Note: Keep going, keep going, you got this!

"That one." Erin pointed to the outfit on Brigid's bed that she liked the best out of her selections.

Brigid paused looking back-and-forth from the one Erin had pointed to and the one in her hand. Brigid nodded. "I'll mix the two. Tan corduroy skirt, black fringed ankle boots, black shirt, short Brigid jacket, these earrings and necklace, and my hair...long side ponytail with like a black ribbon or something?" Brigid thought out loud as she pulled her long hair to one side running her fingers through it to look like the ghost of a side ponytail.

"Perfect." Erin said. "Have you figured out how you want me to do your make-up?"

Brigid replied without hearing her. "Yeah, yeah. You go get dressed first though. But pull out options!" Brigid yelled after her.

Erin went into her closet and looked around. Hmm...freak show, freak show, what does one wear to a freak show? Erin went through her clothes finally reaching a verdict. She tossed out a pair of thick black leggings, tight short cream and green striped dress with 3/4 length sleeves, and a boatneck cut. "Ah ha!" Erin thought to herself as she pulled free her calf length high-heeled black suede boots. Erin was dressed and putting on her jewelry when Brigid walked in.

"Mmm, looking good, girl. That is a look and I am living for it!" Brigid said ecstatically.

"I can look good and lure men to their deaths when I want to." Erin laughed.

Brigid skipped into Erin's bathroom and started rifling through her make-up.

"I've decided I want, like, minimalistic eyes and a strong lip color."

Erin walked to the second sink. "Okay, so how about we do a nude eye with a thin black cat-eye flicked eyeliner with some really strong bronzer for your cheeks and...this strong fuschia for your lips?"

"I swear, there's more to you than meets the eye, sis." Brigid teased.

"I try. Now turn your face this way. Okay, don't move."

"What are you going to do?" Brigid asked wrinkling her nose.

"I said don't move."

"Sorry, my nose tickled. But what are you going to do?"

"I'll tell you but no more moving!" Brigid hmm'd her agreement. "Green-bown shaded eye, some liner, warm cheeks, and muted pink lips. Approve?"

"Hmm!" Which meant yes.

"Alright. We are done. We need to hurry and make it over to Ellie's. Text her we'll be on our way in 5." Erin said removing her keys from her purse and heading down the stairs with Brigid texting behind her. They turned out all of the lights and opened the garage door. The rain had stopped earlier in the afternoon. It seemed to have just been a short shower but the streets were still wet, the neighborhood lights reflecting off of the black pavement.

Erin unlocked the doors and they piled into her crossover. It didn't take but ten minutes to reach Ellie's house. She came running out and threw herself and her sleep-over gear into the backseat. Brigid flipped around in the front seat as they squealed at each other.

"I'm so freaking excited! I can't believe we actually get to do this!" Ellie said as Erin pulled out of the driveway.

"Oh my God, I love your outfit." Brigid said. "Erin, you have to take a picture of us when we stop back by the house."

Once they reached home to drop Ellie's stuff off Erin had them stand together and snapped multiple shots on both Brigid and Ellie's phones. The girls looked through each of them commenting on every single one. They were both in the back seat now pouring over the pictures only stopping once they had reached the restaurant. Erin had a glass of wine and mainly listened to Ellie and Brigid talk about their research project, what Josh had said to Keira, and how the freak show would actually turn out.

"I really hope it is fun." Ellie said.

"Oh it will be. It's the experience anyways. You know you're going to see a guy who probably eats stuff that isn't digestable but you've never seen in person a guy who probably eats stuff that isn't digestable, right? It'll be fun." Erin smiled. "Speaking of seeing said fat man we need to leave." Erin motioned for the check, left a tip, and hurried the girls out to the car. It was going on 11:30 P.M. and the place where the show was being hosted ended up being a bit more difficult to find than Erin had originally thought.

"What did the flyer say?" Brigid asked impatiently.

"It said it was right here and look, here it is. Grouchy." Erin parked her car in the dimly lit alley way and the girls climbed out looking up at the dilapidated building.

"Creepy." Ellie said with excitement. "But I don't see anyone else around. Where do we get the tickets?"

Erin and the girls walked to the front of the building and looked inside. No one was around.

Erin tapped on the glass. "Hello?"

A door opened and a squat figure in light blue robes came to the window and held up tickets with the price stamped on them.

Erin, Brigid, and Ellie glanced at each other not really sure what to make of the situation. However, Erin dug into her purse and pulled out the cash for the tickets. She slipped it through the slot as the incredibly short stubby...thing took it from her and shoved the three tickets out to her before turning and walking through the shortened door it had entered from.

"Well, welcome to the freak show, I guess." Erin laughed handing Ellie and Brigid their tickets.

The girls giggled as they entered into the foyer of an old theater. It looked like an old theater on the inside, the outside must have been done over and then left to rot however long ago. The girls continued to walk through the darkness looking for a light or sound that would lead them to where the show was.

"Where are we supposed to g-" Brigid started to say before she bumped into a solid surface. She felt the surface shift and a voice come from way above her. She stepped back craning her neck up her eyes widening in shock. "Holy sh-"

Erin cleared her voice and pushed Brigid and Ellie a touch behind her as she addressed the tall unnerving man. She held up the tickets and said coolly, "We're here for the show. Could you direct us to where it is being shown, please?"

The tall man lowered his upper body to peer closer at Erin and the girls behind her. His pure black eyes, with no whites Erin made note of causing her medical mind to start running through possible reasons, made eye contact with her once again. You couldn't, medically speaking, tell he was looking at you but you still knew that he was.

"Are they 21?" The rumble of his deep voice was like heavy brazen bells.

Erin looked at him questioningly as if sizing him up. No pun intended. Ellie and Brigid exchanged quick glances with each other.

"Yes, they are." Erin said firmly and held out their tickets once more.

The tall man nodded taking the tickets and causing them to disappear. He bowed and gestured. "Right this way. The show is about to start."

"Thank you." Erin said passively walking in the direction he had pointed with Brigid and Ellie close on her heels.

"What in the hell..." Brigid muttered.

Erin stopped real quick to look at the girls. "Just stay by me. It's a harmless freak show. We just met a freak. Well, a second freak. Either way we knew what we were getting ourselves into and it's nothing more than that. You're okay. It'll be fine. It's just a show." Erin smiled reassuringly even though her protective instinct was very much on the look out. Brigid and Ellie finally exhaled after having unknowingly been holding their breath in and grinned at one another.

"Let's sit in the front row." Ellie said excited once more.

The three entered the seating area around the large center stage. There were quite a few people there, mainly couples it seemed, and some younger looking middle-school boys. Most of the people were in the middle to back rows which left enough seats for the girls to sit front and center for the show. Erin tucked her purse between the seats and folded her hands over her cross-legged knee. Brigid and Ellie were looking around at the stage and the lights and the audience.

"Wow, more than I was expecting." Ellie said.

"Y-yeah...yeah. More..." Brigid said quietly her eyes going out of focus.

Ellie kept looking around and didn't notice her best friend's change in demeanor but Erin did. Erin watched Brigid closely. She was getting another piece of something and she could see her eyebrows beginning to furrow and her eyes move back and forth as if looking for something. Erin gently laid her hand on Brigid's arm. Brigid blinked several times as she came to. Brigid met Erin's eyes, shook her head, gave a small smile to say she was okay, and then looked away. Erin looked to the stage, too, but was going to be keeping a closer eye on her sister than the show.

The lights dimmed and a single spotlight illuminated the tall man they had seen just prior.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am Mr. Tall of the Cirque du Freak! Be warned though if you have any pre-existing medical conditions, are weak of stomach, or faint of heart, then I strongly advise you to leave now. I cannot guarantee your safety throughout the show and by staying you take full responsibility of any accidents, injury, damages, and even death that may occur." His solid obsidian eyes made contact with every individual in the room. Eventually two couples and a single man shuffled in their chairs and exited the area.

"Now that that's settled. Welcome to the Cirque du Freak!" With a brandish of his top hat he disappeared into the darkness as the spotlight moved to the edge of the stage where two attractive assistants wheeled out a cage inside of which was a humanoid beast with gnashing, foaming jaws and pawed-hands each complete with a set of flesh-tearing claws.

"Oh my God..." Ellie and Brigid whispered together.

The Wolf Man. First act marked from the list Erin had made mentally. Erin admitted she was captivated by the beast but then her mind started thinking about the reported cases of "werewolves" and "wolf men" until the beast in its cage was being removed from the stage without her even realizing it. Erin side-glanced at Brigid. Brigid felt her looking and smiled again to show she really was fine. Erin nodded and turning in time to see the two-bellied man start eating bike parts, a refrigerator, tools, whatever was put in front of him. A mental line marked through act two. The acts continued and were marked off in Erin's mind as the evening wore on. She had liked the Truska lady with the beard. She saw a blip of her near the ocean and happy. It made Erin feel warm inside for a split second and she smiled to herslf.

The show was winding down Erin knew and there were only two acts left. The second to last act appeared on the stage out of nowhere. He was a tall, thin but solid man, with unusual orange hair, pale like he had never seen the sun, and a long facial scar that gave his grin a sinister look. Erin received a blip: he knew exactly how he was perceived by the audience and he catered to it. His outfit was a red suit with a decorative cloak and sandals revealing long sharp toenails.

"Hey, that's the guy!" Ellie whispered.

"Yeah, that's him, Erin." Brigid said. A puzzled look flashed over her face but disappeared quickly before Erin could even notice it.

"Wait, is this the spider guy?" Ellie whispered apprehensively.

"Ladies and gentlemen I am Larten Crepsley and this is my lovely partner, Madame Octa!" With a flourish a white linen cloth was pulled off of a large cage on a table that had been wheeled next to him. "I must warn you that she is deadly. One single bite from her would kill you instantaneously as I will now show you."

A goat was led onto the stage and the spider's cage opened. A tin flute was pulled from Larten Crepsley's coat pocket and a wheedy tune was played. The spider went over to the goat, climbed onto its neck, sinking its fangs causing the goat to drop dead with barely a post-death shudder. People gasped and there was the sound of chairs being scooted back away from the stage.

"Do not move! If you move you will distract me and then she will really steal the show at your personal expense!" He snapped before grinning again. He composed himself with a flair and began tinkling out tunes that seemed to keep the spider under his control like a sort of hypnosis. The spider ate with tiny cutlery, did acrobatics, and finally began to crawl over her master spinning beautiful webs before finally descending from the very tip of his flute where he began to swing her higher and higher until she flew up into the air and landed on the man's open mouth over which she spun an ornate web. The spider then crawled onto the man's shoulder as he ate the thick spider webs and smacked his lips. "Spider webs are a delicacy where I come from." The red man lulled his spider back into her cage and gave a gracious bow. As he stood up to exit the stage and bowing once more to the applauding crowd his eyes made contact with Erin's and she had a sudden flash: him forcefully walking through snow, large cavernous halls full of loud voices, duals, returning to the freak show and though feeling somewhat aimless was sincerely happy once more for he had always loved to perform and feel the thrill of the audience.

Erin swallowed a small lump in her throat and clenched her eyes shut and shook her head to clear the vision. When she opened them she saw he was entering the wings of the stage but not before a quick intent glance back at her. Erin shifted her eyes back to the stage keeping a poker face as the sibling contortionists made their grand entrance. Finally the show ended and Erin was extremely glad. She felt tired and wanted to be back in her comfortable bed. As the girls exited their seats they both mumbled about the show ending on a rather...non-freaky note? Others were grumbling about it, too, that after all that that was how it ended? Before they made it to the auditorium exit two huge snakes slithered seamlessly down from the upper balcony towards the crowd. There were screams of panic and the crowd pushing each other back to get out of the way. Erin instinctively stuck her arms out to keep Brigid and Ellie behind her before it clicked that the "snake boy" had not made his appearance. Suddenly there he was standing in front of the crowd covered in green and yellow scales wearing only shorts and bringing the snakes to coil around his body and at his feet. The surprise twist!

"That, ladies and gentlemen, is the real end of our show. Please help yourself to our many souvenirs. Thank you for coming." Mr. Tall boomed to the audience as they laughed and passed by the snake boy some actually daring to pet one of the snakes. Blip: proud, loves the thrill of the scare. Erin passed by him with a warm smile making the "okay" sign with her hand. Ellie and Brigid each ran their hands along one of the snakes.

"Pythons, right?" Ellie asked.

"Reticulated...no, Burmese. No..." Brigid said trying to think back to freshmen zoology.

The snake boy laughed. "You're both right. Reticulated pythons. Most people can't tell what they are." He smiled and blushed slightly. "But it's always nice when someone does know. Especially girls." The three of them laughed as Ellie and Brigid waved goodbye passing into the foyer. Erin yawned as the girls looked over the stalls of gifts and souvenirs. Erin felt a nudge in her side.

"Erin, you cannot already be tired, come on!" Brigid said shaking her arm. "Wake up, wake up, wake up! I want to buy you something for taking us."

"Brigid, you don't need to buy me anything. Just pick something extra for yourself."

"Hey, look! Candied cobwebs and rubber spiders like the red spider guy! Geez, these rubber spiders are as big as the real one. It's unreal." Ellie said looking it over. "I've never seen a spider that big. I have to get this. I am going to scare the living daylights out of my family!" Ellie laughed to herself as she paid for the toy.

"If either of you use it to try and scare me I will ban you both from ever having fun again." Erin warned.

"Relax, we won't mess with you. Grumpy pants here needs to go to bed." Brigid said in a baby-voice. "I've bought all I wanted. Ellie?"

"Yep. I'm loaded. I don't even care that I'm a junior and buying toys. Gotta have mementos from something that will only happen once in your life."

"Once in a lifetime. Yep. Got it. Let's go, kids." Erin smiled as she fumbled in her purse for her keys. It must have rained more while the show was going on. There were puddles around and a very, very light drizzle. Erin unlocked her car and they all got in. Before backing out Erin had a small blip that was gone in a second. It didn't show anything but it was still something; Erin never took her flashes or blips for nothing even when they weren't anything but a seemingly insignificant blip whether past, present, or future in origin. Erin put the car in reverse and backed out of the alleyway crossing streets to get to the main expressway.

Blip. Blip. Blip.

Erin checked her mirrors and looked around her as she drove and started hitting familiar main roads. What was going on? She kept having consistent flashes. They didn't show anything but they were all coming from the same source. Of that she was sure. They caused an uneasiness in her that meant her gut and brain were linked together saying something isn't right but we don't know what. The blips were following her. That was the best way to describe it as it dawned on her: the blips were following her. She immediately started running through the list of variables that Brigid had told her and if they had been "completed."

Web, alley, wet pavement could all be checked off. Although Erin kept in mind that just like her ability nothing could be taken for granted that it was purely for the immediate present. But until proven otherwise, she was going to check off those three points. That left purple and busted screened-in-patio. They had a small screened-in-patio that looked into the garden of their small rowhouse but Brigid hadn't said it was their screened-in-patio. So two were left and either they revealed themselves as part of a smaller equation or they would be put on hold to fill in the gaps of something larger. Erin still didn't know what Brigid had seen at the show but she would tell her eventually. Brigid never forgot a piece of the puzzle no matter how seemingly insignificant. Just like Erin wasn't dismissing the blips that seemed to be continuing though further apart now. She couldn't shake the idea of being followed so that's what it had to be; her gut told her so. This information made her instincts hyper aware. If they were being followed and the one who was doing the following finally revealed themselves, they were in for a very nasty sadistic surprise. Accidents happen all the time without any indication of coincidence.

Erin pulled into their garage and lead the way into the kitchen closing the garage door. She looked at the security system on the wall by the door and punched in the code.

"Brigid, Ellie, I'm going to set the alarm for tonight. Just so you know. You guys do whatever you want. I'm going to bed. Wake me for whatever." Erin yawned. It was already past 3 o'clock in the morning.

Erin trudged up the stairs to her room and threw her purse on the floor. She undressed and threw you t-shirt nightgown on before rinsing most of her make-up off and brushing her teeth. She was so tired she didn't bother doing her nightly skin-care routine and left her mascara on and smudged eyeliner. She turned the lights out and flopped onto her bed throwing the comforter over her and was asleep in seconds.