” The other pounded on the guy’s chest, their faces tight with terror and urgency.
I stood frozen, my legs numb, the scene burning into my brain. The music kept playing over the loudspeakers—some bouncy, happy pop song completely at odds with what was happening. I felt sick, like the ground under me was tilting.
Mike grabbed my shoulder, his voice tight. “Let’s go, Alex.”
We shoved through the crowd, my heart hammering so hard it hurt. As we left, I heard a woman sobbing somewhere behind us, her voice raw. “They said people drowned here before.” I didn’t look back. I couldn’t.
The music never stopped. It played on, cheerful and false, like the park didn’t care. Like it never cared.
We didn’t talk much on the drive home. Mike tried to crack a joke—“Well, we survived”—but his voice was thin, brittle, like he wasn’t convinced either. I just stared out the window, my mind replaying that afternoon over and over. The sled rattling down the track, the loop crushing my ribs, the lifeguards pounding that guy’s chest.
Action Park wasn’t just a theme park. It was a meat grinder dressed up in bright colors, chewing up kids like us and spitting us out. It wasn’t ghosts or monsters that made it scary. It was real. And that was so much worse. Even now, after all these years, sometimes when I close my eyes, I can still smell the chlorine and beer, hear the distant echo of laughter that wasn’t really laughter at all. It was something darker. Something that never really left me.
"We Just Wanna Talk":
It was the summer of 2019, and I was twenty-two, broke, restless, and clinging to the thin strands of adventure that came cheap. My buddy Jake had this dumb, reckless idea to explore Belle Isle, the abandoned park sprawled in the middle of the Detroit River. Once, it was a glittering gem—a place where families packed picnic baskets, kids raced their bikes along sunny trails, and couples held hands beneath the towering oaks. But by then, it had turned into a shell of its former self, a ghost town of crumbling structures, overgrown trails, and rusted skeletons of old playgrounds. The city had long since bled out any life it had left, letting it rot under the weight of budget cuts, neglect, and the creeping stain of crime. I'd read enough horror stories—muggings, assaults, even a stabbing a few summers back—to know we weren’t exactly venturing into a postcard.
Still, Jake was obsessed with "urban exploring," this idea that trespassing into forgotten places made you some kind of historian or adventurer. And honestly, I didn't have much else going on. He tossed me a beat-up flashlight in his cramped, musty apartment, his grin wide and manic, like a kid daring me to jump off a roof.
“C’mon, man, it’ll be creepy as hell,” he said, his voice buzzing with excitement. “We’ll poke around, take some pics, maybe find some old cool shit, and dip before anyone even knows we’re there.”
I rolled the flashlight in my hands, feeling the worn, sticky grip. I wasn’t thrilled, but boredom is a hell of a drug. “Fine," I muttered, stuffing the light into my jacket pocket. "But if we get jumped by some crackhead or a homeless dude with a machete, it’s your ass.”
We drove out as the sun was bleeding into the horizon, the sky bruising into deep purples and angry reds. The road leading onto Belle Isle was cracked and pitted, long jagged weeds pushing up through the pavement like desperate fingers clawing for air. Our headlights carved shallow tunnels of light through the thickening dusk, bouncing off sagging, graffiti-smeared signs pointing toward the abandoned zoo, the long-closed aquarium, the shattered remains of a once-glamorous casino.
We parked near the old casino building. Up close, it looked worse—almost skeletal, the windows black and gaping, glass teeth shattered and spilling out onto the ground like frozen screams. The air was thick with the smell of damp earth and something sickly sweet and rotten, maybe old trash or worse. A heavy, almost electric sense of wrongness clung to the place, raising the hair on my arms. Jake didn’t seem to notice, already slinging his backpack over his shoulder and striding toward the path like he owned it.
“Let’s hit the zoo first,” he said over his shoulder, his voice way too casual.
I hesitated for half a heartbeat, every instinct screaming at me to get back in the car and peel out of there, but instead, I stuffed my hands in my pockets and followed.
The walk to the zoo was short but unnerving. The path, once neat gravel, was now a tangle of weeds and broken asphalt. My sneakers crunched loudly in the silence, every crack of a twig in the shadows making me jump. The entrance gate to the zoo sagged crookedly on its hinges, a heavy chain looped through it, but the lock was busted open and hanging like a broken limb. Jake shoved the gate, and it swung open with a high, tortured screech that echoed into the darkness.
Inside, nature had completely taken over. Vines crawled over everything like veins on a corpse. The animal enclosures were nothing but dark pits, their once-proud signs bleached and peeling. Our flashlights carved weak cones of light across rusted bars, shattered glass, and crumbling concrete. It felt suffocating, like the place was alive somehow, just waiting for us.
"This is messed up," I whispered, my voice harsh and too loud. I felt like I was breaking some ancient rule just being there. "Feels like we’re walking through a graveyard."
Jake chuckled, but it sounded tight, forced. “Relax, dude. It’s just old junk. Nobody here but ghosts.”
We wandered deeper into the twisted maze of ruins. A faded sign pointed toward the bear exhibit. As we passed it, my light caught something—a cluster of crumpled beer cans and still-smoking cigarette butts piled near a cracked stone bench. The smoke twisted in the beam of my flashlight, a ghostly finger.
"Yo," I said, pointing with my chin. "That’s fresh. Someone’s around."
Jake frowned, scanning the darkness. "Probably just kids," he muttered, but even he sounded less sure now.
That’s when we heard it—the unmistakable sound of footsteps. Slow, deliberate, rhythmic. Not the quick scamper of an animal, but something heavier, bipedal. Human.
We froze, our flashlights slicing wildly through the gloom, illuminating only broken walls and the suffocating green of weeds.
"Probably a deer," Jake said, his voice cracking.
"Bullshit," I hissed. "That’s a person."
The footsteps stopped. The silence that followed felt worse, like the air itself was holding its breath, waiting.
"Let’s go back," I said, my mouth so dry it hurt.
Jake hesitated, his jaw clenched, but then nodded. We turned back, walking fast, almost jogging. Every snapped twig underfoot felt like a gunshot. As we neared the bear cages again, my flashlight picked up something new on the wall—a dripping smear of red graffiti, words still wet and glistening.
LEAVE.
I stopped dead. "Jake," I whispered, grabbing his sleeve. "Look."
His face went pale. "That wasn’t there before," he said, voice flat.
We bolted. The world turned into a blur of black and green, branches whipping at my arms and snagging my clothes. The gate loomed ahead, but then—new sounds. Voices. Rough, low, angry. Coming from the direction of the casino.
We ducked behind a collapsed sign, hearts hammering. I peeked around the edge and saw them—two, maybe three figures in dark hoodies pacing near the casino. One of them had something long and metal in his hand, maybe a crowbar or a bat. They looked agitated, restless, like they were looking for someone.
“They’re by the car,” Jake breathed, panic leaking into his voice. “What do we do?”
"We can’t go that way," I said. "We gotta hide. Now."
We backed away from the path, moving in jerky, desperate motions. The old aquarium was the closest shelter, its entrance boarded up half-assedly with splintered plywood. I jammed my fingers under one of the boards and yanked, the wood shrieking as it pulled free. We slipped inside, the smell of mildew and rot hitting me like a punch to the face.
Inside was worse than outside. The darkness was absolute, our flashlights barely penetrating the gloom. Rows of ancient fish tanks lined the walls, their glass cracked, some shattered entirely. A few still held rancid, stagnant water, the surface covered in a film of mold and dead insects. The floor crunched underfoot with broken glass and God-knows-what else.
“This place is a fucking nightmare,” Jake whispered, almost sobbing. “They’re gonna find us.”
"Shut up," I snapped, my nerves unraveling. "Just stay quiet."
We ducked behind a massive cracked tank, crouching low. I killed my flashlight. The world shrank to the smell of decay and the ragged sound of our breathing.
Footsteps crunched outside, slow, measured. Then, a low chuckle, cold and humorless.
"They went in there," a gravelly voice said, way too close.
Jake’s grip tightened on my arm. I squeezed my eyes shut.
The door to the aquarium shuddered as someone kicked it. A second kick. The wood groaned and splintered. Heavy boots thudded across the threshold, each step deliberate, savoring the hunt.
"Come out, kids," the voice called, playful and cruel. "We just wanna talk."
I pressed myself tighter against the tank, every muscle locked. Jake’s flashlight gave a sickly flicker, then went out. Total darkness. I could hear the man’s breathing, heavy and eager, drawing closer.
Then, cutting through the nightmare—the rising wail of sirens. Distant at first, then growing louder.
The footsteps faltered. Another voice, younger, urgent: "Cops, man. Let’s get the fuck outta here."
The gravelly man cursed low and mean. Then they were running, their footsteps retreating fast into the night.
We stayed frozen until flashing blue and red lights strobed through the broken windows, painting the aquarium walls in wild, flickering color. A cop’s voice barked from outside.
We stumbled out, arms raised, hearts still hammering. The cops were rough at first, shouting, making us lay on the cracked pavement, but when they pieced together what had happened—that we were just a couple of dumbass kids trespassing and not the ones causing the real trouble—they let us go with a lecture.
"You’re lucky," one of them said, a grizzled man with haunted eyes. "This place is a magnet for bad people. People disappear out here. You don’t wanna be one of them."
We drove home in total silence, the road blurring past, the world outside the car feeling too big and too empty. Later that night, alone in my apartment, I looked up Belle Isle again. The stories were worse than I remembered—gang activity, drug deals gone bad, muggings that turned into beatings, and the police never finding enough evidence to charge anyone. Just another forgotten place where the world’s ugliness festered in the dark.
I never went back. Neither did Jake. Sometimes, though, when it’s late and the world is too quiet, I swear I still hear that voice in my head—gravelly, mocking, and way too close—whispering, We just wanna talk.
"The Ferris Wheel That Never Turned":
I was 25 when everything changed. It was April 1986, and I had just landed what I thought was my first real job—working maintenance at the Pripyat amusement park. It wasn’t open yet; we were getting everything ready for the big May Day celebration on May 1. My tasks were simple but important: fix the rides, test the Ferris wheel’s rotation, make sure the bumper cars sparked and bumped like they were supposed to. Sometimes, after work, a few of us would ride the carousel horses, laughing like kids, feeling like we were building something that would make the whole city smile. Pripyat felt alive back then—buzzing, humming like it had a heartbeat. Every street corner had people talking about the park, about the new rides, about how perfect May Day was going to be. You could feel the excitement under your skin, like the whole town was holding its breath, waiting for that first laugh to ring out across the square.
But on the night of April 26, that breath turned into a gasp.
I woke to a low rumble, somewhere around one in the morning. It wasn’t thunder—it was sharper, meaner, like the earth itself had cracked open. Olga, my wife, stirred beside me in our tiny apartment. The cheap glass in the window rattled. “What was that?” she mumbled, her voice thick with sleep. I didn’t answer right away. I pulled on my boots, still muddy from work, and stepped onto the balcony. The air hit me immediately—wrong, heavy, metallic. It smelled like burning wires and hot iron. In the distance, beyond the dark silhouettes of the apartment blocks, there was a strange glow bleeding into the sky, a soft, unnatural light in the direction of the Chernobyl plant.
My stomach twisted in a way that told me something was very, very wrong.
At work that morning, the amusement park was eerily still. No laughter, no shouted greetings, just the cold scrape of wind against the rides. The carousel’s bright paint seemed almost garish under the cloudy sky, like a clown smiling in the middle of a funeral. Petrov, my supervisor, paced near the ticket booth, chain-smoking cigarettes down to their filters. His face was pale, sweaty. When he saw me, he beckoned me over, his hand shaking slightly.
“Ivan, you hear about the plant?” he asked, voice low and hoarse.
“What happened?” I wiped my greasy hands on my overalls, suddenly aware of how loud even that small sound seemed.
“Accident. Big one.” He glanced around, as if afraid someone might overhear. “They’re saying there’s smoke… radiation. Bad radiation. The kind you can’t see.” He looked up at the Ferris wheel towering over us, almost as if expecting it to move on its own. “They’re telling us to stay calm. That it’s under control.” His voice broke slightly. “But I don’t think it is.”
I opened my mouth to ask more, but he just shook his head and motioned for me to check the ride controls. All day, whispers slithered through the park like snakes. People said there had been explosions at Reactor 4. That men were being taken to the hospital with burns no fire could explain. By midday, helicopters buzzed over the town like angry hornets, cutting harsh lines through the heavy gray sky. Pripyat didn’t feel excited anymore. It felt sick. Poisoned. You could feel it in the way the trees stood too still, in the way people’s eyes darted around, refusing to meet each other.
On April 27, the order came. The voice over the loudspeakers crackled and popped like a dying fire before it finally cleared enough to deliver its message.
“Attention, residents of Pripyat. Due to the accident at the Chernobyl Power Station, the radioactive situation is worsening. This is a temporary evacuation. Please bring identification papers, food for three days, and necessary belongings. Buses will be arriving shortly.”
At home, Olga was frantic. She moved like a woman in a dream, tossing clothes and diapers into a threadbare bag. Lena, our daughter, only two years old, clutched her stuffed rabbit and watched silently, her big eyes wide and wet. She didn’t understand, and we didn’t know how to explain it. Hell, we didn’t understand either. I told Olga it was temporary—that we’d be back in a few days. That it was precautionary. But my voice shook when I said it, and we both heard the lie even as it left my lips.
I grabbed our papers, a loaf of bread, a few tins of fish, and Lena’s favorite blanket. As we stepped out into the hallway, the distant amusement park caught my eye through the stairwell window. The Ferris wheel stood motionless, an unmoving eye staring over the city. The rides sat frozen, waiting for children that would never come. Even then, I knew deep down we were leaving it behind forever.
The buses lined the streets, rumbling, spitting black exhaust into the already tainted air. People shuffled forward with bags and crying babies, faces slack with shock. Maria, our neighbor from downstairs, grabbed my sleeve, her knuckles white.
“They’re lying to us, Ivan,” she whispered. “My son… he works at the plant. He saw things. Things you don’t come back from. We’re not coming back.”
I didn’t have words. I just picked up Lena and helped Olga onto the bus. As the doors hissed closed behind us, I pressed my forehead against the dirty window, watching Pripyat slide past. The empty swings, the silent bumper cars, the unopened gates of the park. They looked like toys left behind after a child’s sudden death.
That was 39 years ago.
Now it’s April 2025, and I am 64. I don’t know why I came back. Some part of me, the part that still dreams about that night, about the smell of burnt metal and the feel of Lena’s tiny hand clutching my coat, needed to see it again. To make sure it was real. I signed up for a tour—one of those “Chernobyl experience” trips you see advertised on the internet. They gave us dosimeters to clip to our jackets, tiny machines that chirp and beep when the invisible danger creeps too close. Our guide, Anna, is young and serious, her voice firm as she lays down the rules: don’t touch anything, stay on the path, don’t lag behind.
Pripyat is a skeleton now. The buildings sag inward like tired old men. Windows gape open, shards of glass clinging like teeth. Trees grow wild through the streets, roots cracking through pavement that once echoed with laughter and footsteps. It’s not just abandoned—it feels wrong, like a place that doesn’t want you there. Like a grave you’re not supposed to dig up.
We reach the amusement park, and my breath catches painfully in my chest. The Ferris wheel still stands, a hollow, rust-eaten relic against the broken sky. The yellow cabins dangle, some missing their doors, swinging slightly in the wind. Moss blankets the bumper cars, their colors faded into ghostly blues and reds. The carousel horses are broken, their faces worn smooth by rain and time, their empty eye sockets staring blankly.
Anna stops us by the entrance.
“This park was scheduled to open on May 1, 1986,” she says. “It never officially did. Some stories say they opened it for a few hours to distract the people before the evacuation… but there’s no real proof of that. Either way, it became a symbol of the disaster.”
I barely hear her. I’m back in the maintenance shed, tightening bolts on the Ferris wheel, laughing with my coworkers, dreaming of Lena riding the carousel horses. Dreaming of life.
The group fans out, taking pictures with their phones, the click and beep of cameras sounding painfully out of place. I drift toward the Ferris wheel, my boots crunching over broken glass and dry leaves. My dosimeter clicks softly, a mechanical heartbeat. I look up at the wheel, at the way it leans slightly to the left now, rust gnawing its joints.
For a moment, I hear it—music, faint, tinny. Children’s laughter. I close my eyes, letting it wash over me like a ghost tide.
“Hey, you okay?” Anna’s voice jolts me back. She’s closer now, concern etched across her face.
“I’m fine,” I lie. “I used to work here. Before… before the disaster.”
Her eyes widen. “You lived in Pripyat? What was it like?”
“Happy,” I say after a long pause. “We were all so happy. We thought we had everything. We thought… nothing could ever go wrong.”
She nods, but she can’t really know. How could she?
I move toward the bumper cars. As I pass one half-buried in weeds, something catches my eye—a flash of paper. I crouch down carefully. It’s a photo, half-rotted, buried under debris. A family. Smiling. The mother holds a little boy on her lap. They could have been us. They could have been anyone. My hands tremble as I straighten up, blinking hard.
Then, from behind the carousel, I hear it—quick, light footsteps. I freeze. “Who’s there?” I call out. My voice sounds too loud, snapping against the heavy silence.
No answer. Just the creaking of rusted metal.
Probably an animal, I tell myself. A fox, maybe a deer. But my heart hammers against my ribs, dragging me back to that night, to the fear that something worse was always waiting just out of sight.
“Ivan, we’re moving on!” Anna’s voice calls from the path. I glance one last time at the park—the locked gates, the broken rides, the Ferris wheel that never spun for joy.
Turning away, I follow the group. The dosimeter hums steadily at my side, a reminder that the danger never left—it just became part of the air, the ground, the bones of the city.
As the bus pulls away from Pripyat, I look back one last time. The Ferris wheel rises against the bruised sky, silent and watching. Not haunted by ghosts.
Haunted by silence. Haunted by the lives that never got to finish living.
And that, I know now, is a horror that never fades.
"Dreamland Would Never Let Us Go":
I’ll never forget that night in August 1969. It was the kind of warm summer evening where the air felt swollen and restless, pressing down against the hills outside Reading, Pennsylvania. Skyline Drive stretched out before us, winding along the ridges, and below, the city sprawled in glittering lights, each one like a firefly trapped in amber. Glenn’s old Chevy was parked at one of the overlooks, the chrome bumper catching the last soft shimmers of twilight. The dashboard glowed a muted green, and the radio played a lazy, crackling ballad, filling the air inside the car with something slow and hopeful.
Glenn’s hand found mine without a word, his fingers callused and familiar, sending a small thrill through me even after all this time. His scent—clean soap, motor oil, and something uniquely Glenn—wrapped around me, making everything outside the car seem very far away.
“Isn’t this beautiful?” he said, his voice warm and low, like he didn’t want to disturb the quiet magic between us.
I smiled and leaned my head against his shoulder. “I’m so glad we’re together,” I whispered, feeling the words more than saying them.
We talked, the way young lovers do, sketching out a future that felt as close as the stars just overhead. A little house somewhere quiet, a big dog lumbering through the yard, maybe two kids with Glenn’s eyes and my stubborn streak. I let myself believe in it completely, lulled by his easy laugh and the way he squeezed my hand like he could anchor me to this perfect moment forever.
The sound of motorcycles cut through the dream like a jagged knife. At first, it was a faint growl, easy to ignore. But it grew louder, meaner, until headlights flooded the overlook and surrounded us. Motorcycles idled and snarled, a pack of chrome and leather. I recognized the patches on their jackets immediately—the grinning skull of the Pagans motorcycle gang. Everyone in town had heard of them, stories passed around like ghost tales: drugs, violence, disappearances.
Before we could react, a crowbar smashed into Glenn’s window, spraying us with shards of glass. I screamed, covering my face as the door wrenched open.
“Get out!” barked a man with a scar slashed across his cheek, his voice rough and commanding.
Glenn pulled me close, whispering fiercely, “Stay calm, Marilyn.” His voice shook in a way I had never heard before.
They tore us from the car. My sundress snagged on the door, ripping the thin fabric. The warm night air smelled of gasoline, leather, and sweat. My heart hammered wildly in my chest.
“What do you want?” I choked out, my voice trembling.
The leader grinned, and the smile never touched his dead eyes. “Oh, you’ll see, sweetheart.”
They herded us into the back of a box truck parked a little ways off, its metal floor sticky and reeking of old grease. Glenn tried to shield me, stepping in front, but a skinny man with a greasy ponytail cracked him across the face with a heavy flashlight. Glenn collapsed with a grunt, blood trickling down his chin.
I dropped to my knees beside him, frantic, but before I could reach him, the leader grabbed me, pinning my arms behind my back so hard it felt like my shoulders would snap.
“Shut up!” he hissed into my ear, his breath hot and sour.
What happened next—I can barely force myself to think about it. They hurt me. Took turns. Their laughter filled the dark truck, cruel and victorious. I wanted to vanish, to fall through the floor, but there was nowhere to go. Glenn lay crumpled nearby, helpless.
When the truck finally shuddered to a stop, they dragged us out into the night. We staggered into Dreamland Park—an abandoned amusement park I hadn’t seen since I was a kid. Back then, it had been all cotton candy and carousels, music and wonder. Now it was a graveyard. The Ferris wheel loomed rusted and skeletal against the sky, its gondolas rocking in the breeze like empty cradles. The midway was choked with weeds. The funhouse mirrors were cracked, twisted reflections staring back at us like nightmares.
Police lights flickered far away, flashes of red and blue against the trees. Hope flared in my chest. Salvation seemed so close.
“Cops,” the leader snarled, glaring back at his men. “Change of plans.”
For a heartbeat, I thought maybe they would abandon us and run. But then the leader turned, his smile sharp and cold. “Oh, you ain’t gonna tell nobody. ‘Cause you won’t remember nothin’.”
They forced us away from the ruins of Dreamland, into the woods beyond. The darkness was thick and oppressive, the ground muddy and littered with fallen branches. Every step was a struggle. I clung to Glenn’s arm, feeling him limp and faltering beside me.
“We’re gonna be okay,” Glenn said, but the lie in his voice gutted me.
“I love you,” I whispered, not caring if they heard.
“I love you too, Marilyn. Always.”
We stumbled into a clearing, silvered by moonlight. The leader pulled a pistol from his belt, and the world seemed to narrow to the cold gleam of metal.
“Please,” I begged, my voice raw. “Please let us go. We’ll disappear. You’ll never see us again.”
He chuckled, a dead sound. “Too late.”
They tied Glenn’s hands roughly behind his back and forced him to his knees.
“You first, lover boy,” sneered the skinny one, shoving Glenn hard.
“No!” I shrieked, trying to throw myself between them, but the scarred leader caught me and yanked me back roughly.
The gunshot cracked the night wide open. Glenn pitched forward—but it wasn’t a fatal shot. I realized it with a jolt of hope. His shoulder. They’d hit him in the shoulder.
Glenn groaned, writhing on the ground, blood pooling beneath him but still breathing, still alive.
The leader cursed, furious, raising the gun again to finish it.
And that’s when something unexpected happened—the quiet one, the one with the thick beard who had been silent the whole time, suddenly stepped forward.
“Enough,” he muttered. His voice was low, uncertain, but it stopped the leader cold.
“What the hell are you doing?” Scarface demanded, turning on him.
“She’s right. We need to get outta here. Cops’ll be here any minute.”
A standoff sparked between them, a ripple of tension I could feel in my bones. Scarface swore under his breath, spit into the dirt, then shoved the pistol back into his waistband.
“Fine,” he snarled. He grabbed my arm, dragging me forward. “But we leave a message.”
I thought he was going to kill me. I braced for it. But instead, he backhanded me hard enough to send me sprawling into the mud, the stars spinning above me.
“Run,” the bearded man hissed, so low only I could hear.
It took a second for the words to register. Run.
I scrambled up, slipping and staggering. I caught Glenn’s dazed, pain-ravaged gaze and tugged at him desperately.
“We have to go,” I sobbed. “We have to go, Glenn.”
Somehow, impossibly, he staggered to his feet, clutching his bleeding shoulder. We ran, half-crawling through the trees, branches clawing at us, the sounds of the gang shouting behind us fading into the distance as we plunged deeper into the woods.
We didn’t stop until we saw the flashing police lights again—closer this time. I screamed for help, my voice raw and broken.
Hands grabbed us, but this time they were kind hands, strong hands. Voices barked orders into radios. Glenn collapsed in the arms of a police officer, and I sobbed as another wrapped a blanket around me, the world tilting and spinning but—finally—safe.
They saved us. We survived.
But a part of me never left that clearing, under the cold gaze of the stars, Glenn bleeding and broken beside me. Some nights, when the cicadas hum just so and the air gets thick with summer, I swear I can still smell the gasoline and hear the motorcycles snarling in the dark.