And so, the heat wave is over. The 8 Quarter Finalists have returned for one of them to meet their fate in the hotseat. And now we’re in the home straight, with the final in sight. Imagine I’ve just said the most wonderful thing to get you excited. Whoop a little. Now stop. Laugh a little. We good?

You may spot some of the usual changes (new up-to-date pictures, extended voting period). So it’s time to get even more excited about the soon to be winner of 2013. The vote will go live Friday, and you’ll now have four days to cast your vote in digital form.

1. Frankie Sandford vs. Victoria Justice
2. Kimberley Walsh vs. Taylor Swift
3. Jennifer Lawrence vs. Katy Perry
4. Zooey Deschanel vs. Jenna Louise Coleman

Did you actually read this post, or just skip to the list of polls? If so, I stuck a poem up in a place no one normally looks. Imagine reading it in my voice. If that fails, try Morgan Freeman’s voice (I know he ain’t British, but I imagine that would be awesome to hear). Or if you like, try Des Lynam’s voice, which shouldn’t be too hard since he read that poem for the world cup 98, so a quick google should find him reading it (and David Batty missing a penalty).

Although this story mentions real persons, corporations, TV shows and places, it is purely a work of fiction for personal enjoyment. The story does NOT describe real events and should NOT be taken to accurately portray any real entity mentioned. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

The theme music played, Colin made his final superstitious count, then smiled at the camera.

“Hello, and welcome to The Colin Show, and have we got a special one for you tonight.” His Canadian accent was quite strong, despite all the years he’d spent in the States. He had recently moved to London, expanding his brand of straight talking interviews to a new audience.

“Later on, we’ll have the cast of How I Met Your Mother…”  To which the audiences cheered, “But first we have two ladies who have been on many gungey adventures together. They are well known for their exploits, and tonight we get to find out just that little bit more about them. Please give your warmest welcome to Kelly and Emma.”

The two girls walked onto the stage, each dressed smart, but not overstated. Emma wore a red dress with her left shoulder exposed, with her blond shoulder length hair having pink highlights. Kelly on the other hand sported a bright green strapless number, with her strawberry blond hair flittering about her cleavage. They walked over to Colin, each giving a kiss on the cheek, before sitting down.

— After the Author’s note —

Remember the interviews we had back at the beginning of the year, as well as a couple last year? Well this is going to be something like that. Kelly and Emma will answer your questions, although they reserve the right of “no comment”, and obviously I will moderate what questions are asked, as well as maybe throw in a few of my own. Don’t worry about the framing of this story. Kelly and Emma are perfectly aware of who they are, that they are characters in a fictional world (they met Alexandre after all, and the fourth wall does not exist for them), and they’re not embarrassed about the fact that some complete strangers know some very personal going ons in their mansion.

The questions will be framed as questions from the blog, pretty much like you get “so-so on Twitter” on normal interviews.

If you want to know more about Kelly and Emma’s exploits, please check the archive page for my stories. Most of the stories involve these ladies in some way, and will give an insight into what they’ve already been through, and what they’re like. Feel free to ask a question about a particular incident, or for elaboration on something already mentioned.

Do not ask about the photo credit, I got it off the HIMYM facebook page, please look it up there if you are really bothered.

As well as answering your questions, Kelly and Emma will be showing off one of their tanks on the show (Peter had it shipped specially), and one of the other guests will be demonstrating it. So I’ll leave it up to yourselves to decide which member of How I Met Your Mother will be gunged. Of course, this being a “female gungee” orientated site, it’s the highest female who will be in the gunge tank. I’m just interested to know who will waste their one vote on one of the guys (although the tie break situation involves husbands and such, but that’s neither here nor there). Maybe I’ll have a guy pull the chain, that might not waste putting them in the poll.

In terms of time frame, the poll will last about a week, but you can continue to ask questions until around September, although I don’t promise when I’ll put the story up. You’ll know I’m writing up the story when the story is no longer sticky, so don’t be surprised if I miss a question after that.

Any questions about the story premise, please reply to the first comment. Any question for the story, please put as a new reply. Hopefully this all makes sense and you enjoy the story, even taking part.

Disclaimer: Although this story mentions real persons, corporations, TV shows and places, it is purely a work of fiction for personal enjoyment. The story does NOT describe real events and should NOT be taken to accurately portray any real entity mentioned. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

Hi folks. Firstly, I’ll just let you know that I’m still alive. I’ve had a hellish time at work the last couple of weeks and I’ve also had family stuff to keep me busy, but I want to let you know that I hope to return to normal service shortly.

In the meantime, I’d like to pick the brains of the techies amongst you. I have accidentally deleted a folder that contains most of my YouTube/DailyMotion/Vimeo WAM downloads from the past 6 months or so, totalling about 50 GB of video. As you might imagine, I’d quite like to get it back.

To go into a bit more detail, the harddrive on my laptop is dual-partitioned into a Linux partition and an NTFS Windows partition. I hardly ever run Windows these days, but I use the NTFS partition for most of my file storage. The folder in question was on this NTFS partition. I’ve dismounted the partition so as to prevent any disk-writes from overwriting the deleted materials. I’ve also scanned the partition with the ntfsundelete program. Frustratingly, it can locate unimportant files I deleted years ago, but no sign of the large collection of videos I accidentally just deleted.

I guess it’s not the end of the world if I can’t get the stuff back. No doubt much of the stuff is still online, and perhaps I can count on the rest of you guys having downloaded the most significant vids from the period. Anyway, if anyone has any ideas let me know.

Gotta go now again, I’m afraid, but I’ll be back soon.

The stakes are getting higher, the final draws ever closer, and the hotseat is being readied by the various authors/people in charge, where one of the four remaining women will sit. However before that can happen, you all have to decide which two ladies will contest the final, so if you follow the vote here, you’re two steps away from finding out who will win in 2013.

1. Victoria Justice vs. Taylor Swift
2. Jennifer Lawrence vs. Jenna Louise Coleman

The pages go live on Saturday (the vote is already live, if you can find it), and you can vote all the way up until Tuesday (so you have four days in other words).

Good luck to the four remaining ladies.

A Fete Worse Than Death is a short gunge story written by an anonymous author* available over at ECGunge – you can read the whole thing here.

If you haven’t read the story before, be warned that there are spoilers ahead.

At its heart A Fete Worse Than Death is a simple story about revenge, told from the perspective of Charlotte, an 18 year-old student who is plotting revenge on her nemesis Bridget Knight, the headmaster’s daughter. She arranges for a gunging to be held at the end-of-year fête, with the victim to be determined by a charity gunge vote in which, as head girl, Bridget is unwittingly “volunteered” to take part.

The story has been around for a while, but it’s stuck with me. ECGunge was the site that first introduced me to WAM fiction, way back when it wasn’t a proper forum but a group over on Yahoo, and the stories were tucked away in the files section. The first stories I read were, of course, Iain’s Shireburgh Series, but the Other Authors section over there is chockablock with hidden gems. Over the course of a decade memory has eroded much of what I read, and I’d probably be hard-pressed to name or even locate my favourites (it’s been the best part of a decade), but A Fete Worse Than Death sticks out, helped by a punchy, memorable title which captures attention and simultaneously summaries the story (and features a pun).

However, it’s the main strength of the story which makes it most memorable: the build-up. WAM is a broad church with a wide variation in tastes, various different preferences and a number of sub-fetishes. Writing good WAM fiction is like walking a tightrope because whatever you do, you’re unlikely to please everybody. The best advice is probably just to write whatever you want because if you don’t enjoy writing it, it’ll be difficult to finish and it is likely the finished article will feel forced. For me, the most important aspect of any gunge scene is the build-up, and it’s doubly important in stories due to the absence of the visual element.

I don’t enjoy a story that’s just about someone turning up and getting a load of gunge dumped over them – the story first needs to establish the who and the why. I don’t think I’m alone in finding build-up crucial to a story , as demonstrated by the continuing popularity of gunge polls, which cleverly ratchet up the tension ahead of the big gunging. To what extent the importance of build-up is about needing to establish a context for humiliation is probably a question for another time.

Personally I favour realism and mild humiliation at most when it comes to stories and A Fete Worse Than Death falls right into this category. After quickly establishing the players – scheming Charlotte and nasty Bridget – the story gets to work building anticipation for the outcome of the gunge vote. Particularly effective is the description of the preparation for the event, including the description of the construction of the gunge tank, which helps build a picture of the gunging in the reader’s mind ahead of the event itself.

As the big day of the fête unfolds there’s some “filler” WAM in the form of a food fight and a pie in the face. In contrast to the players and events in the main story, the author doesn’t really sketch any of this out, and these sub-plots suffer for it. This is a big contrast to the main storyline, where the author excellently delivers on the build-up.

As the announcement of the gunge vote results at the fête begins, Charlotte is certain that Bridget is headed for humiliation in the gunge tank, but here the story delivers a nice twist as the voting totals don’t turn out as expected for Charlotte:

Charlotte’s heart stopped and she felt the world spinning under her. Voices became echoes in her head. A mistake, surely. Bridget turned and laughed in her face.

“And with an amazing 13,000 votes. The winner is Charlotte Baxter! Come on over, girls!”

Charlotte scanned the crowd to find anyone from the maths club who could tell her it was all a mistake. A girl she recognised dashed out shouting. “It’s true – Mr Knight came in half an hour ago and bought £1000 of votes!” Charlotte cast a glance at Alice who stood with her hands over her mouth in shock. Bridget’s father had got her off the hook again.

The focus on the description of Charlotte and her clothing may tip you off that she will ultimately be subjected to the gunging instead of Bridget, but the story does a good job of keeping you guessing by making it appear that Bridget’s gunging is inevitable by emphasising her unpopularity and providing a vote update midway through where Bridget has an insurmountable lead. Having Bridget’s father intervene on his daughter’s behalf is a believable way of subverting expectations. The twist is made all the more effective by the hints that Charlotte actually deserved it as well – she’s vindictive, thinks very highly of herself and lets the attention she receives due to organising the gunging go to her head. It certainly seems like she got her just desserts, and the baying crowd didn’t seem particularly fussed about who was on the receiving end.

The tale ends with a humiliated but spirited Charlotte making her way to get cleaned up, but there are hints that the story may continue in a further installment with Charlotte plotting her revenge on Bridget. However, as far as I know, no follow-up was ever published, which is a shame given the quality of this effort.

*It looks like EC Gunge lost the author details for all of its stories when it encountered its issues last year, so if you are the author, pipe up and I’ll give you proper credit.

Thanks to the Messy Scenes Blog. Ahh… cute, cowering, Asian bikini girls. First up, a rather strange game involving ‘squid ink’, then a selection of pieings.

Thanks to all those who provided info and links on the Finds page. It really is quite fantastic. I haven’t got time to edit the vids so I’ve just put up the full episodes and I’ll leave you to locate the messy scenes (there are plenty). Particularly worth watching are 36:30 of episode 2, 25:00 of episode 3, and 32:20 of episode 4.

Disclaimer: Although this story mentions real persons, corporations, TV shows and places, it is purely a work of fiction for personal enjoyment. The story does NOT describe real events and should NOT be taken to accurately portray any real entity mentioned. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

This story contains graphic descriptions of nudity.

“Welcome back to the show,” yelled Anna over the crowd. “Now, I know that you guys are probably itching to see someone get gunged nude, so I’ll just get to the results. With over 61% of the votes, the person getting gunged is… Kristen!”

The audience applauded uproariously. Kristen, despite the fact that she signed up for this, looked a little nervous.

“However, while she can’t escape from this fate, if she can answer a trivia question, Dakota or I will join her,” said Anna. “So, here’s the question: In which movie did you play “Ring Toss Girl?”

“ ‘The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas,’ ” remembered Kristen out loud.

“You are correct,” said Anna. “So, the person who will join you will be selected through this wheel, which is labeled with names of the other contestants.”

The wheel was brought out and spun. It landed on Anna’s name. She looked utterly delighted.

“The good news for me is that I’ll be gunged with regular slime, a la Nickelodeon. Kristen will, however, be gunged with things modeled after her movies,” she said. “And, no, we won’t use blood,” she added.

“So, we may as well start getting nude.”

“Yeah,” Kristen said, now acting as introverted as Bella Swan, not at all the mildly confident girl who’d come out onto the stage a week ago.

“Aww, you’re shy,” said Anna sympathetically. “It’s okay, I took some reassuring by the producers that it wouldn’t harm my rep before I took the job. Tell you what, I’ll go first” – and just like that, Anna’s dress was off, leaving her in a lacy black bra and pantie set. She then unhooked her bra, revealing her more-developed-than-previously-thought boobs, to applause from the audience. After stepping out of her panties, revealing her shaved pubic area, she went to stand in the booth where her gunging was to take place.

“Come on, Kristen,” she said, tingling with anticipation.

Kristen looked apprehensive, but she gradually started stripping, too, first to a blue bra, then a red thong. Off gradually came the bra, revealing her medium-small breasts, and then the thong, showing her trimmed black bush. She then stepped into the booth gingerly, as if it were about to explode.

“Okay, now, since Kristen beat Dakota out in the poll, she goes first,” said Anna. “Like I said beforehand, the gunge will come in the form of things related to her films. First course, producers! And make sure the booth door’s closed.”

A previously unseen clear triangular door was closed in front of Kristen. All of a sudden, a bunch of damp, colored pellets rained down on her. By the time they were done, a large amount of white liquid was all over her face (as well as the rest of her body), but she had a big smile on her face, all apprehension gone.

“What was that?” she asked, canned due to the booth.

“Fruity Pebbles with milk,” chuckled Anna, “for ‘The Flintstones.’ Second course!”

A large, solid, soft quantity of something rained down, smashing through Kristen like mud.

“What’s THIS?” she asked.

“Chocolate cake, for ‘The Cake Eaters,’ ” said Anna. “Third course!”

Something red and sticky dropped down on Kristen in a quantity so large, it lasted for a whole fifteen seconds.

Smacking her lips, Kristen said, “No need to tell me what THIS is. It’s cherry preserves, in honor of the song ‘Cherry Bomb’ by The Runaways.”

“True,” Anna grinned deviously. “Last course!”

Something else white dropped down on Kristen, this one slightly thicker than the milk. When it was all over, she was covered in multicolored cereal, brown cake, cherry preserves and this white substance.

“What is THIS?” asked Kristen.

“Whipped cream, for when the White Queen bathes in it in “Snow White and the Huntsman,” explained Anna. “Okay, guys, lemme have it!”

Green gunge rained down on Anna for ten whole seconds, leaving her a shade of light green, though she (and Kristen) still seemed to be having the time of their lives.

“That’s our show,” yelled Anna over the crowd. “Join us in two months, where I’ll be co-hosting with Sarah Michelle Gellar. For now, good night!”

The End… for Now

Author’s Note: This is my first post here, so please forgive me if I mess up the tags and categories.  Hope you enjoy it.

“Come on!” Scarlett urged, hauling open the door. “You don’t want to be late.”

“I’m coming,” Natalie replied, following into the centre. They paid their money and descended to the changing rooms. There were three doors at the foot of the stairs – the ladies’ to the left, the gents’ to the right, and straight ahead was what appeared to be a janitor’s cupboard. A little triangular sign on the door had a picture of a mop and bucket on it.

“This is our secret entrance,” said Scarlett with a sly smile. She produced a small key and turned the lock, letting the pair in. Despite the secrecy and Scarlett’s excitement, there did not appear to be much special about this changing room. It looked rather like any other changing room, if perhaps a bit more roomy. Come to think of it, the extra room may have been because there were…

“No stalls?” Natalie spluttered, wide eyes taking in the spartan room.

A girl, already changed into a swimsuit as dark as her jet black hair, stepped forward. “No need,” she said. “We have nothing to hide from each other.”

Natalie kept her eyes away, turning to Scarlett with a look of silent pleading. “I didn’t realise…” she murmured.

“If you’re real shy the showers are around the corner,” said Scarlett, pointing. “You can change in there, but be quick, Anne likes to have us in the pool sharp.”

So Natalie traipsed past the four team members, heading to the showers. She changed quickly, not wanting to hold them up any further, and was no sooner prying on the straps of her suit than they arrived around the corner and began to soak themselves. Natalie washed too before they all entered the pool, and after her butterflies flew away she began to rather enjoy trying to keep up with their drills. She was not a poor swimmer by any means, but not as conditioned as these athletic women. One girl, Liv it seemed her name was, struggled a little more than the others, and Natalie was pleased to see she could just about keep up. After the session they were back in the showers, and Natalie was curious to see the team gathered around the less speedy Liv.

“Well Liv, here we are again,” the girl in the black swimsuit said. She appeared to be the leader or the captain; all the other girls were in red. Except Natalie, who had not thought that the team would use uniforms in a simple practice. She hoped her own black suit, dripping and clinging to her in the chilly air, would not draw attention.

“But…” Liv whined. She made a pouty face, which seemed a little dramatic to Natalie. Then Natalie was shocked to see Liv’s finger suddenly thrust in her direction. “She was slower than me!”

“She isn’t a member of the team, yet,” said Anne.

Yet? Natalie thought. I don’t recall aiming to sign up…

Anne folded her arms across her chest. “You got the slowest time, again. You know what to do by now.”

Liv sighed, resigned. “Oh all right,” she said. With reluctance she twisted one of the shower controls, then turned it on. Then she screamed.

“It’s freezing!” she moaned.

“It might wake you up then,” Anne said. Natalie thought she detected a little bit of a smirk there, but soon the chamber was filled with mist from the hot showers the rest of the team were beginning to enjoy. Poor Liv, though, shivered as she tried to quickly shampoo her hair.

“Now hear this!” called Anne, ringing a spoon against the pipework. A spoon? Natalie had no idea why that was there, but it did the job. “It is time for today’s lottery!” the captain went on.

The women of the team went quiet, wrapping their towels round themselves as they gathered in a hushed cluster. Natalie watched, bewildered, as the captain held aloft her own swimcap. Somehow it seemed to draw the attention of the entire room. She reached in, swirling her fingers round like a magician reaching for a rabbit, and pulled a scrap of paper from within. The girls watched with baited breath, Natalie too now, as Anne opened it…

“Scarlett!”

Natalie’s eyes shot to her friend. The other girls laughed, nudging and jostling her, smiling with what looked to be relief. Scarlett lowered her head, a coy smile to her lips. Natalie stepped forward to ask just what was going on when Anne whipped back a sheet, revealing a box against the wall. Natalie’s mind had dismissed it earlier as just some broken locker, covered while awaiting repair. But a locker it was not; it was a tall perspex box, capable of holding an entire person standing up. Inside there was a little three-legged stool on the floor. And above…

“Shall you accept your fate?” Anne asked, reaching out to stroke Scarlett’s blonde locks. “Or do you want to play dice with the gods?”

Scarlett smirked. “Dice. Always.”

The other girls cheered. “Very well,” said Anne, reaching into her locker. She produced one tiny die, white with black dots, and bent to roll it across the floor. Scarlett took the opportunity to swat her captain’s wet behind.

“Oh!” Anne squealed, then turned on her teammate. “I ought to just shove you in right now for that.”

“But you’d rather see what fate decides,” said Scarlett. Anne smiled, returning her gaze to the dice. All eyes looked to it now, Natalie’s included. It was… the number three.

“Three,” Anne said. “Well, you’re still getting it. But now you get to decide who joins you.”

Scarlett cast her gaze across the rest of her team. They tried to shrink together, as if they could escape her notice just by willing themselves a little less obvious in the world. But Scarlett passed over them all, her eyes falling on her friend.

“Natalie,” she said.

Natalie gulped. She didn’t know why; she was not at all sure what was happening here. There was a box, a tank even, and that great swirl of colour sloshing above it… but what did that prove? She knew what it looked like, but that couldn’t be it. That would be… crazy! This was a swimming club, not some hackneyed Saturday night show.

“The new girl,” Anne said, looking her over in admiration. “She did not bad today. Needs to work on her conditioning, but she’ll be a valuable asset with a little work.”

“I thought so,” said Scarlett. She stepped forward, taking Natalie’s hands. “Might as well give her a good welcome.”

“Wh-what are you doing?” Natalie asked. Lucky for her Scarlett held her hands, they were starting to shake. She glanced at the tank in the corner, a sense of impending dread reaching deep inside her quivering body. Suddenly she felt hot, and sticky, and so aware of the suit that glued itself to her skin and every drop that ran down her limbs.

Scarlett led her to the tank. Natalie followed, feeling she would simply fall over if she offered any resistance. “Introducing you,” Scarlett answered, though she did not indicate to what. She simply pushed Natalie onto the seat, the wood feeling cold and hard beneath her rump. Natalie stared out at all those grinning faces as Scarlett slipped behind her, wrapping her friend in her arms with a hug.

Anne closed the perspex door. “Welcome,” she said, then pulled the lever.

It had been happening for two seconds before Natalie’s mind could even describe it. Cold, thick wet goo streaked across her head, coating her hair and raining down on her bare shoulders. Her skin rippled with the sensation of slime slithering across it and her vision filled with clotted colour. Natalie screamed, and in her ear amdist the squelching she heard Scarlett simply laugh. And, as the flow slowed down, Natalie began to laugh too.

“I can’t believe you did this to me!” she giggled, lumps dripping into her lap.

“But aren’t you glad?” whispered Scarlett, pecking her friend on her slime-streaked cheek.

Natalie looked out as the splattered door opened. The other women were watching, smirking, laughing, but none judging. She felt absolutely embarrassed, knowing she looked a frightful mess and that a watershed had passed. Or perhaps a slimeshed, but whatever it was, it was now the case that she had been gunged, and never again could she look at any of these women without that fact passing through their minds. Natalie was a gungee, a girl who had felt fate’s grubby hand sit her on a stool and have gunk poured over her. She’d had no control, she had simply surrendered to the sludge that had been destined for her head. And though her cheeks blazed and her eyeline faltered… inside, she swelled. She loved it, and as her friend offered to help her to the showers, Natalie firmly squeezed her hand.

Available in two parts on GungeyStories, as well as a migraine-inducing version on EC Gunge.

Mucky Vicky is one of my favourite authors, and an influential figure in the history of WAM literature. In 2000, she founded GungeyStories, a Yahoo group celebrating “pretty girls squirming in gunge tanks before being totally humiliated and covered in gunge”. While that sounds like a pretty common theme now, it appears that the site was a taboo-breaker in its day. “I must say I was surprised (and a little pleased) to see this club’s logo as ‘humiliated, gunged girls’”, commented one member. Peter Grimnim describes the site as pivotal in his development as a WAM writer, stating,

When I first became aware of the online WAM writing scene I was somewhat disappointed, though lots of the stuff out there was very good, nothing seemed to focus on what I was interested in, namely the humiliation aspect of WAM. All the stories seemed to involve happy smiley girls getting messy and loving it with gay abandon… However, this changed when I came across the gungey stories yahoo group, which focused on the squirming and humiliation side of things that I loved so much.

Perhaps, as a girl (as it happens a bisexual one), Vicky was the only person who dared admit liking this genre. In any case, once the site was up and running, many more humiliation junkies came out of the woodwork. Out of numerous superb stories that the site spawned, Vicky’s own are among the best. Her collection made it’s way to Big Dave’s World of WAM, and later to EC Gunge, where it can now be perused in all its glory. “The New Girl” is my personal favourite – perhaps even my favourite WAM story of all time.

I feel that one of my big weaknesses as a writer is that I struggle to be concise. My stories are usually on the long side, and can get bogged down in complex details and dragging dialogue. Reading TNG makes me feel rather jealous of Mucky Vicky’s ability to write with such sharp, snappy style. There is so much packed into little over a single screen of text. Not one word is redundant; every sentence is a masterpiece of penetrating insight yet elegant simplicity. Sure, there are a few spelling and grammar mistakes, and sometimes the pronoun “she” would be better replaced with a name to avoid confusion, but hey, who cares? This is lucid, lively, cutting prose. This, my fellow wammers, is penmanship.

It is somewhat futile for me to attempt a summary of such a plot, because it will likely end up longer than the original. Nonetheless I shall introduce the characters and briefly outline the story.

Maria, the titular New Girl, is introduced in the opening paragraph, which focuses almost entirely on her appearance. Little is known about her personality and background, but then this is often the case with newcomers. In any case, the average red-blooded reader is provided with all the information he needs; Maria is a big-boobed latina who doesn’t have time for bras.

It is this trait, along with Maria’s flirtatious nature, that draws the ire of the second character. Libby appears in a couple of Vicky’s other stories, and those readers who have already encountered her will know her to be bossy, manipulative, cunning and ruthless. As leader of the cheerleading squad, she also commands authority and status within the school and has a plentiful supply of lackies at her beck and call. In short, she is an alpha female, and knows she must be ruthless and expedient in seeing off potential contenders, ideally through public humiliation. Luckily for Libby, such acts of self-preservation are also a personal pleasure. It’s not going to be Maria’s day.

Within its short span, the story manages to visit many niches, including boot and panty filling, along with more mainstream WAM types such as a pie in the face. Vicky skilfully accelerates the pace of the story throughout, building to the climatic final paragraph where Maria is chained to a railing and stripped topless. In my view, however, the pinnacle of the story’s brilliance comes in the following scene:

“Now were are going to ruin that lovely hair of yours” “Oh please, this isn’t fair. Not over my head, oh no.” Maria was blushing with shame. A huge bucket of custard was now poised above her head, ready to take away her last shred of dignity. Maria was resigned to her fate and waited for it to pour. “Do you think she’s had enough guys? Shall we let her off?” Her eyes light up in hope only to be crushed by the overwhelming response of “Let her have it, give it to her” She felt the smallest trickle on her head and let out a muffle scream. The flow speeded up und her hair had soon disappeared under the gunge. Her bare shoulders and arms all got splatted as her tits received more attention. It spilled over her face and down her back. Her see-through top offered no cover for her ample breasts and her nipples were on show. “This is disgusting, I’ll get you for this” She sat there for a minute, soaking up the laughter, a gooey, squelchy, sticky mess of slime.

A huge bucket of custard was now poised above her head, ready to take away her last shred of dignity. Without a doubt the greatest sentence ever written in a WAM story. It isn’t clear who is holding the custard – Libby or one of her henchwomen – but this is irrelevant because the custard has become disembodied, taking on a life of its own. Maria, helpless and vulnerable, can sense this huge bucket there above her in all its awfulness. She waits for it to pour, knowing it will finish her. She desperately clutches at the possibility of reprieve that Libby cruelly dangles in front of her. Isolated in the face of the gleeful mob, her protests and threats sound pathetic and puny.

Most WAM fiction with a strong humiliation flavour falls into one of two subcatergories – “sympathetic” and “comuppence”. Stories of the sympathetic vein, such as CrippledLucifer’s untitled story, and Grimnim’s masterpieces Poor Poor Emily and Lucy and the Gunge, tug at the reader’s heartstrings, causing the reader to wince at the victim’s ordeal even while being turned on by it. Comeuppance stories, such as Sweet Revenge by an anonymous author, The Demise of Kristine by Michael and KMV, and the more extreme Messy Bondage Minxes by Fireball, invite the reader to revel, guilt-free, in a long overdue and richly deserved downfall. The interesting thing about TNG is that it doesn’t fall into either of these categories. While such violation of Maria’s person would of course be unacceptable and wrong were it to happen in real life, as a fantasy TNG is ambiguous and amoral. Perhaps this is because of the scantness of detail on Maria’s background, leaving the reader unable to make an informed decision on whether she deserves what comes to her. Perhaps it is because Vicky is able to simultaneously capture the perspective of Maria and that of Libby and the mob. Perhaps this is just what happens when an alpha female takes a dislike to a newcomer, and like some David Attenborough documentary, we are merely observers to the ways of nature.

Needless to say, the story ends with the alpha female basking in her reasserted power, and the vanquished latina scuttling away into the wilderness with her tail between her legs (or more accurately, her sullied panties sliding down them), never to be seen again at that school. ¡Adiós Maria!

Carol Dias, who previously rode through a car wash on the roof of a car to earn her Panicat stripes, takes part in a PoR tribute. The pies aren’t targeted at her face; this is Brazil, after all.

Disclaimer: This story is purely a work of fiction for personal enjoyment. The story does NOT describe real events and the characters are fictional. Any resemblance to real events or persons is coincidence.

In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

Note: Well it’s taken nearly a month to get this together and posted…  sorry about that.  Anyway, here is the finale of this little mini-series (fair warning, it’s also the longest installment).  I think I’m pleased with it; hopefully some of you will enjoy it too.

The Tour & The Crowning of the Queen

9AM

“Yes.  Really.  It honestly is my real name.  Got it right when I was born.  Crazy, right?”
What was really crazy was the number of times Summer Skye had experienced this exact conversation since moving to Odenville three years ago.  She handed the inquisitive volunteer her driver’s license as evidence.

Granted, Summer understood where some of the skepticism came from; when she arrived in Odenville, it had been to fill an open spot on the local news, doing weekend weather.  The coincidence still made her groan, but the decision was already paying off.  In just three short years, she’d moved all the way up to the anchor’s chair.  These days, she was the sort well-known personality that received invitations to take the official tour of the Fair.  Not that this was by any means the summit of her ambitions.  Summer had plenty of entry-level opportunities after finishing up her masters in broadcast journalism.  She chose Odenville specifically because the little local TV station served most of Fallfax County.  If anything remotely newsworthy were ever to take place anywhere in the entire region, Summer would be all over it, and she would get enough national visibility to give her career some real momentum.

So for now Summer was biding her time, tolerating the snail’s pace of the day-to-day news cycle and enthusiastically stomaching every quaint rural tradition.  The curious volunteer gave her back the license; finally convinced her name was authentic.   Before any more questions could come up, Summer stepped in.

“Oh by the way, think you could do me a tiny favor?  You see, I have to stay here, to meet the rest of the tour group…  But I’m going to pass out if I don’t get some coffee.  Think you might be able to find me a cup?  Black would be perfect.  Thanks so much!”

The volunteer walked away, happy to help.  Summer shook her head, in awe that anyone could be so cheerful so early.  Of course on a normal day she was up well before the sun, to do the morning news, but she was very rarely eager about it.

Never much one for sitting around waiting, Summer wandered through the rows and aisles of the Fair.  Though nothing was officially open yet, most every booth was about ready to go.  Workers and volunteers were yawning and chatting with one another.  The various carnival rides and the more involved games were going through the motions, testing for problems.   At one of the Fair’s several  petting-zoos, a young goat was stubbornly refusing to get off the roof of the small lean-to set up to give the animals some shade.

“Aw.  That’s too cute.”

Startled, Summer turned to face the woman who just spoke.  The voice’s owner was young and tall and upsettingly pretty.  She had long, light-brown hair and a few freckles spread across a pale face.   Her slender figure was sheathed in a long silvery-blue sundress.  It was a very nice dress, but woeful overkill for a day at the Fair…

The woman had materialized at her side silently; Summer tried to mask her surprise.  The woman in the dress picked up on it anyway, and apologized sweetly.

“Oh, I’m sorry!  I didn’t mean to scare you!  I just recognized you from TV, you’re Summer Skye.  I’m not sure where exactly we’re supposed to meet, so I thought I’d stick with you…  Sorry!”

Summer stared blankly.  The woman smiled sheepishly, pulling a couple items out of a plastic bag at her feet.

“I guess I should really put these on.  To be honest, I’m kind of embarrassed to wear them.  Of course it was such a huge honor to win!  But I just feel silly in them some times.  Sorry, I’m rambling like a maniac!”

Her identity dawned on Summer as the woman shrugged into a white silk sash and placed a silver tiara on her head.  She offered her hand to the newscaster.

“My name is Bonnie Wolcott.  But I guess I’m Miss Odenville while I’m here.”

Summer shook her hand daintily, stiffening a bit.  Suddenly she was extra self-conscious.  She didn’t know this year’s Miss Odenville was coming on the tour.  She had dressed intending to maintain her carefully cultivated image, stylish but classy.  If she had known about this little tart, she would have stepped up her game.

Absently she swept a hand over her dark brown hair; she’d straightened it, so it fell in a shiny wave to her shoulders.  Her jeans were good, tight and dark, and they worked with her short brown boots.  On top she was wearing a fashionably loose-fitting white blouse.  Had she known about Miss Odenville, she’d have gone with something that showed off her assets a little more.  Oh well, nothing to do about it now.

“Hi Bonnie, so nice to meet you!  I’m not entirely sure where we’re supposed to be meeting either, but I’m sure we’ll figure it out.  After all, you’ve seen Freddie’s coat… You could spot that awful thing at midnight in a thick fog.”

Once again, an unseen voice snuck up on Summer; this one was gruff but cheery.

“Well, well, well.  Thanks for giving it to me straight…”

Spinning around, she saw Freddie Milton, King of the Fair, standing there in his top hat and bright yellow dinner jacket.  Summer chose to lean into it, responding with exaggerated surprise.

“Oh!  Freddie!  Uh… how long have you been back there?”

“You know what they say missy, ‘Speak of the devil…’  But I’m glad you’re both here.  That completes our little group.  Talk amongst yourselves for a minute, I’ve got to go wrangle our documentarians…”

Two more women we standing a few feet behind Freddie.  As the King of the Fair sauntered off, they walked over and everyone shook hands.

Summer recognized one of them, mostly because she kind of thought of her as competition.  Vicki Pryce was probably the most popular radio personality in Odenville.  She hosted the afternoon block on WKAP, or KWAP, Summer could never remember which it was.  Vicki had a deep tan and a short stature, at least compared to the statuesque pair Summer and Bonnie cut.  She was slender in the waist but particularly large in the bust.  For the tour, she was wearing a black unbuttoned polo shirt displaying the radio station’s logo, and lurid red shorts.  Her hair, which was rather obviously dyed black, was pulled back and bumped up on the top of her head.  She seemed bleary-eyed and uncomfortable with the hour as she swapped introductions; at least her voice still sounded good.

The other woman was older than the rest of them, probably in her mid-thirties.  She wore glasses, an immaculately pressed button-down shirt, and sensible shoes.  Her hair was shoulder-length, dark-blonde and pin-straight, worn loose with bangs.  Summer had no clue who she was until she introduced herself as Alice Gardener, the new principal at Odenville High School.

Out of the four of them, both Summer and Vicki had been on the tour before, so they quickly explained to the other two.

“There’s really nothing to it.  We just walk around all day, seeing the sights and taking pictures.  Your feet get tired by the end, but we take plenty of breaks.  Honestly, the hardest part is trying not to eat too much fair food…”

Summer cut in.

“And at the end of the tour, one of us is crowned Queen of the Fair.  They take a vote or something.  It happens over in the big open field by the Ferris wheel.”

Bonnie scratched her head.

“You know, it’s weird, I grew up in Fallfax County.  I’ve been at almost every Fair.  I know they choose a Queen, but I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen them do it…”

Vicki laughed.

“Yeah.  Practically nobody pays any attention.  Some of the old folks like to watch.   Every year Freddie says he’s going to get everyone’s attention, but he hasn’t quite cracked that nut yet.”

“Wait,” Alice looked slightly distraught, “So the only reason we were invited on this tour was because we’re women?  I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

“Oh no, no!  It’s nothing like that.  Sometimes men come too.  Often as not, one of them get’s elected Queen.  Everybody thinks it’s hilarious.”

“Haha.  Except maybe Freddie.”

Once the King returned, with a variety of camera people, they all set off on their tour.
The first stop, just like last year, Summer’s first time, was at the Bake-Off tent.  Freddie sampled the snacks while the rest of them mingled with the County’s rich and powerful.

Summer was shocked when she saw Bonnie embrace Marcia Sands.  She may not have been in Odenville very long, but even Summer knew Mrs Sands was wildly influential.  After chatting for a bit, they split up, and Summer slid up beside Miss Odenville.

“Hey Bonnie, did I see you talking to Mrs Sands?  You two seem awfully friendly…”

Bonnie’s smile was glowing, and it irked Summer.

“I suppose we are.  See, she’s my mother’s cousin.  She’s a very nice lady, would you like me to introduce you?”

“Oh don’t worry about it!  We’ve met before.  I was just curious.  You’re awfully connected around here aren’t you?”

Bonnie just shrugged.

Summer couldn’t care less about getting to play Queen of the Fair.  However it was very important, both personally and in the interest of her professional future, that she be seen as helpful and an asset to the community.  And Bonnie’s friendly popularity was beginning to bother her.

So she grabbed one of the photographers and cajoled some of the competitive bakers together for a few pictures.  It wasn’t much, but hopefully someone would take note of her contribution.  They moved on shortly after that, on to the next set of booths and into the swelling crowds.  That was ok with Summer, because the smell of all those desserts was starting to get overwhelming.

2 PM

“Yeah, all day.  …  I know, but it’s great publicity.  …  That’s fine.  Either way I’ll be in tomorrow.”

Summer slipped her phone back into her pocket.  Beaming at the fair-goers standing nearby, she looked around for Freddie and the rest of the tour.

She heard a noise like a worn out bell and turned just in time to watch the mousey girl sitting in the dunk tank land in the water.  That had been another of Summer’s good deeds.  The girl running the booth had been a little camera-shy, so Summer had to convince her to get up there.  Looks like she turned out to be a good sport after all.

Summer grinned.  Dunk-tank girl had actually suggested putting Bonnie up for dunking…  As much as she would have loved that personally, there was no chance she was going to let Miss Odenville walk around the rest of the day looking like the winner of a wet t-shirt contest.  Besides, it’s not like she needed any help making friends.

Bonnie’s insistent popularity and affable charm were grating on Summer more than she liked to admit.  She pushed those thoughts from her mind.  She couldn’t do anything about it so her best bet was to stick close to Freddie and show up in as many pictures as possible.

But the King of the Fair was nowhere in sight.  He had dunked that mousey girl on his first try, and then vanished into the crowd.  Eager to post herself at his side, Summer set off in search of Freddie.

She spotted Alice, the new principal, talking to a couple selling homemade honey from a stall near the dunking booth.  And there was Vicki, taking pictures with a few of the uniformed police officers watching over the festivities.  And of course, Miss Odenville, who was pretending to swoon as a goofy looking clown presented her with a floppy artificial flower to the delight of some children.

However Freddie was still eluding her.  Summer continued along down the row of booths, marveling that she’d somehow managed to lose track of a man in an eye-wateringly yellow coat.  Her eyes darted back and forth, hunting for a sign of the vanished tour guide.

Finally, she glimpsed a flash of that unforgettable shade of yellow, through the gap between a ring-toss booth and a lemonade stand.  For some reason, Freddie was lurking behind the row of booths, in the alley reserved for the nuts and bolts of Fair business.

Instead of approaching him head on Summer crept up quietly, her journalistic curiosity piqued.  She stayed right at the corner of the lemonade stand, just out of sight, but close enough to hear the part of the clandestine conversation taking place.

“… and with any luck, they will have gotten the word out.”  This was Freddie’s voice. “And you’re sure it’s ready?”

“Yeah, I guess.  Can’t exactly test it, can we?  Not really.  Not how it’ll actually be.”  This voice was gravelly and mildly accented.

“True, true.  We’ll just have to cross our fingers then.  What about you guys, how’s it going?”

The reply was a third voice, deeper than the other two.

“Oh about perfectly I figure…  Considering what it is we’re trying to do.”

They went silent.  Before Summer could react the three men rounded the corner, having apparently finished their meeting.  In addition to Freddie, there was a skinny wrinkled man with a grey ponytail and a tool belt, as well as a thickly built man in a red t-shirt and a crew-cut.  Summer improvised surprise.

“Freddie!  There you are!  I was just looking for you.  Hello there!  Who are your friends?”

The skinny man grunted something and bustled past Summer brusquely.  The big man gave her a smile and a wave, but was equally forthcoming.  Freddie tugged on his mustache.  His eyes were shaded by his top-hat, so she couldn’t decide if he was suspicious of her spying.

“Summer!  These are a couple of old buddies, from my poker game.  Tonight is usually our night to play, but with the Fair and all…  Well we have to reschedule.  Now, where are the others?  We don’t want to fall behind now!”

Freddie Milton gripped her hand gently and led Summer off into the crowd.  She followed him, almost struggling to keep up with the King of the Fair, still completely in the dark but happy to be back near the center of attention.

 
7 PM

The sun was going down, and bright halogen flood-lights lit up the entire field.  She could hear the excited murmuring of at least a couple hundred people, all melding together into a gentle roar.  Summer gulped nervously.  She liked attention, maybe too much, but this was downright intimidating.  Summer, along with the rest of the tour group, stood on a low stage in the center of the field in the middle of the Fair.  There was an enormous crowd watching them from a short distance away; packed onto picnic blankets and folding chairs, some even just standing at the edges, craning for a view.  The photographers were snapping pictures furiously and the videographers were burning through card-space, recording everything.   Summer, as a member of the media, was comfortable speaking to crowds.  But this was different.  On TV, the only faces you can see are the ones in the studio, but here she could see so many of them…  And it’s not like she was about to read the news either.   So much had happened so fast, Summer wasn’t even sure what was about to happen.

It was just over an hour ago now, when Freddie had pulled the tour over, pausing in the parking lot to get a bit of privacy.  He was grinning from ear to ear as he explained his scheme to them.

“As you all know, every year the Fallfax County Fair crowns a Queen.  And every year, practically no one takes any notice.  Well this year that’s going to change!

“See, I’ve been working on this problem for a while, and I’m pretty sure I’ve got it solved.  Normally, we’d have the audience, miserably scrawny as it would no-doubt be, vote which of you wonderful ladies should be crowned Queen of the Fair.  This year, we’re going to do things a bit differently.  Now I won’t ruin the surprise of course, but I wanted to let you know that there will be a substantially larger audience this year.  Well I hope anyway…  I’ve certainly worked my tail off trying to promote this event.

“So!  I’m going to let you gals go for now.  If you want to freshen up or something.  Either way, we’ll meet back at the stage in Center Field in half an hour.  Just you wait, this is going to be great!”

Completely baffled, they all followed Freddie’s cryptic instructions.  After some time in the bathroom, trying to make it look like they didn’t spend the day marching through the Fair in the hot sun, they all reassembled.  Summer at least was shocked to see a handful of families already waiting for whatever mysterious event was going to take place.  It was rare that folks attended the crowing of the Queen; it was unheard of that they show up early.

And the crowd only grew.  So now Summer found herself standing on the stage, waiting for Freddie to explain what was happening.  Casually, she tried to glance at the other women up there with her, hoping to see they were equally nervous.   Alice certainly was; she looked timid and shaken.  Apparently being principal of a high school doesn’t prepare you for assemblies quiet so big and boisterous.  Vicki seemed comfortable enough, waving flirtatiously and chatting with Bonnie.  Miss Odenville, for her part, didn’t look particularly anxious, but she didn’t look especially happy either.  All this mysteriousness was starting to get tiresome.

Luckily, Freddie decided it was time to get started.  He stepped up to the front of the stage, producing a wireless microphone.  There were speakers under the stage, and apparently a few small ones up on some of the light-posts, because his voice echoed across the whole field.

“Alright, simmer down now!  We’re going to get the ball rolling!  First and foremost, I want to thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for coming out today to support the Fallfax County Fair!”

Pause for wild cheering.

“But let’s get down to business!  I stand before you, proudly, as the Honorary King of the Fair.  However!  We don’t have a Queen!”  Freddie pressed his palms to his head, making a comically distressed face, putting on a show for the children.

Eleven months out of the year, Freddie was the owner and manager of Milton Hardware, a friendly, hardworking member of the community.  But when the Fair arrives each year, he puts on his coat and hat and becomes the King of the Fair.  As much as he liked to entertain the kids and make their parents grin, playing the role also let respectable Mr Milton tap into his taste for mischief-making.  The thought made Summer smile, but it also made her wary of whatever he had up his marigold sleeves.

“Ah!  But wait!  I’ve got it!”  Freddie was ecstatic now, cavorting around with his finger in the air.

“We’ll have a competition!  We’re going to have these worthy women up here with me play a few games, to decide which of them is best suited to preside over our fair Fair!  The winner will be crowned Queen of the Fallfax County Fair!   How does that sound?”

Once again, the crowd cheered loudly.  Freddie turned toward the brand new competitors, suddenly sounding like a game show host, or a used car salesman.

“Well you heard them ladies!  Majority rules of course!  So let me explain how this will work.  The four of you will be playing three games.  Whoever performs the worst in each game will lose, and no longer be considered fit to be Queen.  And…”

Freddie trailed off.  He lowered the microphone and gave the audience a knowing look.

“… Well, let’s just say you don’t want to lose.”

Alarm bells were going off in Summer’s head, but Freddie didn’t give them a chance to protest.

“Alright, we’ve wasted enough time jabbering, let’s get started!”

He guided them down to the grassy area between the front row of the crowd and the edge of the stage.  Two women, in Fallfax County Fair Volunteer t-shirts appeared out of nowhere, carrying supplies.  Summer had the sinking sensation that this wasn’t some improvised stunt Freddie just thought up.

One of the volunteers was setting up cones at the end of the grassy stretch.  The other was handing Summer, Bonnie, Vicki, and Alice each a spoon and a large egg.

“Ok girls this one is easy.  Just a simple egg’n’spoon race.  You know it goes.  Put your egg in your spoon, and run as fast as you can down to those cones over there.  Round the bend, then head back here.  Last one to finish is our first loser!  Please line up right here.”

Summer was still nervous, but lately she’d been nervous in general.  This game didn’t worry her too much; she had always been the competitive type.  All four women took their places, balancing their eggs delicately.

“Go!”

Summer took off as fast as she could without risking the egg, maybe even faster.  There were a couple close calls as she shuffled quickly toward the cones, but she kept the spoon under control.  Then she saw Bonnie pass her on the left.  That was disturbing.  If anything, cute little Miss Odenville, in her pretty dress, should’ve been at a disadvantage…  But somehow, she was managing to be quite fast.  Focusing hard on keeping her arm still, Summer sped up.  They were neck and neck going around the cones, and they stayed that way until they passed the finish line.  To be honest, Summer had been to absorbed with keeping her egg in place to even notice who won the race.  Ultimately, it didn’t matter.  They both turned around to watch the others.

Alice, true to form, was running the race slow and steady.  She wasn’t setting any lap records, but her egg was steady as a rock.  Vicki was taking the opposite tack.  The busty radio personality would sprint haphazardly, until her egg would start to wobble perilously, then she would stop dead to let the fragile orb settle.   It seemed to be working too, as she was a good bit ahead of Alice.  During one of her pit stops, Vicki looked over her shoulder.

The new principal, probably spurred on by Freddie’s ominous warning, was speeding up.  Not that Vicki really had to worry, she had a big lead and could win just by inching home.  But instead she panicked.  Rather than just slowly winning the race, she took off with a sharp jerking motion.  While trying to dash across the line, she managed to fling her egg into the air.  The radio DJ swung her spoon crazily in a hail-Mary attempt to catch the egg.  Vicki managed to hit her egg hard with the edge of her spoon.  The shell cracked nearly in half, splattering stringy egg goo across her shirt.

“Uh oh!  That looks to me like an instant disqualification!  I’m sorry Ms Pryce, but that makes you our first loser!”

Even while Freddie was crowing and the crowd cheering, Alice shuffled slowly over the finish line, just to be safe.  Summer grinned.  Vicki stood in the middle of the racecourse, still holding her spoon, her arms sagging, wearing a pouty frown.  Freddie thrust the microphone at the woman from the radio station.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

“No…  Just take pity on me, ok?”

“We’ll see about that.  Alright, the rest of you ladies can just have a seat on the stage there while we deal with Ms Pryce.  Vicki dear, please have a seat right there.”

As they were talking, one of the volunteers had collected the cones, while the other had placed an empty plastic kiddy pool in front of the stage, and put a metal folding chair in the pool facing the crowd.  Vicki sat in the chair hesitantly.

“So, give it to me straight, what am I in for?”

The King of the Fair tugged on his mustache and waved, signaling someone off to the side.

“Well, Ms Pryce, we are going to make you an ice cream sundae.”

“Oh!  Great!  I mean really, I’d take dessert over some crown any day of the week!”  Vicki’s reply was upbeat and her tone pleasantly surprised.  Summer believed she honestly didn’t understand…

Two more girls in volunteer shirts appeared, each carrying a heavy paper bag.   Vicki saw them, but was still oblivious.

“Your kingship, could you make mine small?  I know I work in radio, but I still try to watch my figure…  It looks like you brought enough for everyone!”

Patting her gently on the shoulder, Freddie gave her a consoling glance.

“Dear me, I’m afraid we’ve suffered a bit of a miscommunication…  The sundae isn’t for you, it is you.”

“What!  No!  That’s crazy!  I’m sure we can work something out!”  Vicki was shifting in her seat, just itching to get up and run.

Removing his top hat and placing it over his heart, Freddie shook his head sagely.  He flashed the volunteers a thumbs-up.

“Unfortunately, our ice-cream has been sitting out for a while, so it’s a little melted…”

One of the volunteers tipped a plastic bucket over Vicki’s head from behind.  Runny strawberry ice-cream flowed out, spreading everywhere.  The pink goop covered her black hair, flattening the top, and running down her face and shoulders, standing out brightly against her bronzed skin.  She shrieked and practically jumped up as the first layer of sundae saturated her clothes.

“Ah it’s still so cold!”

One of the volunteers, who had copped a few flecks of ice-cream due to her flailing, took Vicki by the shoulders and forced her back onto the slippery chair.  They dumped the last still-frozen lumps from the bucket into her lap.

Vicki was making some small moaning noises.  She sat stiffly as the ice-cream dripped steadily from her body down to the kiddy pool.  She gave Freddie a plaintive look.

“Am I done?”

Freddie laughed, winking at the crowd.

“Ha!  Remind me to never have you make my sundae!  Just ice-cream?  You’ve got to be joking!  It’s time for the chocolate.”

Two of the volunteers, once again standing behind her, lifted large cans above her head and began to pour.  The chocolate sauce was thick, but poured smoothly.  They dumped the dark brown sauce everywhere, paying special attention to fill the front of her polo shirt.  Vicki shrieked again.  She held onto the bottom of the chair and leaned back and forth, trying to keep her pink head out of the chocolate deluge.  The volunteers just waited for her to stop moving, then emptied the balance of the cans over her head and face.

The crowd was laughing and the cameras preserving every moment.  Vicki was trying to simultaneously wipe the chocolate from her face and offer a cute pose to the nearest camera.  Oozing chocolate sauce drizzled off into the pool where it mixed with the strawberry puddle.  Vicki spread her arms and stuck out her tongue at the gleeful crowd.

Without waiting for Freddie’s say-so, all four volunteers began hosing Vicki down with cans of whipped cream.  In an instant she was coated in the white topping.  She was still flailing, trying to bat away the streams of cream, but it wasn’t doing much good.  Eventually she stopped struggling.  Crossing her arms, Vicki just closed her eyes and waited, while the giggling volunteers sprayed the all of the remaining whipped cream on the top of her sticky pink and brown head.   One of the girls, the one who had been splashed with a bit of ice-cream, grabbed the empty bucket and placed it over Vicki’s head, smushing the mountain of whipped cream down over her hair and face and shoulders.

Freddie walked over and placed a single maraschino cherry on top of the upside-down bucket.

“Now that’s a sundae!”

The crowd hooted and hollered.  Two of the volunteers helped the blind Vicki to her feet, and they all waved.

“Well Vicki you gave it a good try…  How about we get her hosed off, huh?  Ladies and gentlemen, let’s have a hand for Ms Pryce!  What a good sport!  And another, for our lovely volunteers!  They’re cheerleaders up at the college, so go support them at the next home game!”

While Vicki was making her way slowly off the field, Summer, still sitting on the edge of the stage, was more nervous than ever.  This was the sort of thing they doing?  The penalties for losing were awfully steep.  Steep enough that Summer was now fully dedicated to winning that crown.  Besides, she thought with grim resolve, she still really wanted to put Bonnie in her place…

“Ok then,” the King’s voice boomed from the speakers, “that’s one down, two to go!   Let’s get ready for the next game!”

Summer, Alice, and Bonnie came back down to the field, where the kiddy pool full of sundae runoff had been taken away.  At the moment, a man in a red shirt was sticking a piece of rebar into the ground several yards away.  Summer was pretty sure that he was one of the men Freddie had the secret meeting with, but she couldn’t be sure.

“Now we’re going to play horseshoes.  Simple enough right?”

Freddie handed each of them a horseshoe; they were blue, the heavy rubber kind designed with safety in mind.

“You all know the rules!  Everybody gets a toss; farthest from the stake is our next loser!  We’ll find a ruler if we need one, so don’t hold back!  Ms Skye, do us the honor of starting off!”

Summer stepped up.  She swung her arm a few times, making sure it was loose.  Having never thrown a horseshoe before in her life, much less in front of an audience, Summer was feeling anxious.  But now was no time for that.  She took a deep breath, and flung the shoe.

It sailed cleanly through the air, but landed short of the stake, on its side.  Except it didn’t stop.  The blue shoe tumbled along in an almost-straight line right toward the target.  When it stopped, it was leaning up against the stake.

The crowd cheered and Freddie clapped, so Summer assumed she’d done well.  Relief washed over her as Alice stepped up to toss.

The blonde principal looked even less familiar with horseshoes than Summer.  She adjusted her glasses and threw the shoe like a discus.  It landed flat, but it was still only about a foot from the stake.  Alice shrugged and stepped back.

Summer was elated.  Miss Odenville would have to do awfully well to avoid elimination.
Bonnie approached the pitching line, holding her shoe in one hand and the tails of her dress in the other.  She took aim, and threw the shoe.  Surprisingly enough, it went straight, but the throw looked way too high.  Summer gave Alice a grin.  Then the crowd exploded.

Her eyes darted back to the stake.  Bonnie’s horseshoe was spinning its way down the metal bar.  A ringer.  A perfect shot.  Summer sighed audibly.   Of course, it could always be worse…  Alice was eyeing Freddie suspiciously.

“Well done Ms Wolcott!  What a shot.  Let’s have our top two potential Queens take a seat on the stage.”  He turned his attention to Alice, wearing a wistful smile.

“I’m sorry to say, Principal Gardner, that you’ve lost our little competition…”

Alice tucked her hair behind her ears, leaning into the microphone.

“True.  But I tried my best.  Like I tell my students, as long as you try, you can always be proud.”  She was using very even, didactic tones.  Freddie nodded in agreement.

“Indeed, indeed.  Absolutely!  However, proud or not, I’m sure those students of yours who are here today will enjoy what comes next…”

Alice shrank back a bit.

“Nothing cold, okay?”

Smiling, Freddie waved to some volunteers waiting in the wings.  They wheeled out something big and square on a cart, it was covered by a sheet.  They set the covered parcel on the grass and moved away with the cart.

“Now Alice, we’re going to give you a challenge to complete.”

Another volunteer appeared, this one carrying a plate of chicken wings.

“Principal Gardner, you’re going to have to put all of these wings back on the plate…”

Alice waited, eyebrows raised.

“Ok… What’s the catch?”

“Oh there’s no pulling one over on you I see!  The catch is, you have to find the wings first…”

He pulled the sheet off the big box on the grass.  The box was a clear plastic bin, and it was full almost to the top with some dense, sharp-smelling, white substance.

“… And you can’t use your hands!”

Alice gave Freddie a withering stare.  It was the sort of skewering look free-spirited high school students dreaded.  The King of the Fair swallowed hard, but stuck to his guns.

“Now now ma’am, I don’t make the rules!”  Summer was fairly certain he did in fact make them.

“But don’t worry!  That in there is delicious blue cheese dressing, kindly donated by Willy’s Wing Hut!  You can’t eat chicken wings plain, now can you?”

Sniffing the tub of dressing, Alice held up a finger.

“Actually, I’m a vegetarian…  So I don’t eat chicken wings at all.  I’m afraid we’re going to have to do something else…”

The crowd let out a collective chorus of disappointed groans.

“Ooh, that is a problem, isn’t it?  Well don’t sweat, because I’ve got a solution!” Now he spoke to the crowd, “Hey, Willy?  Where’d you get to?  Remember that ‘Plan B’ we talked about?”

A gangly man in a stained apron pushed his way through the mob of curious spectators.  He handed Freddie a Styrofoam take-out box.  Willy nodded at Alice and slipped back into the crowd.

“Thanks Willy!  Here we go, Principal Gardener!”  He opened the box, revealing a handful of large celery sticks.

“Now we can accommodate your dietary predilections!”

The crowd cheered jubilantly, particularly the high school aged members, while Freddie began dropping the vegetable stalks in the tub of blue cheese dressing.  When he was satisfied that they were suitably spread out, he turned to Alice.

“So there are five celery sticks in there; you’re all finished as soon as the last one is on that plate…”

Alice sighed.  She took off her glasses and placed them on the stage.  Next she removed her crisp button-down.  Underneath she was wearing a dark-green tank-top, which revealed her trim figure.  There were a few teenage wolf-whistles from somewhere in the throng of onlookers.  Alice shot a chilly glare across the crowd before kneeling in front of the tub.

“You look very determined!  One last thing, then you can start whenever you want…  Technically, as an official representative of the Fallfax County Fair, I’m required to offer you these.”

The King of the Fair was offering her a pair of swimming goggles dangling from his fingertips.

“Nobody says you have to use them, but it’s up to you…”

Alice was twisting her hair in both hands, hoping to keep as much of it out of the dressing as possible.  She looked at the goggles for a moment.  Taking them, she swung them around once and flung them into the crowd.  Gripping the sides of the tub, she stuck her face in the white glop.

“What a trooper!”  The crowd didn’t need Freddie’s encouragement to keep cheering.

For all her bravado, Alice was doing a good job of keeping the majority of her face out of the blue cheese.  She skimmed along the surface, feeling for the celery.  She found the first two stalks quickly, as they hadn’t sunk in much.   Alice dropped the second onto the plate, pausing to take a deep breath before going back in.

The lumpy, pungent dressing was confined to an oval-shaped section in the middle of her face, and looked something like a shiny white mask that was dripping down her chest.  The front of her bangs was covered in blue cheese, but otherwise her hair-twisting strategy was working.  But now there weren’t any more pieces of celery close to the surface.

Using her left hand, Alice wiped most of the dressing off her face.  Getting a good hold on the edge of the tub, she gave into the chants from the audience, and plunged her entire head into the dressing.  Summer, watching from the stage, saw her back arch and her knees scramble for positioning as she dredged the gallons of dressing.  She stopped moving, and then pulled back out of the creamy muck.  Alice flung her slimy head back, clutching a celery stick in her teeth.  Her cheesy hair whipped up over her head, throwing a white stripe of splatter across part of the stage.

“That’s three!  Just two left!”  Freddie was speaking more to the crowd, as Alice’s ears were full of dressing anyway.

The high school principal spat the celery onto the plate and dove right back into the tub.  By now she was up off her knees, bent over and thrusting her head and shoulders into the thick dressing.  She rooted around aggressively on the bottom of the tub, to the point where condiment was slopping over the sides.  Soon she came up again, this time with a stalk pinned between her chin and her collarbone.  She dropped it on the plate and took a second to catch her breath.

Freddie started to ask her something, but was silenced with a creamy glare.

Alice pulled herself back up and dunked her head into the dressing once again, this time letting gravity do most of the work.  Dressing was beginning to splash around as her search for the last celery stick became more and more frantic.  Freddie and the volunteers stood back.  Her rear end was stuck in the air and she was scrounging in the blue cheese almost to her navel.  But still no luck.  She came back up for air and almost immediately went back in.

Off to the side, the King of the Fair was making a show of rummaging through his pockets.  Holding up a finger to quiet the crowd, he pulled the fifth and final celery stick out of his pocket.  If Alice hadn’t been underneath all that dressing, she would have known something was up purely from the volume of the laughter.  Even Summer, acutely aware that she had almost been in Alice’s shoes, couldn’t help but crack a smile.

Freddie let Alice slosh around in the dressing for a few more moments, waiting for the laughter to die down.  Then he crept over and gently laid the last piece of celery atop the rest on the plate.  Then he stepped back and used a long arm to tap Alice on the back.  She rose dripping from the tub and immediately flopped to the grass.  She ran a hand across her eyes and looked questioningly at Freddie.

“Congratulations Principal Gardner, you’re all done!”  The crowd started laughing again.

Alice slicked back her blue cheese-soaked blonde hair, bangs and all, and looked at the plate.  The clean green stick on top stuck out like a sore thumb.  Even from beneath a thick layer dressing, Summer knew the razor-sharp look Alice speared Freddie with trimmed years off his life expectancy.

One of the volunteers handed her a towel and her glasses.  As she began the long process of cleaning-up, Freddie tentatively held the microphone out to her.

“That was certainly no easy feat!  How do you feel having completed it?”

“Entirely disgusting.” Despite the toweling, her hair and face and shirt were still greasy and streaked with lumps of cheese.  “After this, I may have to go completely vegan…”

Chuckling, Freddie shrugged.

“Well Willy, we may not have found you a repeat customer, but on the bright side, I know you’ll have plenty of students coming in to shake your hand!”

Alice scowled at Freddie but it turned into a smile at the end.  She put on her glasses, wrapped the towel around her shoulders, and followed the volunteers off the field.

Suddenly, all eyes were back on Summer and Bonnie.  Both women knew that between the two of them, one would be the Queen of the Fair, and the other would suffer some mortifying forfeit.  It all came down to this final game.

“Alright, no time to spare!  Let’s get this thing finished up!  Ms Skye, Ms Walcott, please just stand right there, yes right on the stage.”

As they took their places, a volunteer handed each of them a microphone and Freddie explained the last game of the night.

“Now we’re going to have ourselves a trivia contest.  You’ll take turns getting questions; correct answers earn points.  Get it wrong, and your opponent get’s a crack at it.  First to three points will be our winner!  Got it?”

Summer nodded, smiling at the crowd.  This was kind of perfect.  She didn’t consider herself a genius or anything, but Summer knew she was awfully sharp.  Well well, Miss Odenville, I guess it’s time to see if there’s anything going on inside that pretty head, Summer thought.

Bonnie gave a thumbs-up and they began the contest.

“Here we go!  Ms Skye, you get the first question because we’re going alphabetically; Fair is fair folks!

“Oh and I should probably mention, the topic of our questions is, naturally, the Fallfax County region.”

The crowd applauded, but Summer’s confidence dropped a beat.  Shouldn’t be too much trouble, but still, she would have preferred current events…

“So, Summer, could you please name for us our state’s floral emblem?  We can call it the state flower, since we’re not in school.”

Oh.  A tough one, right off the bat.  Summer had no clue whatsoever.  Damn.  Think of something…  Roses.  Everybody loves roses.

“Is it a rose?”

“A rose, by any other name… would still be the wrong answer.  So sorry!  That means Ms Wolcott here gets a chance.  Bonnie?”

“I believe the state flower is the violet.”

Freddie tipped his hat in her direction.

“It sure is!  Correct!  That’s one point for the reigning Miss Odenville, and zero for our stalwart news anchor.  The next question is yours also.  Here it comes!

“What is the name of Odenville’s very own minor league baseball team?”

Phew.  Summer was glad she didn’t get that one.  She barely followed professional sports, how should she know anything about semi-pros?  Hopefully Bonnie would be just as clueless.

“They’re the Odenville Otters, of course!”

“Yes they are!  That’s point number two for you!

“Now Ms Skye, if you want to win this thing, you’d better get on it!  One more point for Bonnie and it’s over!  Here’s your question:

“The Fallfax County flag features several different colors.  However, one in particular covers the majority of the flag.  What is that color?”

Summer tried not to panic.  Obviously, here at the Fair of all places, there had to be dozens of county flags flying.  She strained her eyes, trying to spot a flag somewhere.  But it was no use; the sun was gone and the most of the nearby lights were pointed at the stage area.  She couldn’t see squat.

This was potentially very bad.  The worst part was that she knew she’d seen that flag earlier in the day… somewhere.  She just never actually took notice of it.  Wracking her brain, Summer did her best to try and look composed.  She smiled for the audience while she searched for any sort of answer.

The search was fruitless.  Everyone was waiting for her answer.  She couldn’t stall any longer.  Time to fess up.

“I have no clue.”

Freddie grimaced, a twinkle in his eye.

“Ooh, no luck then?  It is a tough question after all.  Bonnie, would you like a shot at it?”

“Sure!”  Bonnie tapped her nose.  “The main color of the Fallfax County flag…

“…is canary yellow.”

Summer was momentarily dumbstruck.  Freddie stood there with a giant grin, wearing his top hat, and his canary yellow dinner jacket…  She clapped her hands to her forehead and sank into a crouch.

“Don’t be too hard on yourself!  These sorts of things always seem easier after the fact!”

He turned to face the crowd, lifting one of Bonnie’s hands into the air.

“But that means that Miss Odenville herself is this year’s Queen of the Fair!”

When the cheering slowed down, Freddie helped Summer to her feet.

“We’ll present our Queen with her crown in a minute, but right now, we have to present this lovely journalist with her second place prize!”

Leading a despondent Summer by the hand, the King of the Fair walked off the stage, down to the grass beside it.  He directed her to sit in the same folding chair from earlier, although it had since been washed off.  Summer felt a cold sweat beading on her forehead; sitting in the spot light, in front of a huge crowd of fair-goers, waiting to receive some kind of nasty surprise, was not how she had intended to cap off her day at the Fair.

“I wasn’t joking about having a very special prize for our runner-up!  Honest!  We’ve actually be soliciting donations for it all day!  Boys, mind joining me on stage for a minute?”

Watching from her seat of shame, Summer recognized one of the men who appeared on the stage.  He was the big one in the red shirt from Freddie’s secret meeting.  One of them was, at least; they both looked very similar.  Between them they were lugging a very large plastic trash can.

“These two fine gentlemen are Odenville firefighters.  I gave them a very important job today.  They went around to each and every food vendor here asking for contributions.  And they collected them all in that big old can!”

One of the firemen spoke up.

“It smells pretty bad, all mixed up in there, but otherwise it was a piece of cake!”

“Actually, I think there’s a piece of cake in there somewhere…” the other added.

The firemen tilted the can forward, just a little, to show the crowd what was inside.  There were gasps, and shouts, and laughs, and a few too many cheers for Summer’s taste.  They tipped it back; Freddie held his microphone close, so the speakers broadcast the sound of the contents settling wetly.

“Now what on Earth are we going to do with that?  Hm?”  Freddie was addressing the crowd, but looking at Summer.

“Should we have her taste it?  Make her stand in the can for a while?  No…  We’ve got a better idea!”

Summer turned in her seat, because she could hear something happening behind her.  It was the other man from the secret meeting, the skinny, older one.  He was pulling some sort of tall wooden scaffolding with wheels on the bottom.

“Some of you out there may recognize Hank.  For those who don’t, he’s a co-worker of mine from Milton Hardware.  Hank has gone and crafted us a sort of ‘prize delivery machine.’  Let’s have a round of applause!”

Summer didn’t clap.  She was much too busy looking at the wooden monstrosity which had now stopped and was looming right behind her chair.  The machine was basically two sides of a ten-foot-tall frame, made of bolted-together 2-by-4s, surrounding some sort of pulley-driven device in the middle.

“I won’t go into detail about how this thing works, suffice to say it’s a marvel of simple ingenuity, rather let’s just let you fine people see it in action!”

If Summer had chosen that moment to protest, the excited cheering would have drowned her out completely, even if she used the microphone.

She watched, petrified, as the firemen placed the “donation can” on a platform at the bottom of the machine.  Hank strapped it in, and instructed the burly volunteers to pull on a rope hanging down from the top.  Slowly, the three men strained to reel in the rope, hauling the platform, and the brimming can, to the top of the scaffolding.  Finally there was a muted click, and the platform came to rest, perched at the top of the frame.

Freddie was suddenly standing beside her.  He took the microphone from her hands.  Reaching up, he removed a bright red cord from a hook in the frame.  Summer’s eyes followed the cord… all the way up to the part of the machine just below the platform.  She could no longer deny the reality of what the machine was designed to do, and what was about to happen.  But she could sure as hell dispute it.

“Wait, this is insane!  You can’t be serious!”

“Afraid so.”

She could see the can up there on the platform.  Maybe it was her imagination, but she thought she could smell it too.  It was too much to even think about.

“No way!  You can’t do this!  I have to sign a release form or something!”

Freddie pretended not to hear her.  He offered her the red ripcord.
“I feel bad about this, I really do!  But I’m afraid the only question left, is whether or not you want to pull the cord yourself.  Sure, it may make a mess, but at least it’ll be on your own terms…”

“Hardly!  If you think I’m going to pull that thing, you really are nuts!”

The King of the Fair held up his palms, turning away slightly.

“Ok, ok!  That’s fine too!  How about we have our new Queen do the honors?  Bonnie, would you mind coming down here for a minute?”

Summer’s eyes narrowed.  Well.  Screw it then.  Before Bonnie could even stand up, Summer snatched the red cord.

Freddie was already running away, but he still found time to comment.

“Terrific!  Trust me, it’s better this way!  Lookout!”  He pelted off up the stage nearly knocking over Hank in his rush to get out of the way.

All of the noise from the thrilled crowd faded into a dull roar.  Summer tugged gently on the cord, feeling the tension.  It was much, much too late to back out now.  The butterflies churning in her stomach were getting unbearable, and there was only one way to fix it.  She held on tightly and yanked hard on the red rope.

Something above her head shifted.  For some reason, she had to fight the urge to look straight up.  Squeezing her eyes shut, she clamped a hand over her nose.  She heard a sound like wood smacking wood, and then an incomprehensible amount of slop landed on her head.

All of her muscles clenched simultaneously, as though trying to offer as small a target as possible.  Not that it mattered.  The most surreal thing, about a situation that was already unbelievable, was the sheer variety of substances and foodstuffs falling all over her.  Some parts of the torrential slurry were lukewarm, while others felt half-frozen.  Most of the sludge was liquid-based, but there were some sodden solids mixed in too.

Although not much of this registered immediately with Summer; she was occupied with trying not to scream, lest some of the evil mess get in her mouth.  She was doing a good job too, until something that probably used to be a smoothie landed on the back of her neck.  Then all bets were off.

Summer screamed, for a second, until a mass of un-cooked corndog batter splattered across her face.  She twisted and flailed, squirming underneath the downpour, but the flow of muck raining down was too thick to stand up against.  At this point her clothes were saturated several times over and Summer was distinctly, hideously, aware that her blouse and boots were half-full of mystery slop.  Her eyes were still shut tightly, but she felt something large and wet land slap across her face.

The can was empty.  The gooey remains were dribbling down right on the top of her head, but the rest of the “second place prize” was spread across the grass, the chair, and, primarily, Summer.

She didn’t want to even open her eyes.  For starters that slimy thing which landed on her face was still there.  Secondly, she had no interest in seeing the carnage that was left of her reputation.  But she did release her nose because she realized she had been holding her breath.  The smell hit her all at once.  It was sweet and vinegary and sour and syrupy and spicy all at the same time.

She peeled off whatever was stuck to her face.  It was triangular and soft; she suspected it was a slice of pizza that had been soaking in something very sticky.  Clearing her eyes with the tips of her thumbs, she cracked them open, just a little.  The slush she was covered in contained a surprising number of bright colors.  Reds, yellows, greens, and even a few blues and purples.  There were too many unique textures to even begin to identify…

“Holy cow!  Wasn’t that something?  Let’s have a big round for Ms Summer Skye, our first runner-up and an exceptionally good sport!”

Freddie’s voice echoing over the speakers yanked Summer back into the moment.  She heard the sounds of eager applause, but even more so she could hear the sounds of raucous laughter at her expense.  It was going to be a nightmare to go into work on Monday.  That is, if she could ever get clean enough to go out in public again.

In one tiny sliver of silver lining, Freddie was already moving on, having Bonnie stand and wave to the crowd while her new crown was brought out.

She stood up, letting the pile of glop in her lap splash onto the grass.  Utterly covered in once-edible slops, Summer Skye curtsied sarcastically to the crowd, about half of whom were still snickering at her ruined appearance.  She spun around, her filthy hair smacking her in the shoulder, and, nearly slipping in the slimy grass, marched off the field alone.

11:50 PM

Summer was sitting by herself on a picnic table next to the parking lot.  Had she turned around to face the sea of tents and booths, she would have been able to watch the tail-end of the fireworks display going on over in the Center Field.  But she didn’t.  Still, she could hear the pops and sizzles in the sky above the Fair.  The only other sound was the quiet chirping of the crickets in the grass.

The table was just outside the yellow halo put off by the empty Fair booths, but the moon was bright and the night cloudless.  There was just enough silvery light to see.  Not that Summer had any desire to see her present state anyway.

She had hosed herself off several times already, but she still reeked of all sorts of festival foods.  Each time she took a hesitant sniff, she was assailed by a new odor.  Her blouse, which started the day white and fresh, was wet, and currently a grayish, reddish-brown, with patches of livelier colors.  She had eventually just taken off her frigid, cement-like jeans, preferring to wear a stolen tablecloth around her waist like a sarong; at least the tablecloth was dry.  She was barefoot too, because there was something squishy jammed in the toes of her boots, and she just didn’t have the energy to deal with it right now.  Her dark, soaking hair hung over the front of her right shoulder.  Despite three washes with dish-soap, it was still somehow both sticky and oily.

There was a crunching sound, like footsteps on gravel.  Summer didn’t bother to turn.  Freddie Milton appeared at her side.  Slowly and a bit clumsily, he sat himself next to her on the table.  His hat was missing and he was sipping something from a disposable plastic cup.  He seemed slightly drunk.

“Ms Summer!  I was hoping I might run into you…

“I…  I just wanted to apologize…  I fear our little contest game thing may have upset you.  That certainly wasn’t the intention…  Mostly I just wanted folks to come to the crowning…

“Uh.  We may have gone a bit… overboard, at the end there.”

Summer nodded slightly, but didn’t make eye contact or respond.  Freddie sighed, finishing off his drink.

“You know, you’re really great on TV…  Everyone says so.  This won’t change that one bit.   You gave it a great try, and it was all in good fun.  And, I know you’re disappointed now…  But just remember, we get a new Queen for each Fair.  There’s always next year!”

She turned to face the King with a weak smile.

“That’s all true.  You’re right.  Thanks Freddie, this little chat really means a lot to me.

“I feel way better now.  But I think I’m going to stay here for a little while.  You should get back to the party though, the Fair needs its King.”

Freddie stood up carefully.  He patted Summer on the back, then wiped his damp hand on his pants.  He smiled, and went to tip his hat.  Finding it absent, he snapped his fingers, turned, and strolled back towards the fireworks.

Just a couple minutes after Freddie left, Summer sensed someone nearby.  She turned and almost jumped out of her skin when she noticed Bonnie standing at the end of the table.

The twice-crowned Miss Odenville was holding a big gaudy gold tiara set with glass rubies.  Her elfin nose was involuntarily wrinkling against the lingering stink.  Bonnie launched into conversation immediately.

“Look, I didn’t know what they were going to do to you guys.  I feel so bad about how all of this went down.”

She thrust the crown toward Summer.

“I know it’s not the same…  And it doesn’t un-cover-you-in-gunk-in-front-of-half-the-town, but hopefully it helps…  Seriously, take it; I don’t like them anyway.”

Summer dismissed her offer with a wave.

“No way.  It’s all yours.  You earned it fair and square.  I’ve lived here for almost three years and I don’t know much about the town…  I probably deserved what I got.”

Bonnie swiped a finger behind Summer’s ear, coming away with a blob of nacho cheese sauce.  She held it up, with an incredulous expression on her pretty face.

“Well…  Maybe I didn’t quite deserve that.  But still, it doesn’t change the fact that you deserve to be Queen.”

Wiping her finger underneath the table, Bonnie looked at Summer quizzically.

“I heard you were out here sulking…  And I heard Freddie trying to cheer you up…”

Just then, a pair of headlights appeared, approaching from the darkness.  They belonged to a taxi which ground to a halt and idled near the picnic table.

Summer stood up.  She checked the knot in her make-shift sarong, causing her blouse to squelch.

“This is for me.”  She started walking toward the cab.

“I didn’t have the heart to tell Freddie this was the real reason I was sitting out here.  I absolutely reek.  There’s not a chance in hell I’m driving my car home smelling like this.  Besides…”

Halfway to the waiting cab she paused, looking at Bonnie over her shoulder.  The beautiful news anchor stood framed in the headlights; make-up-less, drenched to the bone, and still covered in flecks of miscellaneous junk food, dressed a blouse stained beyond recognition and pilfered table-linen, her mangled hair framing her still-blushing-face.

“…I’m never coming to another county fair ever again.”

This story is purely a work of fiction. It does NOT describe real events and the characters are fictional. Any resemblance to real events or persons is coincidence. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

Author’s Note: If you are one of those readers who think it’s essential for a girl to enjoy her WAM, then for pity’s sake, don’t read this. You have been warned.

Coulrophobia. A fear of Clowns. Ironically, it is no laughing matter. Well at least according to my fiancee, Sarah, who claims to suffer from it. Unfortunately, for everyone of her acquaintance who knows how she developed this fear, the whole matter is not taken the slightest bit seriously. It is, rather,  a cause for much hilarity and persistent teasing.

It all started during a family holiday to a place called Linbuts. A once prospering chain of British holiday camps that had now had it’s day. You could call it cheap and cheerful but in truth it wasn’t even cheap. There was some pretence at the holiday being ‘All Inclusive’ but in reality they charged you an arm an a leg for everything once you were in there.

Still, it appealed to families who wanted to keep their kids occupied whilst they got drunk and enjoyed the ‘end of the pier’ type of entertainment. With a preponderance of gaudy attractions and bawdy, seaside postcard type humour on offer, one could almost imagine one was living inside a ‘Carry On’ film or an episode of ‘The Benny Hill Show’ – if it weren’t for being surrounded by people talking on mobile phones and wearing the latest leisure gear.

I happened to be there with my fiancee and her family (that is, her brother, his wife and their two nephews). Sarah has a strange dynamic with them which is fascinating to observe. She’s very family oriented and spends a lot of time with them but she seems to put up with a great deal. She gets mercilessly teased about anything and everything. It’s all good natured and her family get at each other too, but Sarah doesn’t seem to have developed either the thick skin or the quick wit needed to function in that sort of environment. Even her little nephews easily run rings round her.

I don’t tend to join in but I can’t bring myself to blame them or leap to her defence either. There is just something massively pleasurable about watching Sarah squirm with embarrassment (f you’re already feeling sorry for the poor girl then it strikes me that you  perhaps shouldn’t read any further).

I should also mention that she is an absolute stunner. Blonde hair worn like a housewife from the 1950′s, blue eyes. Cantaloupe melon boobs, hourglass figure (which she worries about).  Sarah looks very much like the actress Margaret Nolan did when she used to be in all the ‘Carry On’ movies and was a Bond Girl in ‘Goldfinger’. Proper Dolly Bird material. Some would say she wears a little too much make-up or tries too hard in her ultra-feminine dresses, high heels and hosiery. But I find that her slight lack of self esteem just makes her all the more adorably cute. 

Anyway. It all began on the second day of the holiday. We were attending a somewhat cut-price ‘Circus’ in a large tent within the grounds of the camp. We had front row seats. Sarah was dressed immaculately in a white summer dress with a pink and yellow flower pattern. It was quite low cut, with thin shoulder straps. She wore white stockings and finished the outfit with pink high heeled shoes and pink belt.

The clown act came on. It was two guys named Slap and Stick respectively. Their costumes were relatively subdued as clowns go. Red Dr Marten Boots, Blue denim dungarees, white T-shirts, Black Bowler hats and, of course Red noses. The smear of white greasepaint around their lips seemed almost an afterthought. Blue plastic sheeting had been laid out on the floor. The conceit was that they were acting as cleaners – there to tidy up between acts, as evidenced by props such as mops, buckets and a vacuum cleaner. Less explicably, there was also a chair, a plank of wood and a trolley full of custard pies.

“Good afternoon, Ladies and Gentleman, Boys and Girls. I like this big tent! What do you think of this big tent, Stick?”

“It’s the biggest erection I’ve ever seen at LinButs!” exclaimed Stick. This sort of humour went down an absolute storm. Even the kids who didn’t understand it laughed purely because their Dad’s were busting a gut.

“You don’t call it that!” Screeched Slap in mock horror. “It’s called a Big Top!”

“No. That’s what I call a Big Top!” Shouted Stick, pointing straight at Sarah. Or, more accurately at her chest. Lots of cackling, masculine laughter at that remark too.

I suspected that this was their way of identifying a suitable stooge. If they had got a mouthful of back chat, they might have moved onto another victim. But Sarah’s cringing, submissive ‘don’t look at me’ demeanour must have tipped them off that they’d struck comedy gold at first attempt. 

“Don’t be so rude,” scolded Slap. “Although looking at this young lady does remind me that I need to buy some rubber balloons later on.”

“You need to buy some what?” asked Stick, putting his hand up to his ear as if he couldn’t hear.

“Rubber balloons!”

“Rub ‘er Balloons? Alright then!” Said Stick, licking his lips comically and leaning towards Sarah, arms outstretched and making a fiddling motion with his hands. Sarah flinched backwards in her seat, her chest wobbling all the more invitingly in the process.

“Pack that in!” admonished Slap, pulling Stick backwards by the straps of his dungarees. “We’ve got all this cleaning up to get on with.”

“Get her to help!” suggested Stick. “Girls are good at cleaning up.”

The audience seemed to love this idea as much as Sarah seemed to hate it, but Slap built the tension for a little longer.

“I don’t think so,” said Slap. The audience made a disappointed noise. The glimmer of relief on Sarah’s face was palpable, the spark of hope that these idiots were going to move on, get on with their stupid childish act and leave her alone.

“How can you be so sure that she’d be helpful? How do you know she’s even a girl?”

“Oh, there’s a couple of things I could mention,” said Stick, winking at the guffawing Dads and teenage boys in the crowd.

“I suppose she must be a girl,” agreed Slap. “She’s wearing more make up than both of us put together – and we’re Clowns! Shall we get her up here – Mum’s and Dad’s? Boys and Girls?”

Sarah gulped, mouthed a silent “NO!” and shook her head violently as the audience whooped for joy. I could see her digging her high heels into the floor, ready to brace herself for a struggle. But it was a forgone conclusion. Her two very disloyal giggling nephews pushed her from behind for added assistance as Slap and Stick grabbed one wrist each and hauled the protesting girl to her feet, leading her stumbling into the bright lights of the arena. The audience cheered and wolf whistled.

Once Sarah was facing the audience, she eventually gave a demure, resigned smile that seemed to acknowledge that everyone was here for a bit of harmless fun and that perhaps the most embarrassing option right now would possibly be to return to her seat in a huff and spoil the atmosphere for everyone. As insecure as she felt, the positive reaction of the audience was at least a little flattering. She gave a cute little shrug and an almost imperceptible curtsey that seemed to convey “I’m here now, so get on with it but please don’t do anything too unkind.”

“Thank you for helping us, young lady.” said Slap, taking her gently but firmly by the shoulders and turning her side on to the audience. Whilst he did this, Stick busied himself with a mop and bucket, whistling while he worked.

“Are you enjoying your holiday so far?” continued Slap. Sarah nodded submissively in agreement, though at this moment she wasn’t enjoying the prospect of joining this juvenile display of common denominator entertainment – not one little bit..

“Good,” replied Slap. “Now, perhaps you could do me a big favour and pick up this bucket in front of you?”

Sarah reluctantly obeyed, bending forward slightly to reach the bright red plastic container. The audience were in fits of hushed giggles as they could see the danger approaching. Stick was walking backwards, absent-mindedly mopping the floor. The handle of the mop pumping to and fro with the action of his arm. As Sarah bent forward, the upwards stabbing motion of the mop handle came into hard, fast, intimate contact with her backside.

She leapt up with a shriek of surprise and pain, her hands darting around to her injured bottom. This caused her to fumble the very full bucket of water, a good amount sloshing over the edge and soaking her feet as the audience roared.

“Stop with the Mop!” barked Slap. “You’re a menace. Why don’t you use the vacuum cleaner instead?”

“Good idea,” replied Stick, grabbing said appliance and switching it on whilst Sarah continued to whimper and rub her aching behind. The cleaner was clearly an oversized comedy prop and the loud noise it made came through the PA system rather than from the prop itself.

“It’s making a terrible whining noise,” said Slap.

“Well you would too if you’d just been poked in your big fat bottom!” laughed Stick.

“Not her! The Vacuum Cleaner!”

Just then, Stick managed to shove the nozzle right up Sarah’s dress. She gasped at the shock and indignity of it and pressed her hands down on the front of her dress, clamping her thighs and knocking her knees together to prevent any further intrusion. Over the PA came a bang and a loud spluttering noise, suggesting that the vacuum cleaner was now broken.

Stick removed the nozzle from out of Sarah’s dress and examined it.

“Something’s stuck!” he declared before inserting his fingers into the nozzle and then, with a flourish, pulling out the largest pair of bloomer style granny pants you’ve have seen. Cue massive laughter.

“They’re not mine!” snapped Sarah, in a triumph of vanity over wit. It was the first sign of real verbal protest from her but the obviousness of her statement just opened her to greater ridicule from the audience.

“Are you sure about that? Let’s take a look!” asked Stick, who had now walked behind her and grabbed the hem of Sarah’s dress. He hauled it up to waist height and managed to hold it there for a few seconds, showing off her white lycra knickers and white suspender belt, before she managed to wrestle the dress back down with a frantic wriggling of her hips and some fairly ineffectual slapping of her hands upon the clown’s. The audience reacted with delighted gasps at the cheekiness of it all.

“Good job she was actually wearing some, wasn’t it Mum’s and Dad’s?” said Stick gleefully.

There was lots of male laughter but there was plenty of female hilarity too. This seemed to be a mixture of jealous satisfaction at seeing this effortlessly attractive clothes horse being taken down a peg or two – and also just sheer relief that they themselves weren’t up there being treated like that.

“I do like your fancy underwear, young lady. Are you dressed like that because you’re appearing in a film later on with some seafood?” asked Slap.

Sarah looked very perplexed at this line of questioning. Her brain was still trying to process the fact that she had just had her dress lifted in front of hundreds of people. She could only manage to mumble meekly, “I’m sorry, what do you mean?”

“Well, you are dressed like a Prawn Star!”

“Talking of seafood,” interjected Stick, “With a figure like hers I bet she’s on the Seafood Diet. She see’s food – and she eats it!”

“Aww! Stop it, Stick! You’re embarrassing the poor girl. Look, boys and girls – her face has gone as red as a lobster’s bum!”

Slap led the audience in an”All together now, AAAWWWW!!!”, dripping with sarcasm rather than sympathy that only made Sarah feel a hundred times worse. It felt as if a school bully was giving her a dressing down not just in front of the class but in front of the entire school – with an approving Headmaster and faculty looking on in amusement. She felt trapped and powerless. She struggled to find words of protest or a witty reply but her mind stayed blank.

“This’ll cool her face down!” said Stick.

A large sloppy pie of the shaving cream and paper plate variety now plastered itself over Sarah’s face, filling her eyes, nose and mouth, cutting off any complaint that she might have been about to make.

“There,” said Slap. “You see completely the wrong way to deliver a custard pie: Hurried; no aim; no care. And Stick was blocking the view for some of you. Stick has a lot to learn about the art of clowning. Now, the correct way….” 

Slap picked up a foam laden paper plate as he spoke. Sarah was clearly oblivious to what was being said as she scraped the goo from her eyes and spat out a mouthful – just as a second pie landed and engulfed her pretty features in foam once more.

“……is to stand to one side so you can all see the pie landing!” Sarah coughed and spluttered as Slap continued with his speech, still holding the paper plate in place and beginning to rub it round and round. “Then slowly work the pie around the face, ensuring total coverage.”

Stick approached with a third pie. “and don’t be afraid to really put some effort in by around the third pie. She’s already covered in enough mess to cushion the blow so you can really let her have it.”

With that, Stick rammed home the third pie home as if he intended to take Sarah’s head clean off her shoulders, causing a muffled yelp and making her stumble a couple of steps backwards, creating a real explosion of foam around her head – great globs of it flying through the air and landing in several places on the blue plastic sheeting.

“And don’t just target the face,” advised Slap. “Introduce some pie-variety!”

With that, they each took a plate and slapped them onto the front of Sarah’s body with coordinated accuracy. Slap splatted her in the cleavage as Stick bought his plate around with quite a vicious swing to whack her in the crotch. She was now plastered in foam all down the front of her dress, as well as still stumbling blindly from the foam clogging every facial orifice.  Three paper plates were still stuck to her head at various angles. The audience were in heaven.

“Oh dear, you look like you need a sit down. Come with me,” said Slap as he manhandled the unsteady Sarah by the shoulders. Stick, meanwhile, was not only positioning the chair but had also placed onto it a foam pie of epic proportions. It was into this pie that Sarah was now forced to sit. To sit hard. Foam belched out from under her with the sudden impact, plopping to the floor with a wet splat. A good deal of it forced it’s way up between her thighs to form a pool in her lap, creating an unmistakable foamy bulge under the material of her dress.

Sarah’s look of utter dejection formed a large part of the comedy. Her now silently passive acceptance was so perfect. The audience must surely have believed her to be a great performer. There was as much Pathos here as anything in Euripides or Chaplin. But it was Pathos with Tits and Custard.

“Now, it’s not all about the pies, is it? Mum’s & Dads, Boys and Girls?” said Slap, teasingly, pressing his hands firmly down on Sarah’s shoulders to prevent any escape attempt.

“That’s right.” explained, Stick as he hefted one of the red buckets behind Sarah and lifted it above her head. “You can use all sorts of things you might find lying around.”

Stick tipped the bucket, allowing thick yellow custard to ooze out and plop onto Sarah’s head. It formed a slow moving mask over her hair and face before separating into two distinct sloppy paths, traveling down over her breasts, invading the inside of her dress as well as coating the outside, before forming a pool in her lap. Being the heavier substance, it slowly  pushed down on the sagging mountain of foam beneath it, causing lumps of it to slide down her stockinged legs and splat at her feet.

The sheen of the viscous custard under the stage lights seemed to throw the female stooge into pin sharp high definition. The way her eyelashes fluttered and her chin quivered was a transfixing sight to behold. I swear the audience actually went quiet for a few moments whilst we all watched the yellowing of Sarah.

The spell was broken by Slap berating Stick for his actions.

“No no no! How many times to I have to tell you? Custard first for Brunettes! She’s a Blonde, you should have gone with the black treacle!”

“Treacle for Blondie?”

“Yes. But you should have used it before the custard. The contrast with her hair would have looked better.”

They seemed to almost be breaking character at this point. But it was funny. The idea that they  would have these little arguments about the finer points of clowning.

“Oh well,” said Stick. “Better late than never!”

With that, he quickly up ended the bucket onto Sarah’s head. In contrast to the slow pouring of the custard, he actually letter the bucket go clattering straight down onto Sarah’s head, the edges of it bumping down atop her shoulders. It was a good call, as the treacle would have poured way to slowly and ruined the pace of their act. A sheet of dark molasses had only just started to appear below the lip of the bucket when Stick hauled the bucket back off of her engulfed head. The rapid removal of the vacuum around it gave the treacle the push that it needed. It now rolled down the front and back of Sarah’s seated form with a speedier, satisfying heaviness.

As he lifted it upwards, long strands of Sarah hair stayed attached to the bucket. Stick really had to yank it away.

“YEEOW! MY HAIR!” yelled Sarah. The first we had heard from her for a while. All we heard back from the crowd was loud, unsympathetic mirth at her distress.

“Oh, stop being such a cry baby!” admonished Stick, placing his hand on top of Sarah’s head, tousling Sarah’s hair in demeaning manner, his fingers becoming entwined and tangled in the matted black and yellow mess that had once been an immaculate and expensive coiffure.

Finally, Slap helped Sarah to stand and led her shuffling to centre stage.

“Well, well. What a…”

SPLASH! Slap had not yet finished his sentence when Stick let Sarah have it, full in the face with the contents of a third bucket.

“What are you doing?”

“You said ‘Water’.”

“No. I said ‘what a…’. You didn’t let me finish. I was saying ‘What a mess’.”

Sarah was indeed a mess. She stood there dripping wet and shivering whilst her tormentors bickered. The water had done very little to actually clean her but it had saturated her dress, making it cling to every possible curve of her delectable frame. Though her face was a little cleaner, it was streaked and smudged the total ruination of her mascara, foundation and lipstick, giving her a kind of makeshift clown mask. Her matted, tangled, destroyed hair was almost like a clown’s wig.

As wet lumps of whatever splatted to the floor around her, her expression was unreadable. Was she boiling with anger at all the things done to her? Was she trembling with fear at anything  yet to happen? Was she about to collapse out of sheer shame? Or was she just shivering her tits off from the freezing cold shower? Slap surveyed the drenched damsel up and down and declared,

“Oooo! She doesn’t look very happy, does she boys and girls?”

“She not happy? I’m not happy either!” protested Stick. “We’ve still got all this tidying up to do and she’s been no help at all! All she’s done is distract us! Well, I’m taking my plank and I’m off to look for someone who will help us!”

In a flounce, Stick picked up the the plank of wood from the floor and made as if to exit, stage left.

“Oi! Where do you think you’re going?” demanded his clowning partner.

Stick stopped and turned to answer him. The plank came spinning around and before Sarah could take any evasive action, one flat end of it smacked her hard in the face. She went over backwards as though she’d been hit by a bus. Despite being a genuine, unrehearsed tumble, it had all the comic appearance of a well practiced pratfall. Sarah’s dress rode up around her waist to give everybody a second glimpse of her underwear. The audience roared with laughter.

Slap helped the dazed girl to her feet and whispered to her as he did so.

“Are you alright?”

“Do ide dot. By fink by dose if brofen!” Sarah mumbled from behind cupped hands as she clutched her throbbing nose and forehead, her fingers becoming sticky with treacle as she did so. The fact that Slap got a verbal response at all must have been evidence enough that no  significant damage had occurred, so he gave Stick the cue to continue with the gag.

“Why don’t you be more careful!” he shouted to his fellow Clown, who was just preparing to walk off with the plank again.

“Are you talking to me?” Stick replied, turning to face him. Slap stood sharply away from Sarah as the plank came round a second time, cracking a still befuddled Sarah across the back of the head and catapulting her forward toward the front row. There were screeches of delight from some in the front row as they feared a messy collision with the saturated stooge. Though some guys were also clearly disappointed that my girl didn’t land in their laps. She managed to find her footing before taking another tumble and Slap had quickly grabbed her shoulders from behind and guided her a few steps backwards whilst Stick let his plank fall to the floor.

“Come on, let’s get this plank out of here,” he instructed.

This comment got a laugh, as it appeared to be directed as much at Sarah as at the inanimate lump of wood. The clowns antics were about to get a much bigger laugh though as Slap and Stick both grabbed the plank and hoisted it off the floor in one rapid movement.

Expertly, Slap had manoeuvred the wobbling Sarah so that she had unknowingly placed her feet astride of the plank – which came up fast, edge first, whacking hard into the juncture at the top of her thighs. A mewing sound escaped through Sarah’s gritted teeth as her cheeks puffed out, both hands shot down to clutch her wounded womanhood and she went cross-eyed. Her thighs involuntarily clamped together hard, holding the plank in place so that it would have been difficult for the clowns to extract it at that moment even if they wished to.

But they didn’t wish to. They milked the moment for all it’s comic potential, hoisting the plank just a little bit higher so that Sarah had to totter on tippy toe just to keep balance. Slap exhibited great timing as he waited for the roaring laughter to die down just enough so his next line could have the desired impact

“Idiot! You jabbed her in her Jellybaby!” he berated Stick with mock rage. The laughter hit the roof again.

“Excuse me!” protested Stick. “You’re the one who gave her Scrambled Eggs, not me!” The audience were in absolute hysterics at this risqué banter and the sight of a suspended stooge being utterly humiliated by such consummate professionals.

No further words were necessary as Slap and Stick portrayed with body language alone that they were both blaming each other for Sarah’s current predicament and were now locked in a battle of wills where neither would give up their end of the plank and both fundamentally disagreed on which direction to go. All the while, they acted as if Sarah were no longer there, tip toeing like a bewildered ballerina, struggling to keep the hem of her dress below stocking top level, whilst getting repeatedly mashed in the muffin, due to their incompetence and bickering. The crowd lapped it up.

This ordeal only lasted a matter of seconds, although it felt like an eternity to poor Sarah, before the ring master appeared, pushing a wheelbarrow full of whitewash or some type of flour and water paste. There was a delicious tension in the crowd as everyone could see how well positioned the barrow was behind the tottering Sarah.

“Come on you two!” he scolded the clowns. “We’ve got to get this place tidied up for the next act!”

And with that, Slap and Stick forgot their differences, shrugged and gave knowing nods to the audience.

“Shall we?”Asked Stick. His question was met with howls of approval.

“We can’t hear you, boys and girls.” said Slap, somewhat implausibly. “Shall we?”

Sarah still had a look on her face as if her brain was struggling to catch up with everything that was happening to her.  She genuinely didn’t have a clue what was about to occur.

The audience shouted “YES!” as resoundingly as possible whilst the clowns counted one; two; three – then lifted and twisted the plank in one deft motion, throwing Sarah’s legs high into the air and toppling her backwards to land with a squelchy thud right into the messy barrow.

A thick white cascade of slop erupted from either side of the deep barrow as the hapless victim went completely submerged, save for her lower legs. Her high heeled shoes kicked frantically and comically all the while as she struggled to haul herself into a sitting position. The ringmaster and the clowns used these few moments to walk round and stand behind the barrow – facing the audience and taking bows to signify the end of their act.

Sarah fingers emerged from the sticky morass and clamped to the edges of the barrow. Pulling herself up, finally her head appeared – an off-white mask of goop, discoloured a little by strands of treacle. She shook flecks of it from her hair, blew globs from her nostrils and spat rivulets from her lips. Sarah took a deep gasp of breath, clearly much needed – only to have Slap place the flat of his palm on the top of her head and firmly push her right back where she belonged – under several gallons of makeshift batter.

Sarah’s sticky head emerged again in quite obvious discomfort – which counted for nothing to the clowns or indeed the audience, as Stick took his turn to roughly shove the top of her head back down again and made a point of holding her there as the applause became truly thunderous. 

Sarah’s kicks and struggles were becoming frantic and I was starting to think about stepping in to intervene, when the ringmaster tipped up the handles of the barrow, spewing her out in a flood of sloppy paste. Sarah hit the floor with a wet thud and skidded across the lubricated plastic, coming to a halt just a few feet from the front row in an undignified tangle of limbs. She sat up, blinking and looking from side to side, sucking in great lungfuls of air as if she had just woken from a nightmare.

The audience were on their feet, clapping and cheering. The ring master called for a big hand for the spectacular performance of Slap and Stick, as they took numerous flourishing bows. The he said,

“And let’s hear it for the real Star of the Show – Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you – The Plank of Wood!”

The audience went insane with praise for the plank as the clowns held it proudly aloft. It struck me then that, through all this, the clowns hadn’t even bothered to ask Sarah her name. It didn’t matter to them. She really was just a prop. A suitable foil to prompt their corny lines and a means to extract the maximum laughter from a mixture of ages and genders. The final insult was that Sarah’s wonderful unscripted performance was being left deliberately unacknowledged.

Not that she seemed to be registering any of this at the moment. She was just concentrating all her energy on the task of getting to her feet and then staying on them long enough to make it back to her seat. With all the grace of a newborn calf, she finally made it.

I half expected some sort of ‘After Care’ – free tickets to somewhere; Vouchers for a clothing store to replace the ruined dress; a bunch of flowers; at the very least a towel.

But no. Sarah was being ignored. She just had to sit there with the sticky paste forming a crust under the harsh lights, bravely holding back her tears as the stage assistants quickly and efficiently did the real job of tidying up (primarily just by wrapping up everything in the blue plastic sheeting and dragging it off).

At least Sarah’s family and other random strangers sat around her were not ignoring her. They were teasing her mercilessly. Telling her how satisfying the spectacle of her humiliation had been to behold.

She wanted to leave. She had no interest in staying to watch the final act. But we wouldn’t play ball. Sarah didn’t have a room key on her and we all pretended that none of us knew which once of us had it. We all giggled whilst she pouted and fumed and said that she couldn’t believe her own family were treating her like this. She folded her arms across her chest in petulant protest at our collective mean-ness. But none of us ready to give her any respite just yet in case Slap and Stick intended to return before the end of the show and get any more mileage out of her. We just let her sit there and bake.

But nothing else happened. Slap and Stick came out to bow again with all the other performers at the end and we could all see Sarah trembling in her seat at the mere sight of them but the show ended with no further clowning. You could tell that a lot of people were disappointed by this.

The walk back to the apartments was torturous for Sarah. She faced the derision of various fellow audience members who were making the same journey. People were keen to get an up close look at star of the show. Some of their comments were quite kind like ‘great show’ and ‘you were fantastic’ but all of them were unwelcome as far as she was concerned. A lot of the children took to calling her ‘Big Top’ or ‘Fancy Knickers’ but Sarah did her best to ignore it and kept her nose firmly in the air as she walked.

Other holiday makers who had not witnessed the show just regarded her appearance with bemused mirth as she walked past.

Suddenly, there was the honk of an old style car horn from behind us. Both Sarah and I turned to see the two clowns riding a tandem bicycle along the path toward us.

With Slap at the handlebars and on pedalling duty, Stick was able to concentrate fully on the job in hand – which appeared to be the throwing of a pie into Sarah’s surprised face.

It was a proper pie this time, with a foil tin, a pastry base and a very thick topping like whipped cream or meringue. Unlike a shaving foam pie, it had sufficient weight to be used as an effective projectile. 

There was clearly no lack of clowning skills on the part of Stick, as he nailed his target from a moving vehicle at a distance of maybe ten feet away. Sarah’s face went from confused, to dawning horror to completely obliterated by whiplash inducing explosion of sloppy confectionary. Everyone nearby, including myself, automatically flinched away as shards of pastry, globs of purple fruit filling and splashes of cream took to the air. But there were no real victims of friendly fire here. 95 percent of the resulting mess stuck to Sarah’s face and slowing began sliding down the front of her dress, joining and replenishing the caked dry slop that already adorned her ruined outfit.

It was a magnificent display on the part of the clowns. They cycled on without a change of pace. No eye contact was made. No hint of celebration. It was as if Stick had merely put out his arm to make a traffic signal, not to throw a pie. The pure situationist weirdness of it was hilarious – for everyone except the pie victim, obviously.

They couldn’t be accused of wasting good food either. This kitchen reject was no longer fit for human consumption, that was for damn sure. Anyone with a functioning olfactory system could tell how rancid that cream was the moment it impacted.

Sarah wiped handfuls of foul smelling dessert from her eyes and flicked it violently at the ground with a frustrated growl through gritted teeth. She was using every ounce of self control not to burst into tears but she could not stop the intermittent, dry sobbing noises from escaping her quivering lips. 

But how we all laughed at poor Sarah’s comic misfortune. Her two nephews in particular were now so apoplectic with glee that they having trouble breathing. 

It appeared that the clowns had declared all out war on my hapless fiancée – and the week had only just begun.

Although this story mentions real persons, corporations, TV shows and places, it is purely a work of fiction for personal enjoyment. The story does NOT describe real events and should NOT be taken to accurately portray any real entity mentioned. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

“Welcome back, we’ve got the lovely ladies, Kelly Nerve and Emma Lodge. They first surfaced four years ago, where we saw a glimpse of what happened that one night at the guild of students. Since then they’ve been gunged in so many ways, I don’t know if they keep count anymore,” Emma shook her head to confirm Colin’s suspicions, “And they’ve even managed to bag a few celebrity gungings to boot. They both agreed to come on this show and answer a few questions. How you feeling girls?”

“Great, can’t wait to get started,” Emma replied, with Kelly nodding beside her.

“Well let us start at the very beginning. Can you describe your first experiences with gunge?”

Emma smiled. “Sure Colin. Back when I was 9, there had been one day where it’d rained so much that the field beside the playground was one giant mud bath. Me and a friend were playing, running around as children do, when I tripped in the mud. I don’t know why, but I vividly remember the mud being so soft on my skin, and it felt strangely amazing. It’s a feeling that stayed with me as I grew up.”

Kelly laughed gently. “I can’t remember a specific incident like Emma, I just remember various TV shows as a child. There was Live and Kicking, which brought in the gunge tank at one point, and I remember watching kids in the tank, and wanting to go on. Never got a chance like, but it did provide the first taste of what was to come.”

“So how did you guys meet then?”

“Well, in a number of coincidences you won’t believe are true,” Kelly said, “Emma and I grew up in the same village just outside Manchester, although we ended up going to two different schools. We did both end up at The University of Birmingham though, Emma studying Physics while I took English. We both joined the Fetish society there, and had plenty of fun there.”

Emma interrupted, “Actually, while we did join that society, we never really talked much to each other to start off with. However there was a Splosh meet in Brum that November. Of course, we both ended up going along with our boyfriends, and we found out that all four of us had grown up in the same area, with only Eddie being from a different village. That got us chatting, and before we knew it, we were organising club nights with my coursemate George.”

Colin looked at Emma. “And of course, that brings us on to the early days, when you were still University students, although I understand that by this point you knew of Peter’s wealth. What was it like in that first story, in what was to become two icons?”

Kelly laughed. “I’m not really sure how to answer that. To us, it was us revelling in our exhibitionist natures, getting gunged in public like that. It was fun as well, I mean after all, it’s hard to forget your first time.”

“Yeah, I see what you mean,” Colin said. “Alright, let’s talk about some of the gunge tanks you have at your mansion. There’s some that look familiar, and others less so. Talk us through where you got the ideas for some of the tanks.”

Emma spoke up. “Well most of our ideas come from copying others. Some come from TV shows, like the dunk tanks we have are modelled off one of our childhood shows, Get Your Own Back. Others come from stories we read, like the tank we’ve brought in today.  And some are simply ideas that have popped into our heads, although I sometimes don’t know what Kelly was thinking when she designed it.”

“Hey, you enjoyed that tank many times, even if we had to finally rip away the decorative statue.”

Colin looked directly at the camera. “If you don’t know which one that refers to, you simply don’t want to know.” Looking back at the girls, he continued. “Later on, you began to introduce celebrities into the stories, and you’ve managed to gunge some top names. Why did you open up what is in truth a very private thing to the public?”

Kelly pondered this. “Well Colin, it’s like this. It wasn’t so much that we just invited the celebrities in, more that The Voiceover Man got hold of some power, and all of a sudden, we had the ability to gunge celebrities. I think it started when we did that quiz show, what was it now?”

“Eddie vs. Peter, Kelly. That’s when we first heard The Voiceover Man. It didn’t bother us too much, we always love having other people to gunge, and most of them revel in the fun, especially since the few leaks of what happened look suspiciously like fiction, in a very obscure corner of the web.”

Colin nodded, understanding this corner well. “You mention The Voiceover Man, who as we have come to know, is also the author of the piece, PML. What’s your relationship like with your author?”

Kelly smirked. “Stranger than Fiction.”

Emma shook her head, slapped Kelly lightly, before saying, “You know, sometimes movie references are not the answer. To be honest, it’s a fun relationship. Sometimes you get the chance to peek ahead at the story, sometimes you even get to influence how the story will go. It’s a self-aware feeling, that you know you’re just a character in a story, while at the same time having fun being that character. And I suppose on the other hand, PML gets to ‘live’ some fantasies through us, like a room full of gunge tanks, or his favourite celeb getting gunged.”

Colin nodded. “Yes, I can see the advantages of that. Ok, we’ve got some questions for you from the Blog for you to answer. First up, Hugh asks, ‘If you could cross over into another WAM series, which would it be and why?’”

Emma looked up. “You know, we’ve already had our fair share of crossovers. We recently supported a friend of ours, Rachael, when she went on there with her Idol, Kelly Clarkson, and I’d just like to point out, my good friend here was not named after her, that’s just a happy coincidence.”

“Just like you weren’t named after the Hermione Granger. But yeah, we did have a crossover series all planned out, but someone glitched the only written copy of what happened. Nevermind that though. If I was to say somewhere I wanted to visit, I’d love to appear on Suzi’s Slop Drop. I bet that would be a right laugh.”

Emma laughed at that prospect. “Yeah, I agree, Suzi looks like she has so much fun, and we’d have so many tales to talk about.”

“Cool. Although since you mention Match and Mess, what was it like not being involved so much?”

Emma looked at Kelly. “Oh, we got involved, but we can’t really talk about that. The producers told us we need to let the story of what happened get posted before we can say owt.”

Kelly said, “Yeah, we’re just hoping the author hurries up, we really want everyone to know what happened.”

Colin looked to one side, then back to his guests. “I understand. Anyway, we have another question from a Mr. Freely. He asks ‘What are the chances of The Ramp being recommissioned for another series?’”

Kelly sighed. “The ramp, that’s one of our favourite series. We’d never say never, but I don’t think we’ll be doing another series anytime soon. There’s a few logistical issues behind the series, and after what happened on the last run, I’m not too sure that PML has it in him to organise another vote.”

Emma continued, “I think what it comes down to is the guests we get. Find the right people, and the show is a ratings wonder. Get the wrong mix, and one person has five gungings awaiting them. I’m not too sure whether we’ll be able to pick out the right mix of ladies again. I wouldn’t hold your breath on that one.”

Colin didn’t seem too happy. “What about the other shows you’ve done? How about bringing one of them back?”

Emma pondered this. “Well the Threshold does pop up from time to time, and works quite well, especially in some ways that it’s just a good old fashioned vote. It’d be quite simple to bring it back as well.”

Kelly agreed. “There’s also the A-Z series, that one was a bitch to complete, but the end result was quite wonderful. We had some real difficulties sorting that one. We couldn’t find anyone to match Q, X or Y. Of course, if someone had told us that Miranda Lawson in Mass Effect was played by Yvonne Strahovski, we would have booked her in a heartbeat, but someone was yet to play the game.”

Emma dismissively said, “Ah, don’t blame PML, he wasn’t to know. Actually we might look to bring it back, maybe even use the guest author capabilities further this time. We actually met Alyson backstage, who reminisced about her turn in the tank.”

Kelly then said, “We’d have to find a whole new set of people, but that’s fine, there’s plenty of fish in the sea. We also look to develop more shows, although we’ve nothing lined up at the moment.”

Colin pounced. “Ah but there is one show that everyone on the blog knows about. McPridz asks ‘Who would you both like to see win the Gunge Grand Prix?’”

Kelly outright laughed at that question. “You know, we actually help organise the GGP, so we really shouldn’t answer that question, it’d be showing too much bias.”

Colin shook his head. “You can’t away with it that easily. Who do you want to win the Gunge Grand Prix 2013?”

Kelly sighed. “Alright, since you won’t take ‘no comment’ as an answer, I’ll go for Taylor Swift.”

Emma looked at Kelly before answering, “If you choose her, I’ll go for Jenna Louise Coleman.”

Colin laughed, “So basically, you’re going down the fence between the two people who I can exclusively reveal are the two finalists?”

“Yep.”

“Ah, should’ve expected that. Alright, we now have another set of questions, and we have this message for you girls.”

On screen, Suzi of Slop Drop fame popped up with a couple of friends. Like the perennial hostess, Suzi professionally looked into the camera.

“Hey gals, Suzi Harrison here! I read this and showed a few friends. We’re wondering a few things.”

Suzi continued. “I’d like to know just what the hell that Alex bitch is up to these days.”

The tape paused, or at least, the girls stopped talking, almost as if they knew exactly how long to wait for the answer.

Emma giggled. “We were just talking about Suzi, fancy that. Anyway, Alexandre. Yes, she was a feisty one. A little dumb if you ask me, surely she realised once she was caught, she had no hope. You know you were actually supposed to get hold of her at some point to get your revenge, but I think we know what happened. When we were on the Ramp tour, we visited Wamdale University, and found Alexandre in a room with Emma Martin. Boy if we were having revenge, that’s nothing compared to Emma. I think she might be still there now, seeing as you’ve not seen sight of her. I almost pity Alex.”

The tape continued, with Nicki speaking. “I’m curious as to which real life gunge show you’d love to be on and why”

Kelly hummed. “I’m not too sure actually. Noel’s House Party might have been a laugh, but his jokes were just awful. Nick’s Slimetime might be fun, but that’s for kids, and I’m not too sure we’d fit. I don’t really know. Emma?”

Emma shrugged. “Get Your Own Back would be some experience if it felt like you were actually being humiliated. Actually remember when we had that Holo Room? We managed something along them lines back then. Actually now I think about it, there’s another story I’d love to be in.”

Colin smiled slightly. “Yeah, go on.”

“The Industrial Zone. That show makes even our exploits with a gunge tank look tame. We’ve even copied a few, but could you imagine going the whole show with that much gunge?”

Colin agreed. “That’s fair enough. Anyway, I think Becky has something to say.”

The tape continued, with Becky, the Kayotics Guitarist, spoke up. “I want to know who your dream celebrity gungee is and why.”

Kelly thought about it. “Hmm, difficult to say. It’s not like we haven’t gunged enough celebrities already. Heck, I’d say getting Mary Elizabeth Winstead, a.k.a. Ramona Flowers, was quite a coup for us.”

Emma said, “Actually, you know who we haven’t got yet? Justin Timberlake. For some reason he wouldn’t return our calls after someone squealed down the phone at him.”

“Yeah, but he cheated out of the GGP, Justin Bieber won that for some reason that’ll I’ll never know.”

“He didn’t cheat, and you know it. We checked those results thoroughly. Remember Beckham won the year before, so it might just be possible that Justin just wasn’t that popular.”

Colin looked confused. “So if Justin Timberlake is your dream gungee, why is it you only ever gunge women?”

Emma laughed. “Who says we only gunge women? The women stories are the only ones you see because that’s all the blog’s audience is interested in. I’ve got a feeling that the Voiceover Man only ever writes about women getting it, and ignores some of our other exploits. After all, I see what happened after our weddings hasn’t been posted, so it isn’t like PML shares everything.”

“So in other words, we’re a small part of the overall market. I get you, that’s fair enough. Alright, we have one more question from the blog. Tellygunge ask…”

Kelly exclaimed. “Wait, THE Tellygunge?! Wow, that guy is such a legend. We really hope to meet him one day, and that he finishes the Match and Mess Series.”

Colin laughed. “Yes, that Tellygunge. Nice of you to simply use this time we have to promote his stories. Anyway, he asks, ‘Kelly and Emma, who would you get your own back on?’”

Kelly smiled. “You know, I can’t really think of anyone I’d particularly want to get my own back on. I mean after all, I get to gunge a fair few people, so there’s no reason why I can’t just simply gunge the people I like.”

“Actually, I wouldn’t mind getting my own back on Eddie’s Mum.”

Kelly looked at Emma in shock. “Why’s that?”

Emma smirked. “She once said that you were prettier than I was, and her son had got lucky. I know she meant it as a joke, but wasn’t it that sort of thing the show was known for?”

Kelly laughed as she thought about it. “Actually I wouldn’t mind putting your mum up there, she insulted my apple strudel.”

Emma looked at her friend funny. “You bought it in a shop, and still managed to burn the thing.”

“Details, Details.”

Colin spoke up again. “Yes, well I’m sure we all dislike our in-laws, isn’t that right Mrs. McGrath?”

Kelly and Emma looked at each other nonplussed.

“Anyway ladies, that’s all we have time for. I know you’re sticking around for the finale, so we’ll meet up with you then. Please give a hand for Kelly and Emma.”

The two girls looked suitably embarrassed as the audience clapped.

-

The interview with the How I Met Your Mother cast was just winding down, when Colin turned his attention to the stage area.

“Now guys, I know you were watching the previous interview from the green room, and you know all about our other guests. Please welcome back Kelly and Emma.”

The audience clapped as the two ladies came out on stage, where they stood next to what looked like an ordinary gunge tank.

“Now we’ve actually had you guys up for a vote to see which one of you would be taking part in showing off one of Kelly and Emma’s tanks.” The cast didn’t look that surprised, especially Alyson, who had of course met the two girls beforehand. “I can tell you that Neil, you came third in the vote.”

Neil Patrick Harris, with some amusing initials, bounce as he smiled.

“In second place, we have Alyson.” The redhead smiled, although less enthusiastically as Neil.

“And I’ll just babble on for a few moments, because those watching the show already know the result, but you guys don’t yet. In first place, getting slimed today, is my fellow Canadian, Cobie Smulders.”

Cobie smiled, although her eyes were looking around the room in shock, almost questioning if this was real. She took Colin’s hand, and followed him over to the gunge tank, which Emma had opened up. Cobie stepped inside, turned slowly, before sitting on the inflatable chair. Kelly stood beside the lever and Colin.

“So Kelly, please explain what this tank is.”

“Certainly Colin. This is a tank based off a story called ‘The Industrial Zone’. It’s quite basic in what it does, simply being an over-the-top gunging, but it does have a 200 litre capacity, enough to fill 4 bath tubs.” The crowd oohed, and Cobie paled noticeably behind the glass. “Don’t worry though, we’ve only made it half full, still way more than your average gunging. This one sticks out because it’s one of the first major gunge tanks in the story, certainly the first used by the protagonist, and we did find a leaked version where she does more than just have a gunging.” Emma snickered, but Kelly glared her way. “Anyway, I think the best way to showcase it is to see it in action. Neil, since you topped the vote between the guys, how about you come here and pull the lever for us.”

Neil (seriously, NPH, anagram of NHP) came forward, and took the lever from Kelly, smiling. “Awesome. Hope you’re having fun in there Cobie, you know this is going to be legend – wait for it…” Neil pulled the lever, shouting “…dary!!” as a siren blared.

Red and yellow gunge fell rapidly onto Cobie, who screamed, ducking her head down as the slime splatter right over her head. The goo spread over Cobie’s black hair, across her shoulders and down her body. The inflatable chair was low down, so the gunge soon pooled up in her lap, while giving her legs a good coating. The two colours, as is their wont to do, mixed together as they splattered over the Canadian star, creating an orange mix covering Cobie. Soon enough though, the gunge flow stopped, and Cobie was left well covered in slime. She kept her head down for a moment, her head a smooth dome of gunge, before peeking through the curtains of her hair, pushing the gunge back behind her head. She gave a small smile to her laughing co-stars, but her expression soon turned to confusion and she looked up slightly.

A second wave of gunge launched itself upon Cobie, smacking her right on the forehead. Cobie’s reflexes were fast, but not fast enough to avoid taking a faceful of gunge. The slime seemed to be falling faster this time, and there was definitely a lot more of it, especially since the gunging lasted longer than the first wave. The gunge surrounded Cobie completely, even forming a pool at the bottom of the tank, which was slowly rising. Cobie by now was laughing at herself, self aware of the embarrassing situation she was in. The gunge rose to just past her knees, and Cobie was splashing at the pool as the gunge stopped flowing above her, not that it mattered, seeing as she was utterly covered in what had fallen on her.

Colin approached the tank, pressing on a intercom that Kelly was showing him. “Wow, that was some gunging. How’s it in there for you Cobie?”

Cobie gave Colin a dark look, before saying “Slimy.”

Colin laughed. “Well I don’t think I could have summed it better myself. And that’s all we have time for. Don’t miss the new season premiere of How I Met Your Mother, Monday at 8 on E4. Special thanks to our guests, Kelly and Emma.” The two ladies waved from beside the gunge tank. “And Josh, Jason, Neil, Alyson and especially Cobie.” The American stars waved, with Cobie giving a weak wave from inside the tank. “Join me again next time. Goodnight.”

This story is purely a work of fiction. It does NOT describe real events and the characters are fictional. Any resemblance to real events or persons is coincidence. In keeping with its fictional nature, the events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

Author’s Note: This is my second story here, hope you like it.  Also, I remembered to put in the disclaimer, yay.  Thanks to whichever admin added it to my last post.  Here we see Natalie, still feeling the sticky sensation of slime on her skin, having to relive her experience by seeing the fate befall another poor victim on live TV.

Her name was Juliet.  I remembered that much.  Her identity, her face, her greatest fears, they were all blazed into my memory by the television.  They were broadcast in HD, too, and I could see every bead of nervous sweat, feel every taut muscle contract in preparation for what was to come.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.  Actually, perhaps not so ahead of myself, but ahead of Juliet.  What happens to her had already happened to me.  That might be why I felt such sympathy.  As well as something else…

When I got home my hair was still damp and my skin still chilled beneath my clothes.
“Hey, Nat?” called a voice from the couch.  ”How was your swim?”

It had been more than a swim, but how could I ever express something like that?  Especially to a roommate, a girl I barely knew.  I knew her so little she still kept forgetting to call me Natalie; I hated my truncated nickname.  It made me sound like a buzzing insect.  But over the past month we had got on, at least, and she kept the place clean and tidy.  I don’t think I could have stood to have a messy roommate: I cannot abide mess.  Some of the other apartments in this shared townhouse were already loaded with greasy plates and sloppy pizza boxes, and the term had barely begun.  Keira cleared her dishes away after eating, even washed them at least once a day, and mercifully actually knew the schedule for the rubbish bins and made sure to have it out on time, when it was her turn.  Aside from setting up amicable rules and schedules we had not talked much these past few weeks, and it was unusual to see her lying on the couch on a Saturday night.  Being a drama student and a dancer, she was always either rehearsing lines with her theatre group or wearing something ridiculously short to a club.

“Fine,” I said, annoyed that my voice had wavered with that simple sentence.  If Keira noticed, she did not let on.  She lifted her long legs off the ratty couch and sat upright, leaving me a seat beside her.  In silence, I took it, feeling strangely self-conscious as my wet hair held coolly to my scalp.  It’s not as if we hadn’t seen one another dashing out the bathroom a dozen times already.  Why was it so different now?

“What are you watching?” I asked, as if I couldn’t just look at the screen and see.  Anything to break the awkward silence.

“Some dreck, I don’t even know the same of it,” she replied.  ”It’s one of those old Saturday night shows like when we were children.  Looks like STV are trying to go back to the 1990s.”

I looked at the screen.  It really did look like a show from my childhood – the bright colors, the elaborate yet useless set, the rows and rows of audience members pointed straight at the stage where a man in an awful purple suit held a microphone between two people I presumed were the contestants.  It kind of looked like a church, with the man in purple the preacher, and the contestants standing before the congregation.  One was a tall, broad shouldered male student who had a ruddy face, an irritating coiff and the toothy grin of a public school boy who only pretends to play rugby.  The other was a young lady made entirely of small, delicate features, with a pretty little nose and radiant red hair.  Both wore bog standard clothes – an open-collar shirt and jeans for the man, a black tank top and leggings for the woman.  Thanks to the HD screen, I could make out the name badges.  The boy was Quentin (I might have guessed!); the girl was Juliet.

“It’ll probably last two weeks and they’ll get rid of it and try again,” said Keira.  ”Don’t know why they bother, nobody’s watching on a Saturday anymore.”

Now I could hear the host, a man with a smooth head and lips like a lizard.  He grinned at the camera as he announced, “Now it’s time to face… your… fear!”  Like performing seals, the crowd chanted along with him.  Quentin beamed and played with his hair.  Juliet bit her lip and adjusted the strap of her top.

“What’s happening?” I asked, in spite of myself.  I didn’t want to talk.  I might wind up saying something silly.  But I knew that look.

“It’s like Fear Factor and X-Factor and Noel Edmond’s House Party all squished together.  They both do challenges and quizzes, the winner gets their dream to come true.  I guess that makes it a bit like Jim’ll Fix It Too, hopefully no one will get arrested.”

I shivered.  Probably because it was chilly in a student flat, and shower water from my thorough washing still beaded between my shirt and my skin.

“Yeah the host is a bit creepy too; pretends he’s the devil or something like that.  I can imagine the Daily Mail headlines now.”

I willed myself to smile.  Keira’s voice seemed strangely far away as I recollected the evening prior to this quiet little moment on the couch.  Maybe the mention of Noel Edmonds had brought it all flooding back.

“I’m sorry,” the host hissed.  He stood between the two contestants, a hand raised over the shoulder of each.  Time ticked along with the pulsing music in the studio.  The audience was hushed.  Tension hovered, unseen but not unobserved, in the dim light.

Then, he dropped a hand.  ”Quentin,” said the host, squeezing the man’s burly shoulder.  Quentin made an exaggerated face, the kind that says he’s disappointed but still going to be a super sport about it all.  ”Tell your girlfriend to get packing, because you’re going white water rafting on the Nile!!”

The lights came up, the crowd applauded, and Quentin hopped up and down on the spot.  As he pumped his fist in the air, his coiff flapped around on his head.  The host continued to grin, looking exceptionally pleased with his witty fake-out.

“And as for you,” he said, turning his eyes on Juliet.  The girl shrank back, her face flushed.

“What if you don’t win?” I found myself wondering aloud.

“Think 90s,” said Keira, rolling her eyes.  ”At the start they ask them what they fear most.  Dreams and nightmares.  I think that’s the name of it, actually.  I guess it’s a little more coherent than calling a program about winning washing machines and motorbikes ‘Takeaway’.”

Figures in dark robes and hoods, like ninjas, appeared to either side of Juliet and clamped her arms.  As they led her away, their swaying hips revealed they were likely women.  Why the ubiquitous eye candy was covered up, I had no idea.  I was too busy focusing on the face of the host.  That grin just kept getting bigger.  ”I think it’s time for you to face your fear.”

The TV cut to Juliet, now being plonked down on a seat.  A jolt ran through me.  There she was, perched on a little stool, surrounded by a perspex box.  The two ninjas closed the door with a flourish then disappeared into the mist rolling across the stage.  Lights flashed, thunder rolled, and then all grew dim save for a blisteringly bright spotlight aimed directly at Juliet.  In the glare, all eyes on her, her face bloomed a beet red.

“Oh god,” I whispered.  I hope it was quiet enough for Keira to miss.

“This is what you said you feared most,” called the host’s voice.  ”Three.”

“Two,” chorused the crowd, unseen in the darkness that entirely surrounded Juliet, leaving her adrift and alone.

“One!”  A siren wailed, Juliet clamped her hands to her face and in a second the pretty, sweet girl was lost beneath a deluge of smooth, glossy slime.  It ran over her face, caking her hair and swallowing her features.  It streaked down her shoulders, peeling down one strap of her tank top in its wake, and flooded her modest cleavage like a valley under a torrential storm.  Her black outfit turned to shiny swathes of color where the gunge stuck to her curves.  Juliet sat there, shoulders hunched against the cold, wet deluge, her lips and eyes squeezed together as if trying to defy reality by force of will.  But it was happening, and finally she relented, letting out a visible sigh as her head and shoulders relaxed and let the gunge come.

I realised I was leaning forward in my seat, almost toppling over.  I leaned back, slowly, tried to avoid drawing Keira’s gaze.  The TV was a vibrant splotch of running colours, and underneath it all sat Juliet, green eyes staring out from a shell of slop.  The smeared door popped open, revealing her in all her slimy glory.

The host held out his microphone, keeping his purple suit at a distance.  ”How do you feel?”

Juliet just stared, then squeezed her eyes shut.  Words failed her, and coated in cold she shook, her shoulders still tense.  In her mind, I was sure she was willing herself to just be swallowed up by the earth.

“Glad I’m not her,” said Keira.  She let out a light giggle.

“Me too,” I said.  Except I had been, less than an hour ago.  I had sat right there, pinned in a perspex box, watched by a hungry crowd, and sucked air into my lungs in that helpless second before it all came splashing down.  The whole team had watched, and my own cousin, as I was covered in gunk and stripped of dignity.  The memory rushed back, and with it a chill ran through my belly.

Keira lifted the remote.  ”Want to see what else is on?”

“Yes,” I said.  The show had already moved on.  Juliet, of course, had not.  She would still be sitting there, covered in gunk, her clothes stuck to her skin.  Slime would weigh her down as she stood up, shame would hold her head low.  As she walked away from the watching crowd, she would feel the coolness press against her with every step, feel the sludge seep into her underwear.  Everything she was wearing had been affected, every inch of her would have to be washed, and in a final indignity some anonymous stagehand would lead her to an unfamiliar shower where she would be expected to wash away the worst of it.  If she was lucky.  ”Please.”

Apologies for the very long delay in getting this next instalment out. I won’t be at all surprised if you’ve forgotten who all the characters are; I struggled to remember myself! Hope those of you with submitted characters are still interested in playing.

Disclaimer: Although this story mentions real persons and places, it is purely a work of fiction. The story does NOT describe real events and should NOT be taken to accurately portray any real entity mentioned. The events and activities described in the story may not be legal, ethical or safe. This site does NOT endorse or recommend their enactment.

“Welcome back to Match and Mess, where we’ve just concluded the first round!”, announced Mel. “Still in the running for a cool £10,000 are…

“Mei-Ling Cheng, the cosplaying prankster from Edinburgh, and her teammate Myleene Klass.

“Rachael Davies, the retail assistant and unruly dinner guest from Manchester, and her partner Kelly Clarkson.

“Abby Smith, pub assistant and maladroit football supporter from Preston, who is paired with Catherine Tyldesley.

“Caroline Stanley, the Bristol canoe instructor who thinks she is a cultural cut above her partner Emma Watson.

“Joanna Linden, the somewhat, ahem… excitable waitress from Taunton, who worships her teammate Pixie Lott.

“Kathryn Ni Chearnaigh, the Dublin model who harbours a near-pathological jealousy towards fellow team member Lauren Conrad.

“and Isobel Redden, the Glasgow student who partakes in amateur dramatics both onstage and backstage, and is paired with Karen Gillan.

“Unfortunately, we do have to say goodbye to naughty Brighton secretary Sally Edwards, along with her partner Tulisa Contostavlos.

“And now joining on them on the stage is Sally’s friend Julie!”

There was a welcoming round of applause directed towards Julie, who was perched on the edge of the pink sofa next to her messy friend. She was a tall, slender girl with dark chestnut hair styled with a swept fringe, and was dressed in a low-cut white top and skinny fit jeans.

“Hi there Julie”, smiled Mel. “I understand that although you and Sally are friends, this is the first time that you’ve met face to face.”

“That’s right”, nodded Julie. “We’re WA… er, gunge buddies on Twitter.”

“Twitter Gunge buddies?”, Mel raised an eyebrow dubiously. “What exactly does that kind of friendship entail?”

“Oh you know, starting campaigns in the Twittersphere to get each other gunged, giving each other messy dares…”

“Whatever keeps you entertained”, shrugged Mel. “Anyway, with that in mind, it sounds like the elimination ride could be right up at your street. So follow me, the three of you!”

Tulisa, Sally and Julie duly got up from their seats and followed Mel. If there had ever been doubt as to the location of the messy ride, it was soon dispelled as the four approached the imposing dumpster located at the rear of the stage. It was mounted onto a pair of rails that receded into the forboding murkiness of a tunnel. Suspended above the tracks en route was a giant agricultural-style hopper.

“It may be a shame to be eliminated first from the game”, remarked Mel, “but it’s certainly an honour to be the first passengers of our garbage disposal system.”

“You calling me garbage?!”, growled Tulisa.

“Only in the most affection sense possible”, Mel hastily assured her. “Now then, Sally, would you like to hazard a guess at what is in the hopper?”

“With the state I’m in, it doesn’t really matter”, Sally responded defiantly. She had a point; having received all six punishments during the round, she was already a complete mess. “So whatever it is, bring it on! Do your worst!”

“Be careful what you wish for”, smirked Mel. “You see, when we interviewed Jane to dish the dirt on you, we also asked her what your least liked food is. What do you think she said?”

Sally though a moment, and then her eyes widened in horror. “Oh my god, it’s curry, isn’t it?”

“Correct!”, grinned Mel. The scene flashed to Sally’s other accompanying friend, Jane, who was still seated up in the audience and now wore a guilty. “Last night”, Mel continued, “we went around the fine curry houses of Mossley and collected their surplus wares. Oh course, it’ll all be cold and congealed by now, but seeing as you like curry so much, that won’t bother you, eh Sal?”

Sally had her hand over her mouth in shock, speechless for the first time on the show. She hated curry, even when it is was fresh, warm and on a plate for the purposes of eating.

Chuckling, Mel turned to Julie. “Now this is the point where I would usually invite a friend or family member of the losing contestant to pull the lever to gunge them, but in your case, I can’t help wondering that you might prefer to join her. The choice is yours!”

Julie didn’t need long to deliberate. “Well Mel, you know I was jealous of Sally going on the show because of all the gunge she would get to play around in, so this opportunity is too good to miss. I’m joining her!”

There came a riotous cheer of approval from the audience.

“I was hoping you’d say that”, winked Mel. “There are only two seats though, so one of you will have to sit on the other’s lap. Tulisa, please take the other seat; your sentence… erm, forfeit has been handed down!”

The trio clambered into the dumpster. Sally invited Julie to sit down first, and then sat herself down on Julie’s lap. She was aware that this position would leave her exposed to the deluge to curry, but she had noticed a discreet hole in the centre of the seat. This indicated to her that a bum-squirter was installed, and she was keen to give Julie a taste of her own medicine. Sally chuckled quietly to herself, noting that her unwitting friend was seated with the squirter dead on centre. A grouchy Tulisa seated herself next to them. They were sat so that they faced outwards into the studio, and thus would be travelling backwards.

Meanwhile, Mel summoned Jane down from the audience as a replacement lever-puller. Jane approached the stage somewhat apprehensively, worried that she might also be roped into taking the right, but this fear was unfounded.

“Ok folks, let’s have a big count down, shall we?”, led Mel. “five, four…”

The audience joined in. “THREE! TWO! ONE! TAKE OUT THE TRASH!!”

Jane ripped down the lever, setting the dumpster into a trundling backward motion. Almost immediately, a barrage of poppadoms whirled in the from the sides like frisbees. Tulisa jumped at the initial surprise, but quickly sought to regain her cool. Seconds later, however, a squeal emanated from her lips as she leapt to her feet in an even bigger state of shock. A switch of camera soon revealed the reason; a jet of light-brown gloop was spraying upwards, splattering against the seat of her already sodden shorts. Sally had been right about the bum-squirter!

“You can’t have poppadoms without mango chutney!”, Mel explained with a wink.

While Tulisa squirmed on her feet, trying in vain to avoid the mango jet, Julie had no such option. Sally pressed down with all her weight, determined that her friend would not be moving anywhere. Julie’s face was a picture as she felt the full pressure of the sticky condiment through her jeans. The chutney escaped through any gap that it could, shooting out from between her legs or up her back. “How do you like the bum-squirter now!?”, Sally smugly asked her.

Julie was relieved and disappointed in equal measure when the bum-squirter’s reign of terror came to an end. A second later, the dumpster ground to a sudden halt, jolting Tulisa back into her seat. Casting a nervous glance upwards, the three saw the steel hopper poised directly above them in all its enormity. The slats opened and the contents began to pour out, at first a curtain-like trickle, rapidly crescending to a fully-feldged delulge. The faces of the women – a manic if cringing grin in the case of Julie, a screwed up look in disgust in the case of Sally, and a scandalised scowl in the case of Tulisa, promptly disappeared under a wall of curry. It was sandy-yellow in colour – presumably a korma – and interspersed with lumps of unidentified meat and veg.

As the audience hollered in excitement, the curry kept pouring, the pale yellow giving way to a darker brown – perhaps a dansak or a rogan josh. Eventually the deluge began to abate, until just the last few dregs were sliding out of the hopper. The contents of the hopper had been transferred to the dumpster, filling it up neatly to the brim. Amidst it all, up to their waists, were three mishapen browny-yellow figures. Initally, they were motionless, frozen in position with shock, and a fleeting lull in applause fell upon the studio, as the audience pondered whether this extreme gunging had gone horribly wrong. Fears were soon allayed when an unrecognisable Tulisa took to her feet and began swearing at all and sundry. Sally and Julie snapped into a spirited play fight. Indeed, although it was hard to tell what exactly was going on in all that mess, they may well have been doing more than just wrestling… Mel was relieved when the dumpster finally slunk out of sight, into the dark and dry-ice mist of the tunnel.

Back on the stage, the camera panned the ring of sofas to gauge the responses of the remaining players to what they had just witnessed. Mei-Ling, Rachael and Abby looked nervous but also rather excited and intrigued. Lauren, Caroline, and Isobel looked horrified, and Joanna had all but fainted. There was a similar range of reactions amongst the celebrities.

“I think this might have been a game sharpener!”, smiled Mel with approval. “Join us shortly for round two, when there’ll be more games and more goo!”

While the participants were herded off to the much-needed shower facilities, Mel trudged back to her emperor-sized dressing room where she collapsed wearily into a reclining leather armchair. She was promptly attended by a bevy of strapping young men, one of whom began to massage the tension from her shoulders, while another removed her shoes and commenced pampering her aching feet with lotion. A third fanned her with a giant palm branch, while a fourth served her a reviving cup of strong Northern tea.

“Bloody hell, and that was only the first round!”, she thought aloud.

“It gets easier from herein”, came a voice from behind that Mel recognised as belonging to Mike, the director. “You did a cracking job back there, Mel. Textbook!”

“There aren’t any textbooks written on what I’ve just been through”, Mel complained. “The guests are never this arsey on Let’s Do Lunch with Gino and Mel!”

“You don’t try to gunge the crap out of anyone on Let’s Do Lunch”, Mike chuckled, as he perched himself on the corner of her dressing table. “Although it would liven things up if you did.” Short and bearded, almost gnome-like, Mike possessed neither the handsome visage nor the muscular physique of the studs who presently fawned over the 42-year-old presenter, but he more than made for it with oodles of charm and a very persuasive manner (how else had he managed to get 8 big name celebs to agree to be obliterated with mess?).

“It’s a shame we had to get rid of that Brighton girl”, rued Mel. “She was one of the more stable ones. I get the feeling we’re going to have a fully-fledged catfight between Irish one and her celeb, and as for that silly girl from Zomerrrzehht… there’s no way she’s going to stay the course.”

“Fear not. Joanna’s father and I had a, ahem, supportive word with her – a bit of classic good cop, bad cop”, Mike assured Mel. “She’s agreed that she’ll accept whatever we choose to throw at her. Signed in triplicate, in fact.”

“Yeah, but I’m still going to have that sanctimonious Pixie Lott on my back every step of the way”, Mel grumbled. “She called me a bully, Mike! Me, the lovable Melanie Sykes, a bully!”

“Relax! We’re going to edit all that out. Nobody will ever know.”

“Apart from everyone in the studio audience”, Mel fretted. “It’s going to get leaked to the press, I know it! I’ve spent years cultivating the image of a cheery, chirpy, happy-go-lucky Northern lass, and now I’m in danger of having that hard work wrecked. I don’t want to be typecast as a domineering gungemistress!”

“Hmmm, I see your point”, Mike slowly nodded. “You do come across a touch… tyrannical.”

Mel nearly spat out her tea over the male concubine who was attending to her feet. “Tyrannical!? Me, Mel Sykes, a tyrant?! Tell me you don’t mean that, Mike, surely!”

Mike appeared not to be listening, but instead stared off into space and pensively stroked his beard. “Yes… it’s always a danger with these shows where starry-eyed contestants and well-loved celebrities get humiliated; the presenter often ends up becoming a hate figure…”

“A hate figure!?” Mel gasped.

“Noel Edmonds… Simon Cowell… Ant and Dec…”

“Nooooo!!” wailed Mel. “Is there anything I can do to avoid this fate? Tell me!!”

Mike pursed his lips. “Well… I guess you just need to offset your heavy-handedness with humility, your stridency with self-deprecation… you need to show that you can be a good sport as well as a big bad boss.”

“And how exactly do I do that?”

“Give your victims a little opportunity for some payback”, Mike ventured. “We’ll have a few spare minutes at the end of the show. Maybe we could wheel on a gunge tank or…”

Mel’s eyes widened. “You mean me getting… oh no, uh-uh! Oh no no no!” She wagged a finger at Mike sternly. “There’s a no-mess clause in my contract, remember?”

“How could I forget?”, Mike smirked. The no-mess clause was one of the non-negotiable terms that Mel had laid down on the table when signing up to present the show, along with the hunky ‘personal attendants’ and her own personal on-site gym. “I’m just saying it would be in your own interest to waive it.” Mike took out an official-looking document and a pen.

“So that’s what your game is!”, Mel scowled. “Trying to scare me into agreeing to get messy! You rat!”

“Just giving my advice…” Mike held up his hands.

“Well you can keep advice like that to yourself! I am not going to let you trick me into a gunging!”

Mike decided to push his luck. “How about a few pies?”

“NO!!”, snapped Mel. “No gunge, no pies, no nothing! Now get out of my dressing room! OUT!!” She picked up one of her black stilettos and drew it back, threatening to throw.

“Ok, ok, I’m leaving!” Mike didn’t want to test Mel’s conviction; he knew her aim would be good. “I’ll just the leave with the waiver here on the table. If you change your mind…”

“OUT!!” snarled Mel.

Mike scampered out of the room. Mel quaffed the dregs of her tea and ordered the server to fetch her another cup. Exhaling with frustration, she lay back and tried to relax as the young studs continued to massage her shoulders and feet. It’s ok, Mel, she told herself. No-one will think you’re a bully. There’s no need for drastic measures. But her eyes kept returning to the waiver on her dressing table.

This happened while I was away so I’m not sure if it has already been posted to the site somewhere. If anyone already put this on the Finds page, then apologies for my failing to credit you. Anyway, here it is.

We’ve come so far, and we’ve reached so high, and we’ve looked each gunge tank in the eye.

The final is now upon us, and your vote matters more than ever. In just over a week, the winner of this year’s GGP will be known, and will be ready to take their place in the Hot Seat, as depicted by one of you crazy people.

Now before we get into the whole final thing, I’ve got a bit of an announcement, one which I want to get out of the way before any real interesting stuff happens, and before I can change my mind again, and so I can waste some time before you see who the finalists are. After three years of doing the Gunge Grand Prix, I’ve decided I don’t fancy doing it anymore. Truthfully, it feels more chore than fun now, and I don’t really want to be spending my time on something that isn’t that much fun. I still enjoy the idea, and would love it if someone could take my place for next year, where I should still be around to help out, give advice, show some of the tricks that help run this many polls at once. But that’s for you to decide if you want to take part.

So, now that I’ve overshadowed the final with that bombshell, I shall proceed to reveal the finalist. If you read the Colin show earlier in the week, you’ll already know who they are, but I can now officially reveal that the final two.

First up, taking her place is Taylor Swift.

The singer-songwriter has prevailed to reach the final.

2011 record – Round 2 (Out to Katy Perry [on a tiebreak no less])
2012 record – Round 5 (Out to Hayden Panettierre)

1. Georgie Thompson
2. Helen Skelton
3. Susie Dent
4. Hayden Panettiere
5. Pixie Lott
6. Kelly Clarkson
7. QF. Kimberley Walsh
8. SF. Victoria Justice

And now she’s in the final. Will she break the actresses’ hold on the competition?

And her opponent will be Jenna Louise Coleman.

The Doctor’s companion has made it this far.

2011 record – Did Not Enter
2012 record – Round 3 (Out to Katherine Jenkins)

1. Sophie Dahl
2. Rachel Riley
3. Kaley Cuoco
4. Jennifer Aniston
5. Michelle Keegan
6. Selena Gomez
7. QF. Zooey Deschanel
8. SF. Jennifer Lawrence

This year she’s a finalist. Will she follow fellow Who companion Karen Gillan to victory?

And so we have our final for 2013. Voting will commence on Saturday 31st August, and will last all week. You have your usual one vote, and make it a good one. The winner will be announced next Saturday, and then the story writers can sharpen their pens typing skills, and make the hot seat work for them.

Taylor Swift vs. Jenna Louise Coleman

Good luck, the fourth is with you.