Marigold's Playplace

Marigold's Playplace was one of my favorite places to go as a kid. Any young child loved going there, a place where you could run free and climb to your heart?s content. There was a gigantic slide that went straight down like the face of a cliff, curving at the bottom in a ball pit. It was painted orange, red, and yellow, like a lava flow. There were secret passages and rope bridges and foam, pointed teeth jutting from above and below, each one a different color that formed a rainbow. For any kid, it was an adventure waiting for you to climb in.
The only thing I didn?t like about Marigold?s Playplace was the gnomes. They were these gigantic paintings of little men on the walls, cartoonish caricatures which smiled down at you wide open mouths and eyes the size of their fat fingers. They had four on each hand, including the thumb. Dressed in bright clothing, they seemed to be galloping along the walls with carefree abandon, as happy and adventurous as the kids they were watching.
I don?t know why, but the gnomes scared the crap out of me. They seemed almost hungry as they watched us play, unmoving, flat figures that waited for their prey to stray too close. That was just my imagination, of course. There was no such thing as gnomes that ate children.
I loved going to Marigold?s Playplace. Every time spring rolled around, I?d excitedly ask my parents to take me to Marigold?s. Which they did. I thought sometimes I?d end up staying there forever. Until the day I found the open zipper.
Most play places have space between the frames that are sealed off from the kids, with a zipper to allow access by staff. Marigold?s was no different. Sometimes I would try and squeeze in any way, but that never worked. So imagine my surprise when I was running along the padded foam and came across an open zipper. I paused in my excitement and peered in, poking my head through it. The space behind it was dark and empty, located underneath a ramp that led to the big slide. I could just make out the faint pattern of the tiled floor. I was eight-years-old at the time, so obviously I went the rest of the way inside. As I did so, I felt like my knees were knocking together. At any moment I felt like someone would reach forward and pull me backward and I?d find myself staring into the scolding face of the staff, who?d take me to my parents and berate me for trying to go somewhere dangerous.
Nobody grabbed me. I shuffled quietly through the darkness, breathing in and out quietly. My heart rate had skyrocketed. I was convinced someone was waiting for me in this darkness, someone who would grab me and drag me away from Marigold?s forever.
In the distance, I could faintly hear the other children playing. Someone began to cry as the ballpoint became a battleground again, despite the protests of the staff and parents.
In the dark space between the frames, I was all alone, separated from them all.
Then the light turned off. It was just for a second, but when the lights went out completely, I was convinced someone had found me and was standing behind me. I was in complete blackness, with only my own breath keeping company.
Then the lights came back on and I immediately ran out back through the zipper. I was panting as I began to run down the structure, ready to find my parents and leave immediately, spooked by the blackout. I didn?t run into anyone, which I was very thankful for. Kids can be relentlessly cruel if they find out you?re scared of something silly, like a blackout.
And I didn?t run into any of them. I thought they?d just run off to the parents after the blackout. Until I turned the corner of the ball pit and saw the little place where the parents waited for their children. It was just a small section of the building which was sectioned off and given tables and a few arcade games, a pool table, and a brown wooden bench where moms put down their car seats with their sleeping newborns. A shoe rack was seated right beside the fence that sectioned off the parents? area and the play structure itself.
The shoe rack was empty. As was the parents? section. Even the reception area was empty.
And the gnome paintings were gone.
?Hello?? I called out, hands clutched to my chest. ?Hello? Mom? Dad? Anyone?? I began to tear up a little, my eyes becoming wet. ?Hello?? I began to sob. ?Mom, where are you??
Something moved. I didn?t see it, but I heard it. I heard something like a footstep, a heavy, plodding footstep. It came from the reception area. My breath sharply pulled itself inside my chest. A lamp flickered softly as another heavy, plodding step came from the reception area. The lamp flickered again, and briefly illuminated a shadow across the ground. It was a short, squat figure, dressed in a pointed hat and baggy clothes.
A jet-black, dirty hand with four fingers curled around the reception area, claw-like nails scratching into the wood.
I ran.
I turned around and ran into the play structure. Through the soft, sticky fabric of the socks, my feet slapped against the ground, the pain hitting the soles of my feet like a brick. I began to turn around the corner of the ball pit when something hit me in the eye. I cried out in pain, hand cup my sore eye as the other blinked rapidly. I glanced around until my eyes settled on the small red plastic ball on the ground, rolling to a stop. Then another plastic ball hit me in the ear, so hard my ear began ringing. I cried out again and looked into the ball pit.
Empty, save the sea of plastic balls. Blue, yellow, green, and red. The lava-cliff slide descending into it seemed like it was scooping up a few of them. I blinked again, eyes watering, when I saw a fat, filthy hand, reach out from around the side of the slide. Stout fingers wrapped around a ball before it darted back again, out of sight. A harsh, disgusting chuckle broke through the air, ringing in my ears. I ran again.
I was climbing up a rope bridge to another area of the Playplace when another ball smacked against the bare skin of my leg. I turned around and caught a glimpse, just a glimpse, of a red, pointed hat that ducked behind the lava-cliff slide. The green ball had landed on the door bridge and without thinking I picked it up and threw it back win a weak arm before I kept climbing.
I stopped when the ball smacked into something and an angry growl followed. Something began to climb up the slide, hissing and growling in anger. I didn?t dare look behind me as I climbed the rest of the way up and to the next level. I had to find the ramp and get back underneath it. This had all started when I went in there, and I hoped it would be my escape from this nightmare.
I had just jumped over the sharp teeth when there was a yell behind me. It was so loud it had to be a few feet away. I couldn?t help not looking back.
I?ll never forget what I saw. There, running toward me on squat legs, was a little man in a pointed hat, with sharp ears that jutted out from the sides of his head. A beak-like nose was hanging over a white mustache that dropped past his lips and down his chest. His skin was covered in dirt and filthy black soot, red eyes glaring into me as his mouth opened wide. Rows upon rows of sharp, yellow, malformed teeth waited for me. Behind him, on the rope, another one had climbed up the rope bridge. It paused when it saw me - and grinned.
I screamed and began running again. And running. I didn?t navigate the play structure, I just run through it, until I found the open zipper beneath the ramp. Without thinking, I jumped into it, landing on my stomach. One of my legs hung out of the edge. I began to crawl inside when there was a snarling roar and then I felt something bit into my leg. I howled in pain as I felt part of my flesh come away from my leg, a pair of strong hands holding me down. I looked down to see the blood crusted face of the gnome, chewing open-mouthed as my blood seeped into his white mustache. He began to bend down again. I yelled and kicked outward, slamming the heel of my foot into his face while pulling my wounded leg with all my might. It slid past the zipper in a second, the metal teeth grazing across my open wound.
The gnome recoiled in a second from my kick, knocked onto its back, but instantly recovered. It sat up, my blood seeping through its cracked lips. It swallowed and then roared, lunging forward for the zipper. I kicked out again, slamming its face back. For a brief moment, I felt like I was going to make it out of this.
Then I saw it out of the corner of my eye. A dozen gnomes, racing through the play structure beneath me, gnashing their teeth and climbing across the frames, closing in like sharks on a dead whale.
This was a feeding frenzy. And I was the meal.
Four fingers suddenly closed around my foot and began to pull me back through the zipper. I couldn?t scream as I saw the gnome?s harsh, gleeful glare, eyes flashing with hunger as his teeth closed on the toes of my sock.
Then the lights went out again, only for a second. When they came back on, the gnome was gone.
There was a gaping, bloody hole in my sock. My little toe was gone.
I screamed, loud and shrill, in pain.
I was found by one of the staff who dragged me out and to my parents. When my mother saw me, she screamed and cried, demanding to know what had happened to my leg and foot. I couldn?t answer her. Everything was going white. I felt faint. Then nothing.
When I woke up, I was in the hospital. Alive. But I cried any way. Because while I?d been unable to wake, I?d still been at Marigold?s. The gnome dragged me back out of the zipper as his brothers closed in. They grabbed me with stubby fingers that dug into my stomach, chest, tendons, even my eyes. Then their mouths engulfed me.
I never went back to Marigold?s. My parents never asked why, though they did wonder what could have happened. My mother wanted to sue them, but she never did. Nobody could prove, somehow, Marigold?s was responsible for my horrific injuries. The official explanation is that the zipper did it, but nobody believes it. My parents asked me many times what had happened but I never told them. Even until their dying day, I didn?t tell them. I can live with that.
I still have trouble walking. My foot was so mangled the doctors had to amputate it, and now I use a plastic prosthetic instead.
I still have nightmares every now and then. Of gnomes pulling me down to the ground and pressing their teeth into my neck, cheeks, chest, even groin, and tearing me to pieces. When I wake up, I don?t do anything. I can?t think of anything to do. I just lay there and wait for sleep to take me again.
The lawn gnomes that dot the gardens along my street glare at me with smiling faces when I pass them. Every now and then, when I know no one is watching, I?ll steal one, take it back to my shed, and smash it into pieces with a hammer. Over and over again, smashing into the fat, stout body until it?s dust. Nobody sees me scatter the dust into the rivers and ponds. And nobody ever will.
Marigold?s is still open to this, and still popular with children. I?ve been keeping an eye on it, waiting in case anything happened. In the year since then, nothing has - until recently.
A kid went missing. When the staff searched the structure, all they found was the chewed remains of the kid?s shirt. It was in the frame of the playplace, underneath a ramp.


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