The carnival rolls in sometime after the midnight hour of a chill Midwestern October eve. Ushering in Halloween a week before its time, a calliope's shrill siren song beckons to all with a seductive promise of dreams and youth regained. Young boyhood companions James Nightshade and Will Halloway are the first to heed its call. From a place of safety, they watch a midway come to spectral life, their emotions a riot of eagerness, trepidation, bravado,...

Born into a world with only seven days to live, Sim faces the same choice everyone does: how will he spend them? Is there something greater to hope for? A short story from Guys Read: Other Worlds, edited by Jon Scieszka.