As featured in this year's Driftwood anthology, "Toothless" is my memorable memoir of the most frightening person I've ever met.
Little did I know the terror I had yet to experience as I stood gaping at the towering Ferris wheel, its joints creaking as it spun in circles towards the blue summer sky. The wiry baskets that hung at different points on its wheel rocked back and forth, some twirling upside-down, their inhabitants screaming. I marched up the steps, my tickets in hand. Kate, a good friend of mine who had foolishly agreed to come along, seemed a bit more hesitant, but I was determined to get onto that ride and have a good time.
I shoved the tickets into the hands of the manager of the mysterious ride and stood ready for my excitement, Kate at my side; she fingered her ebony-black hair sheepishly, her brow furrowed.
Soon the wheel stopped its dizzying circles, and one by one, the tenants of each egg-like gondola tumbled out frantically and bounded away. It was soon our turn.
Another worker of the Ferris wheel, a grungy man, opened the door to our basket and smiled unnervingly at the two of us—I could have sworn his sinister eyes rolled over Kate’s curves once or twice, though she was a girl of only fourteen. I had almost taken a step forward when she whispered hurriedly in my ear, “Mary, he’s got no teeth!”
Appalled, I glanced again at his shady smile, and to my utter horror, his yellow-stained smile shone greasily at us with many missing pieces. My heart churned in my stomach, and the thought occurred to both of us to run away from this disturbing man who probably had torturous weapons hidden in his jacket. Seeing our hesitance, the man beckoned to us with one hairy finger and a still wider grin.
I would have turned around right there and then and left behind my precious valiance; however, I thought of the tickets I had already sacrificed. Setting my teeth (thankful I was for a complete set), I stormed into our capsule with the perturbed Kate.
Never had I experienced fear as I did at that moment: an assassin had caught us in this rickety basket, this cage from which we had no way of escape. An edge of my trailing skirt caught in the wind and fluttered over the side. His probably blood-stained hands gathered up what had tossed over the rim and patted the blue folds back in my lap. Every hair on my neck stood up on end. He, probably with many silent chuckles at his catch, locked down the guardrail over us and slammed the door to our cage.
Those next moments were worth every year I lost from my life. We flew up to the bright sky and flipped upside-down and giggled about the “creepy carnie” who was probably an axe murderer. My mind wandered to what would happen if I threw up on an unsuspecting pedestrian below, perhaps a brat who needed a splash of discipline.
The two of us screamed and screeched our hearts out: “We’re gonna die!” I shrieked at the top of my lungs as we soared up to the peak and flew in nauseating circles. My insides sagged before tumbling inside me as we plummeted down again. For a moment I felt I was flying, weightless, apart from the bar holding us down.
But soon it was all over; the murderer opened our cage, still peering over Kate’s figure malignantly. The instant the murderer lifted the guardrail, we raced away as fast as our legs could carry us.
Kate and I often retell that life-threatening experience of how closely we escaped with our lives. While death had scathed by us close as a razor blade’s edge, we had enjoyed a good time, by golly! Perhaps we had made the carnie’s day a little brighter, too—before he returned home to his hoard of unsuspecting fourteen-year-olds.
