Peals of laughter float out of the cave’s mouth and hang heavy in the humid air. The joyful sound is disquieting
emanating from the darkness. Your fear grows from your gut, but you know there is no turning back now. You
step past the threshold and feel a splash against your leg as your foot lands several inches below where you
expected. Whatever liquid you disturbed drips slowly down your leg and settles at ankle-height. It’s more
viscous than cave water ought to be. You can’t see your outstretched hand reaching to steady yourself against a
wall, but you can feel your fingers find a vertical surface. It is smooth and forgiving like air pressed tightly
against vinyl. Your shoes stick to the floor as you move forward through the wetness. Your guiding hand cups a
soft corner and you feel your body turn 90 degrees to what is probably the left. The faint light from the cave’s
entrance disappears completely, though you didn’t realize it was still there until it vanished. Suddenly, the
uncanny laughter is joined by strains of a toy piano playing a melody you haven’t heard since childhood. There
is no echo. The music feels uncomfortably close. You keep trudging forward sticking to the floor and following
the puffy walls that give under the weight of your hand. Further along, the unmistakable scent of cotton candy
wafts through the air. It gets stronger and you feel nauseous as every breath you take is filled with sweetness
and your hair and clothes become heavy with seems like millions of molecules of sugar. Panicked by your
suffocation, you drop your hand from the wall and run deeper into the blackness. The ground splashes up at you
until you collide with something hard and unmoving. Paralyzed by the shock, you have a moment to take in
your invisible surroundings. The air is breathable again. As the sound of your pounding heart recedes, you
realize that the toy piano has been replaced by the airy voice of an organ and the sharp dinging of bells. The
sticky ground covering still reaches your ankles, but your sore shin can attest to the fact that you collided with
some sort of platform. You find the edge of the platform with your hands and step up. You extend your arms out
and jam your finger on a large, cold object. Further groping reveals a long head, strong neck, and four legs like
a horse. The organ music gets louder and you hear the long moan of wood shifting as the platform abruptly start
moving beneath you. You feel your body leaning slightly to the left as the platform moves – you must be
spinning. You grab onto the horse-like object for equilibrium and are surprised to find that it is not where you
remember it. It feels higher. Now it feels lower. Your arms are moving up and down as you try to keep your
balance in the disorienting darkness. The organ music picks up tempo and volume and the platform spins faster.
The cold object you have been holding is pulling you off your feet at it moves up and down at ferocious speed.
Without warning the movement stops and you are flung into the darkness. Your body whips through cotton
candy air and then you feel everything stop as think, supple vinyl breaks stops your trajectory. You bounce off
and into the wet, sticky floor. The liquid splashes on your face and trickles into the crease of your lips. It tastes
like caramel. You sit in on the cave floor to assess what parts of you are broken. Everything seems to be intact.
The music from the toy piano is still playing, but it is faint enough for you to hear another sound nearby. Above
your head, where your body collided with the cave wall, there is a distinct hissing. You stand up and feel a thin
stream of cold air on your face. The stream gets larger and warmer and suddenly there is a light behind the air
that blinds you. You cover your face and feel the air blow violently around you. You hear faint screams and a
piano crash in the distance. Uncovering your eyes you find yourself back on the mountain path, facing the
valley, with caramel dripping from your eyelashes.
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