Fire With Fire by Jenny Han, Siobhan Vivian

impossible to
see what’s right beyond the first bales of hay. We take a couple
of steps inside, to the first big intersection. You can go left or
right, or keep heading straight.
Kat grabs my hand. “You’re freezing.” She pulls me along
with her to the left. “Now, stick close to me. Suckers are going
to jump—”
Right then two ghouls leap from the shadows. I scream and
start laughing, while Kat practically leaps into my arms.
“Personal space, asshole!” she screams at the ghouls.
“Are you okay?” I ask her. “Do you want to go back
through the entrance?”
She gives me a face like I’m being stupid. “They caught me
by surprise, is all. Come on. This shit is going to get tiring
real fast. And the sooner we get to the end, the sooner we can
hook back up with Ricky and the guys.”
I pat her on the back. “O-kay, Sister Katherine.”
We only take a few steps before I feel someone come up
alongside us as if she were part of our group. Kat notices her
too, and we both turn and look. This is an older woman, but
she’s dressed up like a little girl in a blue dress, white lacetrimmed socks, and black velvet buckle shoes. She’s carrying
around a doll covered in fake blood, and she holds it up to us.
“My dolly’s sick!” she cries in a weird, whiny voice. “Help
my dolly!”
Kat lets out a shriek I didn’t know she was capable of, high
and shrill and raw. She drops my hand and takes off running.
“Kat!” I’m laughing so hard I can’t breathe. “Kat!”
I push my way in the direction Kat ran off, but it’s hard
with all the other people in the maze. I take a left, then a right,
and head straight right into a wall. I walk backward out, and
someone taps me on the shoulder. “Kat?” I say, but it’s just a
psychotic farmer wearing bloodstained overalls and carrying
a pitchfork. I mean, another one of the workers.
He spins me around, and when I take a step forward, I
realize I have zero idea where I’ve come from and where to
go next.
“This way, you guys!” a girl’s voice calls out.
It’s not Kat. It’s Lillia.
I stumble in the direction of her voice, but it’s hard to tell
exactly where she is, with the music and the other people
screaming and laughing.
I take a couple of turns, but I don’t hear Lillia again. It’s
dizzying, and the flashing strobe lights are starting to give me
a headache. I shout, “Kat? Kat?”
Another ghoul jumps out at me, and this time I scream. He
grabs my arm and tries to keep me from getting away from him.
I shake him free and quicken my pace down a long maze alley. I
need to find Kat. I don’t want to go through this thing alone. It’s
definitely way scarier when you’re all by yourself. And Kat’s
probably having a heart attack right now, for all I know.
I take another left and walk for a few feet until I hit a deadend hay wall. I shake out my hands, take a deep breath, and
try to calm myself down. Am I ever going to get out of here?
Then I turn around and run right into Reeve Tabatsky.
I mean that literally. I run right smack into his chest. The
force sends me stumbling backward a step. Reeve’s crutches
clatter down on the ground, and he totally loses his balance
with his bum leg. Thankfully the maze alley we are in is narrow, and one of the hay walls breaks his fall and keeps him
from hitting the ground.
“Shit,” he says.
“I . . . I didn’t see you,” I say, breathless.
“Are you okay?”
It takes me by total surprise, Reeve asking me this. My
cheeks heat up bright, but I lean down and pick up his crutches
for him so he won’t see it.
“Don’t worry about me,” I say, the words tumbling out of
my mouth super fast and nervous. I can’t believe I’m finally
face-to-face with Reeve, having an actual normal conversation with him. After all these years, here we are. I straighten
up and ask him, “How’s your leg?” Reeve doesn’t take the
crutches from me, so I lean them against the hay wall for
when he’s ready.
He says, “It’s