Lost in the Funhouse

Lost in the Funhouse Summary | Detailed Summary

Lost in the Funhouse is but one of a collection of works that, in the author's own words, are "experimental". It tells, through disjointed, baffling prose, the story of Ambrose, a boy in his early teens - thirteen, in fact, and on the cusp on puberty - and his family who go to Ocean City for a holiday. Three times a year the family makes this trip to the shore: on Memorial, Labor and Independence Day. This particular trip occurs on the latter, at some point during the Second World War.

Ambrose, his parents, Uncle Karl, his fifteen-year-old brother, Peter, and Magda, a pretty fourteen-year-old girl make the trip by car, a black 1936 LaSalle sedan. En route to Ocean City, the family passes the time playing various games including cow-poker. Moreover, 'Looking for the Towers' is a tradition of their thrice-yearly pilgrimage - a game in which the first to see the Towers would, as per custom, receive a candy bar or piece of fruit as reward - and one that their mother now preserves with the promise of "something hard to get nowadays". Winning, Ambrose understood since the age of four, was simply a matter of sitting on the right-hand side of the car. Despite this knowledge, he allows Magda to win and his mother teases the two boys, insinuating that someone has a girlfriend. The prize is a banana and Magda peels it using only a single hand and her teeth. Ambrose is in love with Magda, but is reluctant to make his feelings known.

During the car ride he remembers a time when, three years previously, Peter, Magda and himself played Niggers and Masters. When it was Ambrose's turn to be Master, Peter bowed out of the game, leaving just Magda and himself. Alone, Ambrose was scared to 'punish' her but in the spirit of the game, she embraced his knees and begged for mercy. It is something he has remembered to this day. His mother gives each of them a dollar to spend on the boardwalk amusements.

Having arrived, the family stare at Fat May the Laughing Lady, a mechanical caricature that solicits customers for the funhouse. Peter suggests going to the funhouse, while Ambrose suggests they go swim first. An oil spill, they discover, ostensibly as a result of tankers torpedoed offshore, has made swimming in the ocean an unwelcome prospect, so the family chooses instead to sunbathe on the beach and swim in the nearby municipal pool. Uncle Karl remarks that it would not seem like Fourth of July without fireworks, the absence of which was a result of shortages or on account of the enemy submarines in nearby waters; no-one is sure which. Peter, aided by Uncle Karl, tries to pull Magda into the pool and in the ensuing struggle, Ambrose catches a glimpse of Magda's nipple. Mother admonishes Peter and Uncle Karl. Having given up, Peter swims and later shows off on the dive board, while Ambrose and Magda watch. Ambrose thinks about asking her if she remembers that day, but decides against it.

Later, on the boardwalk, Magda asks Ambrose why he is limping, and he lies, saying that his foot must have gone to sleep in the car. In actuality, his perpetual thoughts about Magda have aroused him. After dinner, Ambrose goes under the boardwalk to search for out-of-town matchbook covers with his flashlight. He sees a couple having sex, and quickly retreats back to the family. He is excited to the point of nausea and desperately wants to tell Peter what he saw. Magda exclaims that Ambrose's foot could not still be asleep. Instead of the funhouse, the three children ride an aging merry-go-round.

Their money spent, Ambrose, Peter and Magda, at Peter's behest, return to Fat May to watch the girls get their skirts blown up as they enter the funhouse. Ambrose discovers a half-dollar and nervously asks Magda to go with him into the funhouse. He is relieved when Peter gets a quarter as well. Ambrose is so nervous that he accidentally gives the ticket-woman his name-coin instead of the money and she, pointing at the birthmark on his temple, jokingly tells Magda to watch out for Ambrose because he is a marked man. An elderly man advises Ambrose to go through the rotating Devil's Mouth entrance crabwise, saying that he will get an eyeful if he does. The three children enter the funhouse and Ambrose is the first to get through, but is dismayed to find that, that is not really the point. Peter trips Magda and laughing, shouts, "I see Christmas!" as she clutches in vain at her skirt.

Ambrose, taking Magda by the elbow to steady her, makes his way through a section of the funhouse with a slanted floor and rotating discs designed to throw people off balance. Magda clutches at him as she falls, and for a moment, her cheek is pressed against his belt buckle. He wants to tell her that he loves her, but then a sailor and his girl bump into them, sending everyone sprawling to the ground. He realizes, with some disgust, that he would not have told her anyway. Peter slaps her behind and Magda chases him into the next section of the funhouse, a mirror-maze, and Ambrose, slow to follow, is separated from them.

He marvels at the endless replication of his image in the mirrors, and hears Peter and Magda wondering aloud where he is. Then he hears them find their way, giggling, through the glittering maze and finally, hears them exit. Ambrose, however, does not find the right exit, and wanders off into the inner-workings of the funhouse. He finds a small crack of light, behind which is an old man operating a series of switches and levers, but he is, as yet, not lost enough to want to call out to the old man. Later, when he is, he cannot seem to find it again and thinks he must simply have imagined it. He hears noises, and hopes to find other people whom he can follow out without alerting anyone to his predicament. At some point, he calls out with feigned humor, asking if anyone knows where they heck they are, but his voice betrays his fear.

He imagines starving to death while telling stories to himself only to be discovered by an expedition years later. He imagines that his stories are overheard by an assistant operator through the thin ply board partition and transcribed in their entirety. He changes his mind, deciding that they are written down by the operator's daughter who falls in love with him, having never laid eyes upon him.

Hours have passed since Peter and Magda exited the funhouse and they, eating french-fries and discussing names for their children, are waiting with Uncle Karl and Mother, while Father, aided by Ocean City personnel, searches for Ambrose. They cannot find him because Ambrose has wondered into an area of the funhouse that even the designer and operator have forgotten about. Eventually, he is found and on the trip back home, his Uncle Karl gently teases him. He wishes he had never gone into the funhouse.