"Alright, Darren, calm down," Dr. Colfax advised me as I paced around at his office. I had to make an emergency session schedule because of Nyx.

That kid shows up out of nowhere, have me and Steve run around town like a couple of mules and she all of a sudden gives up tickets to some freak show where all my problems began!

"Darren, you are creating a hole on my carpet, sit down."

"I-I'm sorry, I-I can't." I stammered. "T-that kid, that brat is driving me nuts since she first got here." I said, my fingers running through my hair, on the verge of pulling them out. About to dive into a massive panic attack!

"This kid, Nyx you say? If she is causing you trouble, have you thought of trying to stay away from her? Or try and notify her parent or guardian?" the doc asked me as he annoyingly watched me pace around.

"I know the hotel where she and her father are staying but I don't know who he is o-or how she keeps showing up!" I grunted before I finally managed to force myself to sit down on the couch. "She showed up at my job, practically embarrassing me in front of my co-workers, my best friend and throws th-these tickets for a show that had haunted my nightmares for years at my face!"

The doctor rubbed his chin curiously before looking back at me. "Maybe...this could work on your favor."

"Huh?" I raised a brow. "What are you talking about?"

He adjusted himself in his seat and leaned towards me. "Darren, you told me for years that the nightmares started after you visited this show as a child. Since the old theater burned down years ago, this could be a way to face your fears, rid of your nightmares."

"Dr. Colfax, you do realize that freak shows are fucking illegal right?" I narrowed my eyes at him. Is he serious? He's suggesting i go back to the freak show to face my damned nightmares? Was he nuts?! Are there doctors for the doctors? Does He needs to get his head examined?

He nodded. "Well nowadays it's common. They are known celebrities on television who are freaks. They might be the same thing." Colfax looked at me as he put the clipboard down. His eyes weary. "Darren, I've been treating you since you were fifteen, the longest patient I have ever treated. We tried everything to help conquer your fears. I prescribed you all the medicines I could to help you. We undergo all the treatments, the exercises. But there will be times times that I won't be able to do anything if nothing changes. I don't want to resort to sending you to The Brownstone Institution."

I felt my blood froze by those words.

Sending me to the nut house. Forcing me into a straight jacket and throwing me in a locked, padded room, taking nothing but drugs that would reduce me into a bloody zombie!

Suddenly I'm more scared of that than my bloody night terrors.

"So, Darren, my advice: Go to the circus, see them once more. If it doesn't work, then I would have no choice but-"

"I'll go!" I blurted out before I could stop myself.

"Good. Have fun." He said before ending the session.

I don't remember how I ended up home that night, but as soon as I entered the house, not even shutting the front door, my body collapsed on the sofa, face first into the cushion.

Go to the circus...those four words echoing in my head, drowning my senses till it was all I could hear.

I only saw the Cirque Du Freak once in my life. I was a kid when I went and saw it with Steve. I barely remember the acts.

Let's see, I do remember the wolf man, snake boy...I think they had a bearded lady, i don't remember…

But what I do remember most of that night...besides that ugly grey creature in the blue robe scaring the living shit out of me - thus ruining my whole life… was the spider… Madam Octa I believe it was her name.

The most beautiful, exotic...dangerous spider I had ever seen before in my life. Seeing the tricks she was doing, seeing how powerful her venom was with that goat…

What also stuck out was her handler...Crapsley? Crepsley? Either way, he was kinda creepy.

I don't remember much after that...except when Steven took off and I followed him to the balcony…

Where that gray, blue roped person jumped out of nowhere, scaring the literal shit out of me. It hissed and called my name before I took off running. I didn't even return to Steven's house or to even mine. I do remember the police picking me up, pale to the face, saying words that were corhearent and took me down the Child Protection Services where I stayed there for a few days until my parents came and gotten me. They were scared out of their minds, thinking that I was kidnapped or murdered and thrown in a ditch to rot.

Anne was crying, clinging to me thinking that I was lost forever.

My friendship with Steve was strained for a while, but neither of us talked about what happened that night. We eventually got things worked out but still,that night changed my life…

Could I be able to return to that circus?