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A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
It's Friday. Time for StoryCorps. Halloween is Kate Heathcote's favorite holiday, but her husband, David, who's from the U.K., did not grow up celebrating it. Kate was eager for David to fully embrace his first spooky season in the U.S., so she convinced him to take a job at a professional haunted house.
DAVID HEATHCOTE: I don't think I realized just what I was signing myself up for. I had to go for an audition. So I'm like, OK, this is professional. They don't take, you know, any Tom, Dick or Harry. I remember turning up on my first day, and, my goodness, I was a goblin monkey doorman. To be a goblin monkey, you have to start jumping around on the floor and using muscles that I'd just never used before, pouncing. And people don't get scared unless you fly at them. And then we added to that, you know, this loud pumping music with strobe lights.
KATE HEATHCOTE: I waited for so long for you that first night 'cause they closed down kind of late. You just kind of wandered out, like, in shock. Got you in the car. You sat down. And I think the radio was on. You're like, no, no. Can it just be quiet?
D HEATHCOTE: I could hardly talk, and I was dehydrated, and I cried a little bit.
K HEATHCOTE: (Laughter) I definitely told you, you don't have to go back if you don't want to.
D HEATHCOTE: But I doubled down. I spent a lot of that month being Zombie No. 1. And I remember this gaggle of schoolgirls. And then you hear one of them say, it's all models in here. There's no real people. And I launched myself out of my alcove. And the trouble is they've all linked arms, so they just go down in this mass, and there's this mound of legs and arms and screams. And one of them said they'd wet themselves. And that is the ultimate win.
K HEATHCOTE: I realized that I had signed you up for something significantly harder than I ever anticipated. But you were willing to support me in what seemed like a crazy idea to you.
D HEATHCOTE: Well, actually, they did have person of the week, and I won that certificate twice.
K HEATHCOTE: Yes.
D HEATHCOTE: And they gave me free tickets. And I wanted you to go with me. You wouldn't go through.
K HEATHCOTE: (Laughter) I'm a big wuss. I love Halloween, but I don't like being scared (laughter). I guess I owe you a trip through it.
D HEATHCOTE: That sounds like a promise. Now I've got you.
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MARTÍNEZ: That was David and Kate Heathcote for StoryCorps. They sound adorable. I'm sorry, they just do. As of this airing, Kate has still not agreed to go through the haunted house with David. Their conversation is archived at the Library of Congress. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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