Katherine, a young girl tricked into helping a friend

The fun fair was always a big deal when it came to town. It only came twice a year, spring and autumn but the whole town liked to take part when it arrived. The stalls always varied, but there were always the typical things you'd find anywhere – hook a duck, the dunk tank, the tilt a whirl, as well as a mixture local shops selling their wares as part of the seasonal market and there was always room for enterprising people to set up something a little different knowing that there'd be a lot of eyes on them over the weekend.

Katherine had a friend who was such an enterprising person and she was quite looking forward to seeing what they came up with, she knew it was a charitable stall and that they'd been putting all their efforts into putting it together in the week leading up to the fair. However that unfortunately all she knew, as she'd been preoccupied preparing her own plans – she had a date. She'd been interacting with this person online for some time and this would be the first time they were meeting in person. He lived nearby and knew what an event this usually was.

She had agonised and gone back and forth over outfits, planned out the route they might take through the market and stalls, had booked an appointment with her stylist the day before to touch up her hair, nails etc. But then it happened, her friend fell ill and wouldn't be able to look after her stall and through persuasion, the type of guilt trip only a best friend could get away with as well as a good dose of bribery Katherine agreed to be look after the stall on the opening night of the fair.

Unfortunately she hadn't been given any details of what she was expected to do, other than the general attract customers to the stall and get them to open their wallets and donate to the charity. So needless to say she was surprised when she showed up a little before the gates were opened and found out what she had volunteered (been guilted into) doing. There was a set of stocks she was expected to place her head and arms through and the big sign read “Gunge the Girl” and next to that was a price list £1 for a thrown pie, £2 to step closer, £10 for a bucket of gunge (which varied looking at the assorted buckets from the stuff you'd see on TV to porridge, custard, mushy peas) and for £5 “bring your own mess”.

Once the initial shock had died down a little and she was able to close her mouth again, Katherine quickly ran through her head how she might get out of this but with only 30 minutes before the crowds began to enter she quickly realised there was nothing she could do, she was stuck and had no way to find someone to take her place – and even if she had more time, who did she know that would volunteer for this? She began to regret not cancelling the date. She had hoped that it would only take a little effort to run the store and she could still have a fun date as she had her hopefully boyfriend stood around, chatted only pausing for the occasional customer. She had still worn her chosen outfit as well, a nice revealing red dress, a choker, as well as some stockings and heels.

She had some help , a few people who would stop by and top up supplies should the stall prove as popular as they suspected but sadly neither wanted to take her place in the stocks. So as opening time approached, she sent off an apology message to her date, vaguely mentioning she had to run a stall so wouldn't be free if he wanted to cancel, put her head and arms through the openings of the stocks and felt herself being locked in and prepared to get the messing of a lifetime

Butterflies and nerves were taking over poor Katherine now, the gates had been opened and she could see some people heading in her direction. How had she ended up here? All the efforts she'd put into her outfit, make-up and appearance were apparently going to be for nothing, 5 minutes from now they could all be covered in a mixture of cream, custard, blueberry pie filling, gunge and who knows what else.

She also had no idea what everything was going to feel like. Like everyone else she'd seen the occasional pie in the face or light messing on TV but she'd never considered the possibility it might happen to her – never mind in front of the entire town for a couple of hours. There'd be no fake smile, quickly shrink away to get cleaned up here, she was going to have to be in for the long haul and she just hoped no one she knew was going to show up and rub it in, literally and figuratively.