The Nightmare Factory
Hello, all! This is a month long series about my adventures working in a haunted house in Salem, MA during October. Though I used to work there nearly every day during college, my location and work schedule limit me to only one day a week this year. As such, I’ve decided to collect some of the better scares and hilarious moments in a weekly article.
This week marked the official opening of Salem’s Haunted House Presents: The Nightmare Factory for the Halloween season, though the haunt is open nearly all year. I literally supported myself on this job my senior year of college, though sometimes I wonder how. I’ve come to the conclusion that it was my sheer love of scaring the buhjeezus out of people that kept me running all year long.
Unfortunately, yesterday wasn’t as fast paced as we look forward to on Halloween, so this article will probably be the shortest. These incidents involve a middle aged man and a preteen boy respectively, illustrating my abilities to scare everyone equally.
Our haunted house is set up to be run by one person, but during October we split the scares up between a handful of people. I work near the front, so I get to hear everyone hyping themselves out before they walk through the door. I also get the first scare, but instead of picking out the people who I know will scream, I aim for the ones that look like the big toughies. Or whoever is last in line, it depends on my mood.
In any case, this one group was full of screamers led by dad. Everywhere I jumped out, they screamed, but he was just laughing and enjoying the experience. I had one last chance to get this guy, and it came as he walked right by the curtain I was hiding behind. I got up to his ear and yelled, “Don’t leave me!” He yelped and nearly ran into the wall. After the tour was over, our ticket taker asked the group, “I heard Dad screamed in there,” and the whole family laughed when he admitted to it. “That was really great,” he said to us. “I can’t believe you got me to scream.” You’re welcome, awesome dad!
The second kid cracked me up. I was waiting behind the scenes for my cue when I heard him yell, “I remember this part!” Usually when a customer says that, they then follow with a detailed account of what is to happen, thus ruining the surprise for everyone else, but we didn’t give him a chance. I jumped out, and he and the rest of the group screamed and flew into the back wall. They were laughing so hard as they rounded the corner that the next person scared them into screaming again, easily. He must not have remembered what was going to happen TOO much if he screamed that hard. Thanks for not spilling the beans, little dude!
More to come next week. I Love October!
Tags: Scaring People
Rhiannimated Mind | Rhiannimated | 
6 October 2009 7:31 AM
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