The sun is setting on Hickory Acres, but the park is still full of people. Some parents gather up young children and begin to head home, while others continue to enjoy the various activities. At the edge of it all is the entrance to the corn maze.
Lauren sits on the end of an unused trailer near the entrance, fiddling with an old-fashioned radio. Kara leans next to her.
“You really should be focusing on your job,” Lauren repeats without looking up.
“I don’t have anything to do until the next group starts. Besides, it’s not like they’d fire me, their star employee.”
“You’re only their star employee because you don’t have a life.” Lauren glances up so that her friend can see the impish glint in her eyes. Kara punches her playfully.
“Hey, money’s money. What time is it right now?” Lauren glances at her watch.
“We have about five minutes. At this rate, it might just be the two of us.”
“Oh, they’ll come,” Kara says with a rueful smile. “They always come.” She looks around for the beginnings of the next group to go into the maze.
IC: David Carter stands at the edge of the entrance, just far enough away so he thinks he could get away with claiming to be “just looking” if someone asks him whether or not he’ll go in. He waits a moment more, left hand clutching his ever present black notebook, as if indecisive.
But he sees another person (Bailey) getting into line, and slowly moves behind him.
“Dangit, I thought he was joking about coming tonight. Now I’ll have to take him home, too.” Kara just laughs.
“Oh, you poor responsible soul.” She tries to give Lauren a sympathetic pat on the knee, but she twitches out of the way. Shaking her head, Kara walks towards the entrance. “No need to form a line, pretty informal around here. Did you guys register online?”
Lauren hisses back at Bailey before pointedly turning her attention to Jeff. "Nah, just found this lying around. I’m seeing if I can still get anything out of it.
IC: David stares at Lauren with hollow blue eyes, clearly trying and failing to smile. “I, I uh signed up on the website. Thought it would be interesting…maybe, well, I thought I could maybe see what you guys had, see if I could take some inspiration away from it. I-uh never mind. That’s it.”
He fidgeted, shoving the small notebook into his left jacket pocket and resting a hand on the medium size camera in his right pocket. He did still intend to record the tour, assuming no one tried to stop him. David looked over at the maze, eyes widening as he took in the fading sunlight. In this backdrop he could very well imagine something nefarious and cold lurking in the depths of the maze, waiting for prey-
Carter avidly shook himself out of his fantasy, almost smiling at the thought. Maybe this will be useful after all.
