Chapter 14
Kennedi
“Have you ever been in a corn maze before?” I asked Bryson.
“No. What about you?”
“Baby, you know that I love saving mostly all my firsts for you,” I replied.
“Then maybe one of us should have had some experience, because I could have sworn that we took this same path three times already.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah. I’m certain that we did.”
“But how can you tell, Bryse?”
“Because the last time we went this way, I purposely dropped that crumpled, ripped brown leaf on the path. It’s still there.”
I looked to where he pointed and saw a very distinct leaf that stood out among the others. As panic set in, Bryson looked at me and pulled me into his arms. “Hey, don’t cry. You know that we’ll get out of here. They have staff members along the way that we can ask.”
“I was just determined to do this on my own. I didn’t want their help. It’s important that I prove to myself, if no one else, that I could do this without any help.”
“And you can, baby. First, I need you to calm down and breathe. Once you’ve done that, you and I are going to create a strategy for getting out of here. Then we’re going to work our strategy until we accomplish what we set out to do. Okay?”
I nodded, and he held my hand as I inhaled, held my breath, and exhaled until I calmed down.
Trust your instincts. Always trust your instincts. You have the wisdom inside of you to make the best choices.
The cook’s voice returned in my head, forcing a smile to my lips. It was almost like she knew that this moment would arrive, but she couldn’t have, could she?
“Pull the map out again, and let’s identify where we think we are,” Bryson suggested.
I reached into my knapsack and pulled out the map we had been given at the front of the maze before we started. We stared at it for several seconds, turning it this way and that, before we found where we thought we were. Only time would tell if we were correct.
“Are you ready?” Bryson asked.
“I am, but I have a suggestion.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m going to walk with my hand on this right wall of corn as we go. We’ll keep going in the same direction to lead ourselves back.”
Bryson grabbed my face with both hands and kissed my forehead. “You’re brilliant, baby.”
I laughed and replied, “Only if it gets us out of here.”
“Let’s go.”
Twenty minutes later, we made it out of the maze, and I was happy that we hadn’t just made it back to the entrance, but all the way to the exit.
“What’s next?”
“Well, since we’re right across the road from the pumpkin patch, why don’t we pick out a pumpkin?”
“Okay, baby, but what are you going to do with it?”
“We can carve it when we get back home. Place it on our porch,” I replied with a shrug.
We headed across the road to the pumpkin patch.
There were tons of people walking all over the patch and hayrides as well.
I knew that the majority of the people weren’t from Grace Gardens B&B because there were so many of them.
We walked up and down row after row of pumpkins, checking out small, medium, large, and gigantic pumpkins of various shapes and variations of orange, yellow, and yellow-green hues.
Little children ran all over the fields, laughing, playing tag, and some were even whining.
They made my heart tug for our future children.
“I think we’re tired, so we settled for a pumpkin quickly. What do you think?” I asked him thirty minutes later, when we were armed with our pumpkin and walking back to the parking lot where our car was parked.
“I think we did good, especially for grabbing something to take home and throw out.”
“We won’t be throwing it out. We’re going to light it up and set it on the porch for the trick or treaters.”
“Don’t tell me your ass is gonna be home to help me pass out candy this year.”
“Help you? I’m gonna do you one better. I’m dressing up.”
“Oh, really? When was the last time that your ass dressed up in a costume?”
“The masquerade ball.”
“I meant for Halloween.”
“Wow. Uhm, . . . second year after college, when I was invited to a Halloween party.”
“What were you?”
“I was Josie, and my friends were the Pussycats. Not the movie, but the original cartoon.”
“Bet your little ass was fine as hell.”
“Still am. Watch me when I dress up as Daphne, Fred,” I replied, tugging at the string of his hoodie.
He groaned, and I laughed as we climbed back into our car and headed back to the B&B. We were only five minutes away when I yelled, “Stop!”
“What’s wrong?” he asked, slamming on the brakes.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you, but can you please pull over to the side of the road?”
“For what?”
I pointed and answered, “Autumn leaves.”
Bryson shook his head and chuckled. “Big ass, bad ass kid. That’s what you are.”
“Aren’t you the one who claimed he picked my profile for that very same reason?”
“One of the reasons,” he replied, gripping my chin.
He kissed me and shut off the engine. “Come on, girl. Let’s grant you your wish.”
I hopped out of the car with glee and took off running across the field. No sooner than I reached the pile, I jumped in without any preparation or warning. I fell just shy of the leaves and rolled off the pile. Bryson snickered at me and shook his head.
“How you fuck up jumping in a pile of leaves?”
“Join me, Mr. Fuller, since it’s so easy.”
He shook his head and replied, “Nope.”
“Come on, it’s fun.”
“I’m not about to mess up some man’s hard ass work because you have this neurotic fantasy about jumping into a pile of leaves.”
“Well, seeing as how I’ve already messed it up, you may as well.”
“Actually, you barely made a dent. Your clumsy ass rolled off the pile.”
I frowned at him, jumped up, and jumped back into the pile this time, hitting the middle. I did it repeatedly until I asked, “Are you going to come and join me?”
He sighed, laughed, and then ran toward me.
I rolled away just in time for him to jump into the pile.
I grabbed a handful of leaves and tossed them in the air.
It wasn’t long before Bryson joined me, doing the same thing.
We laughed and had so much fun until we heard a truck coming in our direction.
We looked up and noticed a man turning red in the face.
He shook his fist out of the window and shouted a bunch of curse words at us.
Bryson and I ran as fast and as hard as we could until we hopped inside his car and took off.