Fun House

have been the highpoint of my Catholic education.)

Instead, we head over to the boardwalk.

Turns out Ms. Shapiro has always wanted to see a real Fun House, and we have one on Pier Two. In fact, it’s one of the oldest attractions in Sea Haven. The Fun House isn’t a thrill ride, because you don’t ride: you have to walk through it on foot to experience it. It’s what they call a participatory amusement. It’s also why nobody’s building the rickety things any more. People today, they like to sit in cars after they’ve driven their cars to where they’re going.

We stroll up the boardwalk. Soak in the blinking lights, gaudy sights, and greasy smells. Layla is nibbling on a cyclone of cotton candy. I’m not. I’m still in uniform and nobody wants to see an armed cop looking like a two- year-old with a gob of pink gunk stuck to his nose.

“Thanks for hanging with me, Danny,” says Layla. “I just needed to get away from the Nut House. Take a break.”

“No problem.”

“Marty’s been driving me crazy.”

“How so?”

“The ratings.”

“They’re good, right?”

“Yeah. This week. Next week, who knows? It’s like they say on Project Runway: ‘One day you’re in, the next day you’re out.’”

I’ll take her word for it. I’ve never watched Project Runway. Don’t think it’s about airplanes.

“So where’s this real, live fun house?”

I point to a brightly colored building dead ahead.

“Those big red lips?” says Layla.

“Yeah. The clown’s mouth is the entrance.”

The front of the Sea Haven Fun House is basically a two-story-tall clown face with a huge gaping mouth under demented eyes, because the Fun House clown has the same psychological profile as the one in Stephen King’s It. The red carpet you walk down after giving the ticket-taker five coupons is the big monster’s tongue.

“Do they have those mirrors in there?” asks Layla. “The ones that make you look fat and skinny?”

“Definitely. Two sets of ’em. Wouldn’t be a Fun House without funhouse mirrors. There’s also a barrel of fun-a rolling hallway you have to walk through. And, my favorite, the Turkey Trot.”

Layla laughs. “What’s that?”

“This long corridor with an oscillating floor. Three planks sliding back and forth. I set the indoor world record. Trotted the whole thing in under twenty seconds.”

“Danny, tell me: Exactly how much of your misspent youth was misspent in the Fun House?”

“One whole summer. Right after my second year of high school. My buddy Jess’s dad used to run it. Gave us both summer jobs as ‘custodial engineers.’”

“You were a janitor?”

“No. I think the janitors made more than us.”

“I see.”

“It was a blast,” I say, remembering how the guy in the control booth would blast air up unsuspecting girls’ skirts, giving them their very own Marilyn Monroe moment.

Every once in a while, Jess and I would sneak behind the body-warping mirrors and say funny stuff to the girls checking themselves out, especially if they were girls we knew from school.

Well, we thought it was funny stuff. The girls didn’t always agree. Especially since most of our mirror material included the words “big,” “boobs,” and “butt.” Fortunately, Jess and I knew every nook, cranny, and secret passageway; knew how to get to the exit slide faster than any of the girls chasing us.

“Hey, Danny,” says Layla, “is it too early for a cold one?”

She’s eyeballing this pizza stand tucked in next to the Fun House entrance. It squats underneath a “Draft Beer” sign shaped like a frosty, overflowing mug. A strobing red arrow full of chaser lights points down to the promised land of liquid refreshment.

“Well, I’m still in uniform,” I say.

“I’ll drink. You can observe. Slap the cuffs on me if I get out of line.”

“That’ll work,” I say.

We head into the pizza joint, find a couple swivel stools at the counter. Layla has a beer, almost as tall and frosty as the one on the neon sign. I order a Coke so everybody can see that their public servant is not drinking a beer. Unless they think it’s a Guinness or something. Darn. Didn’t think of that.

“Marty’s a snake and a hack,” says Layla after her third sip of beer, which, I guess, has completely washed away the lingering sweetness of the cotton candy.

“Really?” I’m sipping my soda through a straw now. Nobody drinks Guinness with a straw.

“He’s a backstabber and a hack. All he knows are crappy cliches, because that’s all he’s ever done. His last three shows totally tanked. That one about the oversexed cougars looking for love with pizza delivery boys? Hot To Trot? Nobody watched it. And the only reason he wanted to do Fun House was so he could be closer to Atlantic City. He didn’t have any ideas on what to do with the kids in the house; he just wanted to hit the casinos on his nights off. That’s why he needs me. To do his thinking for him, because I have ideas like some people have pimples. They just pop up.”

“Like putting steroids in the show?”

“It’s reality, Danny. Steroid use to keep your body buff is a very real, very contemporary issue. When drugs turn up, like they did today, we shoot it. It’s a conflict that hits home with males 18 to 24, the sweet spot of our target audience demographics. You live around here?”

Okay. That was rather random.

“Excuse me?”

“Your apartment. Is it close?”

“Not really. I’m about thirty minutes south.”

Down where the rents are cheaper.

Layla whips out her iPhone. Swipes her fingers across the face. “It’s six-fifteen. Maybe we should skip the Fun House.”

“Huh?”

“You need to change into your undercover clothes, right?”

“Yeah.”

“And get to the restaurant to meet Ceepak by eight.”

“Right. Twenty hundred hours.”

“Six-fifteen to six-forty-five, six-forty-five to seven-fifteen. That’s just the travel time.”

She’s right. I need to boogie.

Layla gulps down the foamy dregs at the bottom of her plastic beer glass. Slams it on the counter. “How long will it take you to change?”

I shrug. “Not long.”

“Five, ten minutes?”

“Yeah. I guess.”

“Seven-fifteen to seven twenty-five. We’ve still got thirty-five minutes.”

“Oh. Okay. You want to grab a slice or something?”

Layla smiles at me.

“What?”

“Danny, how long do you need to take a shower before you change clothes?”

“Don’t worry about it. I took one this morning.”

“How long?”

“Another five minutes.”

“Good. That gives us thirty minutes.”