The informant was told this story by a friend who had heard it from a friend as well. The informant was told this story as a warning since she was about to go to the amusement park in question with her parents. This particular amusement park had a haunted house on the premises. The story scared the informant greatly and she remembers trying to convince her parents to visit another amusement park to avoid the risk of the haunted house.

Informant: If you go into this house, it’s really haunted. There are people with missing arms laying around, ghosts and mirrors that would mess with you and if you walked into them, you’d be absorbed into them and never leave. People would go in there and never come back. One time this girl visited and was too curious and got stuck in the house. She opened a door and got absorbed in and became a ghost. But she released an evil spirit that took the form of a human and now walks the grounds. And if you go to this amusement park, this figure will go around and hunt on little girls that are with their parents.

Collector: Was this story associated with one particular amusement park or did you hear this story in relation to going to amusement parks in general?

Informant: It was an amusement park in Orlando, Florida that has a haunted house. I can’t remember which.

Collector: Did you feel safer because your parents were with you?

Informant: No, I did not feel safer with my parents. I did not allow my father to take me to the amusement park.

The story shows the very common fear/threat element that many horror folk stories contain. However, in many stories, the monster attacks when the child is alone or vulnerable. The threat element is heightened in this story by clarifying that little girls with their parents are the ones attacked as it takes away the comfort many kids hold on to of being safe when with adults.

Children’s desire to share these horror stories doesn’t seem to stem from a place of concern or warning, but rather purposeful spreading of fear. This horror story, like many others, does not contain a solution or a way of protecting oneself. Its entire purpose is scaring other children who are likely to be victims of the monster in question.