Into the Happy Valley

by Eric Dawson

Biff pushed himself up to standing. Somehow, emerging from the dark tunnel into this new place, he had stumbled and fallen and, as he looked around, he realized they had ended up in some sort of operations room. Before them rose a giant console, bejeweled with dozens of unlabeled buttons and levers and, above this same console, a curved window that looked out onto a green, grassy lawn below. Biff straightened his purple unitard and looked at Lydia and their two teenage sons, Nate and Howie, all present and accounted for.

“You guys okay?” He could see they were just fine, so did he really even need to ask? Good dad thing to do, he figured.

“So cool, look at this,” Howie said, running over to the console and immediately placing his meaty hand on one of the levers.

“Don’t touch anything,” Lydia said, face masked with worry and warning.

Nate, the smaller brother, grumbled. “We should probably check around for directions or something. Just to be safe.” Nate was the official family worrier. And cynic.

“This is all part of the experience,” Biff announced, trying to sound more confident than he felt.

“You think?” Nate asked, face looking like he had just sucked down an entire lemon.

“Of course,” Biff said, stepping over to the console next to Howie, whose eyes practically glowed with all the possible things he could push, pull, press, and turn. Outside the window, and below, was what appeared to be a private park enclosed by ivy-covered walls, in the center of which stood a fountain and a bench, with a forest behind.

Biff examined the forest closely: the trees actually looked like real trees, he thought. But, coming in from the parking lot, he hadn’t remembered a forest anywhere nearby at all. So, it had to be fake, didn’t it? And the building they were in, hadn’t it been a bowling alley at some point back in the early 80’s? He couldn’t remember but, regardless, the forest was good. Like, really good: even the leaves, he noticed, shimmered.

“We didn’t need the Gold Star Experience,” Lydia said, looking around as if checking for some sign explaining where they were. Biff thought about telling her that there wouldn’t be any plaques or signs but then thought better of it: she’d figure things out on her own. The Happy Valley Gold Star Experience, he understood, had been designed to test a person’s mettle, to reveal how customers responded to uncertainty and even fear. He’d read something about that, anyway, which was part of the reason he was so excited: he wanted his family to remember what sort of a man he actually was.

Lydia cleared her throat, and Biff braced himself for what he knew was coming: she hadn’t wanted to do the Friendly Valley Experience in the first place, what with all the “ethical uncertainties” she’d heard about, but they’d voted as a family, and that had been that. Even Nate, the bookish one, had been won over, but mostly so he could write about the experience, he’d said after the family vote. Probably for a college essay.

“I just don’t have a good feeling about any of this,” she said. “And besides, these unitards aren’t even a little flattering.”

Biff stared at his wife, not quite sure how to win her over. “Look,” he said after a few beats, “the Happy Valley Gold Star Experience involved no extra cost, and we’re among the first people in the world to experience it.” Did they even understand how big a deal that was?

Nate stared at his father from behind his shag of hair. “So, we’re guinea pigs?” he said, still sucking on the same lemon. “Did you even read the agreement contract?”

Biff was tired of the negativity, tired of all the questioning. He turned to Nate, standing there in the same purple uniform they’d all been given, and pointed a finger at his chest. “Can’t you just enjoy something for once in your life? I thought this could be a fun family experience, so why not just keep an open mind? Can you do that for me? This one time?” He was so angry he wanted to spit. Lydia crossed her arms, but then she turned to Nate, eyes letting him know she agreed with her youngest son. As usual.

Biff raised his voice: “Did any of you read the agreement? Or is it all on me once again? Dad doing all the work as usual.” He knew, as he spoke, that what he said wasn’t true. He barely did any of the work when it came to the family, and if he did, it was only because it was something he wanted to do, like now, with the Friendly Valley Experience. Still, he liked how the words sounded, and he’d learned that if he spoke forcefully enough, people didn’t usually question things too much.

Nate lowered his gaze. “I tried to read it, but they rushed us out too quickly.”

Biff reminded himself to be calm. He did need to get a handle on his temper, but what was he supposed to do?

“Look,” he said, speaking directly to Nate, “that’s just because they wanted us to get out here and try this new thing. Which is an honor, by the way.” He glanced around and noticed that even Howie didn’t seem entirely convinced. “Besides,” he added, “my friend Govind knows someone on the inside here who got us in. Do you know how long people wait for this experience?”

Lydia, Howie, and Nate all stared at Biff, each with the same blank expression.

“Months!” he shouted, wondering as he did why he was still shouting, then added, more calmly: “I trust Govind, so whoever he knows here has to be a good guy, too.” He felt himself still running at high throttle, so he looked out at the park, and the second he did, his face splintered into a half smile.

“There!” he said, pointing to the grassy space below. “People. A family. Just like us!”

Sure enough, in walked a family: a squat, balding father; a tall, pretty mother with skin the color of cinnamon; and a surly teenage girl, slinking around in the background, examining something on one of the trees. They also wore unitards, but yellow instead of purple. Howie knocked on the window glass. “Hey down there, what’re you doing?”

“Maybe they’re about to have their own experience,” Lydia said, making it sound more like a question, face still taut with worry.

“I don’t think they can hear us,” Nate said. “Probably can’t see us either.”

Howie knocked on the glass harder.

“Stop that,” Lydia said. “You’ll break something.”

“Maybe this will get their attention,” Howie said, and he slammed his hand down on a small red button. Immediately, a rainbow bloomed in the sky directly above the family in the park. Like, a real rainbow, Biff thought, though there was no way, was there? It had to be some CGI something. Or AI. Or whatever it was Hollywood was using these days.

“Hey, do you see that?” Howie said with a bark of a laugh. “A legit rainbow. From a button.” He pressed it again, and the rainbow disappeared, then again, and it reappeared. He did this twenty times in a row before Nate stepped closer, tapped his shoulder.

“Maybe cut it out,” Nate said. “I don’t think they like it very much. And I know I don’t.”

Biff looked down at the family below. Did they not like the rainbow? Maybe they were actors. And if they were real people who didn’t like rainbows, then what sort of ungrateful people could they be? Everybody liked rainbows.

At this point, Howie hit a purple, square button, and rain began to fall on the family: not a downpour, but a light, steady drizzle. The mother in the park turned her face up to the sky, as if seeking purification in the water.

“No fun,” Howie said. He hit the button again and the rain stopped.

Biff moved closer to the glass to get a better view of the family. Was the surly girl’s face actually surly, or was that some other emotion at play there? And the father now stood in front of the mother, arms out, as if to protect her, protect them all, but from what? The squat man’s head swiveled back and forth, like he was waiting for a predator to emerge at any moment.

Howie laughed another hard, brittle laugh. “They look scared,” he said. “Look at ’em.”

The mother, not paying attention to the father, dropped to her knees and began praying, but in their direction.

“Can they see us?” Howie asked, lowering his voice for the first time since they’d arrived.

“I don’t think so,” Biff said, noting that the mother’s gaze was a little askew, and the father kept looking up, but off to the left. The teenage daughter sat down, buried her face in her hands.

“It’s like we’re gods or something,” Howie said. “Let’s see if we can talk to them.” And at that, he turned a knob to the right, as if flipping on a car radio.

The ground below began to tremble.

“Let me see that,” Biff said, flicking his son’s hand away and grasping the knob, a knob that did, actually, vibrate. He turned it up to the halfway mark and the ground shook with even greater force, sloshing the water out of the pool and knocking the family off their feet. What would happen if he took it up all the way? He felt a shiver of excitement at the thought.

“Stop,” Lydia said, eyes fixed on the group below. “They’re terrified, can’t you see?”

His wife really did worry too much. Yes, the family did look scared, but the Friendly Valley Experience had only gotten rave reviews, and this was the Gold Star Package, so he knew everything was fine. Either the people below had paid for the experience and simply wanted to be scared or it meant they were bad people who needed to be punished. Hadn’t he heard about the Friendly Valley Experience being subsidized at least in part by the federal government for that very reason?

Maybe the family wasn’t a family at all but three disconnected hackers, con-artists, terrorists, or even murderers. At that, ground still trembling, Biff pressed down on a blue button the size of his hand, and everyone below covered their ears, faces contorting in pain as they did.

“I can’t hear a thing,” Howie said. “What’s going on?”

“What’s going on,” Nate said, “is that we’ve got soundproof glass between us. Weren’t you paying attention before? Still,” he said, looking down at the group, “it seems like they’re experiencing some sort of acoustic weapon. I’ve read those things can rupture a person’s eardrum.” He turned to his father. “Maybe you’ll want to turn it off?”

Biff squinted his eyes at the family below, watching as the mother twisted and turned her body. That was acting, he thought. No way would someone respond to sound like that, even if actually in pain; hell, it almost looked like she was dancing. But a bad dancer, he thought with a snicker that he kept to himself.

“Maybe it’s just really loud rock music,” Howie offered, watching now as the father fell to his knees. Biff studied the man’s face: the scraggly beard, the beady eyes. Hadn’t he seen that face before, perhaps on a news broadcast? Maybe the supermarket shooter from, where was it, Ohio?

Biff leaned forward: yes, he had seen that man before, and definitely for being associated with something bad that had happened. Who the others were, he didn’t know, but they were probably just as questionable. Biff pressed down on a square black button, and all three leapt into the air then immediately began running around, returning to clutch-huddle together by the half-empty fountain, quivering.

Lydia stepped closer to the window. “It looks like the ground’s electrified, like they’re being hurt. I don’t like this. I don’t care if they’re actors or not. I don’t like any of this.”

“Definitely paid actors,” Howie said.

The teenage girl, red hair pulled back into a ponytail, fell into a crouching position on the ground, then she lifted up her hands, as if beseeching the sky; her palms were black, like they’d been charred.

“Special effects,” Howie said. “But it doesn’t matter. I still feel like I’m the master of the universe. Let’s see what all these other buttons can do. What if we pressed them all at once?” He had a gleam in his eye as he pronounced the words.

Lydia placed her hand on Howie’s arm, shifted her body to block him. “I don’t feel comfortable with any of this. We need to go. Now.”

At that moment, a small door behind them slid open. Through the doorway, they could see a narrow hallway, and at the end, a sign that flickered the words, “Thanks for trying. Exit this way.”

“No,” Biff said, face dipping into a scowl, “we stay.” And at that, the door closed.

Energized by his father, Howie spoke up: “I agree with Dad: we stay. This is a competition, and that was the hallway for losers. Don’t you and Mom see?” he said with a sneer towards Nate.

“Even if true, you still don’t know what the competition is, moron,” Nate said.

“What’s that?” Howie shouted, leaping over to Nate and pushing him as he did. Howie was a year older and at least thirty pounds heavier. He played rugby and football while Nate read, mostly either philosophy or sci-fi and fantasy.

Nate looked at Howie square in his square face and clenched his teeth and repeated himself: “I said, ‘You don’t even know what the competition is, moron.’”

Howie pushed his brother, and their father stepped between the two.

“We’ll figure it out,” Howie said with a snarl, then turned and slapped three more buttons on the console behind him. The second he did, the lights went out, and when they flickered back on only a few seconds later, the father lay on the floor with an arrow in his side, and his wife and daughter were swatting at something in the air, frantic with fear. Nate looked, and as the welts on their faces began to form, he realized what they were swatting: wasps. Dozens of them. The girl began to cry.

“She’s not even a good actor,” Biff said. “See?”

“Yeah, I could do better than that,” Howie said.

“I’m done with this,” Lydia said.

“But they’re acting! Just look at them!” Biff said. “This is all part of the test. To see how we respond.”

Nate gazed down at the family in their sad yellow unitards. A pool of blood had begun to form under the father’s back, right where the arrow appeared to have gone through. His eyes had gone glassy, and his mouth gasped for air. The mother and daughter, now covered with red welts, held each other and cried. The mother reached out and put her hand on her husband’s forehead.

Lydia stared at Biff. “Do you really think that’s all acting? Is that what you really think?”

Did he? Biff wasn’t sure. Those welts did look pretty real. As did the blood. But still. He had seen that father on the news somewhere. He was almost certain.

“You coming with us?” Lydia said. Nate stood by her side. There had always been an unspoken bond between the two of them, Biff thought, with their stupid nature walks and books. So soft, he thought: both of them. And why couldn’t they all just have a little fun? He’d paid a lot of money for the experience, so no way were they just going to walk out. But then he saw Lydia’s face, and he knew that face, knew when she wouldn’t budge, either.

“Fine,” Biff said. “You and Nate can leave. But Howie and I stay. We’ll just meet you at the gift shop after.”

Howie did a quick arm thrust for victory, nodded goodbye to his mother and brother, and returned to the console, rubbing hands in glorious anticipation as he considered which button he wanted to press next.

“We’d like to leave,” Lydia announced in a clear, stentorian voice, and the same door as before opened.

“Not sharing the prize with you, bro,” Howie shouted back.

“I’m sure I wouldn’t want it,” Nate answered, and he and his mother turned to go, not even glancing back as they did. The door closed silently behind them.

“With those two gone,” Biff said, “now we can really take this thing for a spin. Right, son?”

“Heck yeah,” Howie answered. He loved it when his dad referred to him as “son.” It made him feel as if he were the only one.

A half hour later, Biff and Howie, father and son, stood panting at a new door that had just opened, delirious as they were with their newfound power and brutality and gore. What spectacular fun! Even though the family deserved whatever they got, Biff was still pretty sure the blood was special-effects blood. As were the broken bones. And the shards of glass? There’s no way real glass would have shattered like that.

But now, with the door open, the two looked down the corridor and saw another door, over which were emblazoned three simple words: “Hallway of Winners.”

Howie ran ahead and Biff caught up. They opened the door together and stepped into what looked like a beautiful, perfectly manicured park.

“Hey, Dad, a rainbow,” Howie said, pointing with a smile as rapturous as it was empty. Biff stopped, stared up at the sky, and felt his mouth go dry. “Oh God,” he said, “please, no.”