There are few things that get me revved up as much as a horror musical. The dramatics as base, the demand to suspend disbelief as flickering lights by stagehands turn ghosts and haunt, the crescendo in voice, music, and metaphor at the climax, the absolute bonkers concept of sitting in a room with a bunch of people as performers perpetual canon their co-stars to death. I am exhilarated, thrilled, absolutely gobsmacked at how horror musicals have gotten me through this pandemic (as well as tough shit before it) but it makes sense. How else do you make sense of the impossible but with media that demands you believe in it? I bring this quiz to you in the hopes that you get a glimpse of why I love this shit so much and so you can tell my friends to stop hating on it, it’s good shit!

You wake up and start to get ready for your day. Where are you headed off to and what time is it?(Required)

You’re making a cup of black coffee and meditating various atrocities while sitting on your porch in the chilly autumn air. It’s 7:17 am.

You’re packing the kids’ lunch so you can focus when you screw your partner in approximately 19 minutes, the flowers outside bloom in confusion. It’s 2:47 am.

You’re softly stepping around the house in a particular pattern, 15 times in penance and hold your breath while doing so, so you don’t awaken any deities. They appreciate the thought but it doesn’t matter. It’s 4:37 am.

You’re standing in front of the bathroom mirror, wiping off the fog from the shower. You’re thinking how your tie will match your belt and you hope the barista will notice. It’s 7:59am.

You’re primping the fuck out of your hair because, honey! That’s where life begins, every day a little curl in the heart and in the mind, a little murder in the hands and in the throat, or whatever that one guy said. It’s 5:56 am and no, you’re not crying like Cassie from Euphoria while doing it, why do you ask?

You’re jogging around the track to the thump thump thump of each step, Music is usually good but not today! You need to make sure your mind and your body are in perfect sync, no more mistakes. It’s 3:18 am.

You’re strapping a book to the inside of your overalls so that when you wrap your raincoat around you, the pages stay safe. You pick up an umbrella by the door. You put it back. It’s 9:16 am.

We’re out of the house/apartment/wherever you live, where we going next?(Required)

You’re heading into town to grocery shop. The leaves dance around your ankles as your feet crunch on the gravelly road. You wonder why you feel like you’re being followed. Every time you turn around to check, it’s just a bird looking right at you.

You have so many errands to run! You sit on the park bench to prepare. You watch nature, be nature. When did grass start growing teeth?

You’re walking to the basement of the community center, preparing for the day. One of the posters leading to your hallway has been marked with obscene language again and you marvel at the poetics of it before ripping it down, guilty. You get a papercut and forget to grimace at the sting.

You’re standing in line for coffee, hoping that by the time you get to the front, the barista you like will be there to roll her eyes as you order something you can definitely make at home. Your palms sweat a little as you practice pushing your blazer back so that the reference to your belt and tie seem natural.

You’re walking towards your receptionist job at a big firm downtown. People move aside as you walk down the middle of the sidewalk and you blow a kiss to yourself when you see your reflection in one of the storefront windows.

You’re speedwalking to your job at the school. The bus was twenty minutes late and you wonder how many kids are going to grow up like you, still catching the bus, still in school, still wondering what the fuck is going on.

You’re running from one hodded storefront to another, regretting that you left your umbrella at home. You nearly slip and so go into the first store you see to wait the storm out.

You run into someone you don’t really remember but remember enough that either you or someone you care about, doesn’t like them. How do you treat them?(Required)

Think of yourself as the neutral one and let them talk to you first. Wave, but not too enthusiastically. Smile, but not too broadly. Walk, not away nor towards them. Just do everything perfectly neutral.

Consider throwing an object at them but then remember you’d have to explain why you threw an object at them. Get up from the bench and walk briskly past them, not making eye contact, even as they call you back by name.

Bite your inner cheek twice on the right side, and keep your tongue running across the hurt of it while you smile and talk to them politely.

Flip them off and then immediately pretend you were flipping off someone else.

Walk up to them and tell them that you love part of their outfit and immediately undercut it with a comment implying that you’d never be caught dead with it, but it’s brave of them to do so.

Clench your fists in your pockets. If they stop you to talk, your fists remain clenched as you put on a smile you know is too big for your face. If they do not stop you to talk, keep your fists clenched and furrow your brow at why they didn’t feel the need to speak to you.

Scream in their face as loudly as possible. Then ask them how they’ve been finding the weather recently. Watch as they leave, maintain eye contact when they glance back.

Now that they’re out of your face, what can you finally do?(Required)

Go through the grocery store with a green basket in your hand. You stand in the frozen food aisle starting at the dinner for two meals longer than you mean to. You blink and you imagine sitting and eating with one person. You blink again and imagine sitting and eating with their partner instead. You close your eyes and take a deep breath. You move to another aisle, putting only crackers in your basket before heading to checkout.

Return to your car, briefly remembering to check underneath for any living animals. Get into your car, and pull off towards the strip mall saying the items you need out loud. Condoms, chicken strips, ice packs, Bruce Springsteen, new fan filter.

Welcome teenagers to their mandatory meeting. Ask them who has done the homework, and then gently remind them that the homework is for their benefit. Dodge a spitball as you write today’s goals on the blackboard. Fight the heat around your ears when the chalk snaps, and someone laughs.

Punch in and then saunter to your desk so your deskmate can’t tell that your heart is working overtime. The espresso always seems like a good idea when you think of the barista’s brown eyes, but you regret it as soon as you’re 2% done with your drink. Log in to your computer and ignore that the screen is singing.

Pull up the search bar on your CFO’s computer and start shopping remotely, pausing every now and then to see what email he’s sending next. Pause to answer phones on the second or fourth ring depending on how far you’ve gotten into your shopping list. After you’ve searched “machetes”, “lighter fluid”, and “shovel” under his personal shopping account, you close out and call in for lunch.

Peek outside the door to see if the rain has stopped.

Time to wrap up and head home. Where’s home?(Required)

In the house, you decide to pop in some music to go along with your nighttime routine. How are you listening to your music?(Required)

Food put away, dishes washed, and the possible monster in your cellar ignored, it’s time for bed. Where are you sleeping?(Required)

On the couch with the fireplace loud and warm, reading a hardback book with your finger serving as bookmark amongst the dog-eared pages.

Wherever your body decides is best. Sometimes the bed. Sometimes the kitchen floor. Sometimes on the pool table in the basement. Often the lawn, though you hope not this time, you believe the sprinklers are set to come on tomorrow morning. It’s Wednesday right?

In your bed, a small, modest thing with a candle on a nightstand by your bedside. You never light the candle, but you like to think of how you could choose to un-dark the room at any moment. You never do, though.

On your buddy’s couch, well, around your buddy’s couch. Some part of your leg is on the couch but most of you is on the floor, your head precariously close to the glass front room table after they called you for last minute drinks as dessert.

In the CEO’s bed. You never ask her what it means because you’ve decided it means nothing. You pull the covers off of her and towards yourself to make a point and vow to put your resignation in tomorrow.

In your best friend’s room, hovering by the bed. You never remember how you end up in here, just that you imagined them wrapping their arm around your middle right before you wake up. You walk back out the room, gently shutting the door behind you. You grab paper towels from the kitchen to clean up your muddy footprints.

In your closet, facing the door. Towel stuffed under the door so that light won’t bother your eyes when you fall asleep. Waking with a start when you remember you need to block the keyhole too.

What horror keeps you awake at night?(Required)

The knowledge that love will ruin you in the end and you know the end is coming sooner than you can prepare for it.

The way your brain is a VHS player and you cannot seem to hold the pause button for more than a few seconds at a time and when you reach for any other buttons, sometimes the machine zaps you.

Regular existential dread that just sits in the corner of your room, hovering three inches above the ground and appears to always come near you but when you move further back to the wall, it’s the same distance away as before.

The visitors that are coming. Knowing that once they come, they will make themselves visitors no longer.

The belief that if you had done one thing differently, you wouldn’t be staring at your ceiling in the dark, sweat collecting at the back of your neck and soaking into your pillow.

That if you had gotten help sooner, maybe they would still answer your calls. Maybe they’d see the skin of your hands instead of all that red.

When you started humming in your apartment years ago, as a way to keep yourself company, something hummed back, in harmony with you. It’s been years but you know that someday the humming will return.

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