Chapter Two
“I want one!” Eve shouted over her shoulder back at me. “But I have nowhere to put him!”
“One day we’ll open a mini pig rescue,” I told her.
“A sanctuary for retired racing mini pigs,” she agreed.
“Where they can relive the glory days and get tummy scratches,” I added.
And unfortunately for me, my vivid imagination could paint the scene like a double exposure over my vision.
I could see a row of fruit trees, a gaggle of mini pigs playing and rushing around.
A dairy cow in the background. Our hands entwined as we walked the dirt path that curved throughout the property in the golden hour of late afternoon.
Clear skies and an ease of peace and security that Eve deserved to know.
There wasn’t a line when we got to the bull tent, just Eve’s coworker and his girlfriend sitting in his lap.
I felt the back of my neck warm. They were in a full make out session and either didn’t notice us entering or didn’t care.
I looked around, anywhere but at them. There was a small padded ring with thick corded ropes on the edges with the mechanical bull in the middle.
The bull was tan and white with a worn leather saddle and a faux brand of a J and a B.
Immediately to the left of the entrance were some temporary bleachers.
I could see that half of them had already been folded and disassembled.
The ground was grass flattened from use and tramping.
Right along the edges of the bull’s padded base the grass was standing tall.
“Get a room Spencer,” Eve announced to break up the couple.
The couple pulled apart. Spencer was covered in acne and his greasy hair stuck to his forehead.
His girlfriend was way too pretty for him, chestnut hair up in a messy bun, a model’s body.
Spencer’s girlfriend, for her part, had the awareness to blush, whereas Spencer smacked her ass and grabbed it just to show he could.
“Boss wants you to pack up tonight, he doesn’t want to have us come out tomorrow to load out. ”
Eve sighed. “Yeah, that’s fine,” she said. “I brought the work truck keys anyway.” She turned to me, “it’s a good thing we used a ride share so we don’t need to take two cars.
“I have an extra kettle corn I’m not going to eat if you want it,” the girlfriend offered Eve.
“Sure, thanks,” Eve accepted the bag and took a seat near the control panel by the steps up to the bull ring. When the strange couple left, I cocked an eyebrow at her.
“There’s someone for everyone, I guess,” I said.
Eve shook her head. “She could do better.”
“Right?” I agreed.
“He’s such a sleaze. I hope Dave fires him soon. Or finally promotes me to manager so I can fire him myself,” she leaned back, her long legs stretching out and my mouth went dry. Maybe the margarita was getting to me. Unacceptable.
Suddenly, I felt hot and claustrophobic. I needed air. I needed a drink of something to clear my head and dilute the alcohol content of my blood. “I’m going to get some lemonade,” I said. “Want any?”
Eve talked through a handful of kettle corn that she had shoved into her mouth. “Yeah, that sounds good!”
I nearly tripped on nothing walking out of the tent.
I made my way past the mini pig races, which were empty now.
The crowds had cleared and moved on now that the show was over.
Music blared from different stands on either side of the main food strip.
I found the tall sign for Bucket o Lemons and got in line.
As I waited, I tried to slow my racing heart.
The line moved slowly forward, and I gave myself until I was at the window to daydream about Eve.
It hurt in my chest, like rubber bands over rubber bands, stretching and squeezing and adding pressure on the can of emotions that I kept sealed.
If I could get my shoulders to drop, if I could relax my jaw, if I could let myself unwind, because I felt truly wound up in all the desire and denial…
then I’d probably start crying. I had to lock the emotions down and ground myself.
I looked up at the glow of light pollution and the brightest of stars that twinkled beyond our solar system.
How much longer could I do this? When would this feeling end?
Between a rock and a hard place seemed like an easier predicament than this.
I let out a huff of air, too tense to be a sigh. The teller asked for my order. “One bucket of strawberry lemonade, please,” I said.
“Strawberry must be a fan favorite for you and your girl,” she said. My brows furrowed and I looked at her again. It was the bartender from earlier, the purple eyeliner stars, the space buns. The smile that felt like a high voltage warning.
“You work here too?”
She cocked her head to the side. “If you had the opportunity to do something you’ve always wanted, would you take it?”
She dodged my question, but it took me by surprise.
Did she mean that serving drinks at a county fair was something she had always wanted?
It seemed a bit far-fetched to me, but maybe I was just being judgmental.
I considered her question. “Depends on what I’d have to lose.
Nothing is free, everything requires a sacrifice of something else.
” Like kissing Eve would sacrifice what we had already, for better or for worse, and I wasn’t going to risk worse.
She handed me my bucket of strawberry lemonade.
The purple lid had two straw openings with large bendable straws sticking out.
“Remember that when you wish for something, the first step to make it come true is to take action. Seize the day. Take the opportunity as it is presented to you. Grab it by the horns and ride it as long as you can. How can the universe provide for you if you refuse to walk in the doors it opens?”
I felt a chill run down my spine, out of place for the warm summer night. “Yeah, I’ll… keep that in mind.”
She fluttered her fingers at me in a wave goodbye.
It felt… charged. Like there was some mark on my back that she put there.
I was being paranoid. This thing with Eve was hard.
I felt like the answer was to make space between us, some distance so that I could make the can in my chest flatten, lose its carbonation.
But at the same time, I didn’t want to. She was my best friend.
I wanted to do everything with her. I wanted to talk to her all the time.
I loved her. As a friend, obviously. I didn’t want to take space from my best friend.
My body rejected the idea with an involuntary grimace.
No, that wasn’t an option. So, then I just needed to focus on being a good friend to her and not think about the rest of these feelings.
Maybe it would be like a mental training, like the things the Navy SEALS or whoever in the CIA do to withstand torture and interrogation tactics.
I just needed to have mental and emotional fortitude.
As I made my way back over to the bull ring, I steadied myself.
I loved Eve, undeniably. She was my best friend.
My mind was a broken record reinforcing that boundary.
I just needed to focus on the highlights of our friendship, the comfort we had with each other, the undying support, the inside jokes and years of history.
I would protect our friendship- the most important relationship in my life.
When I came inside, Eve was disinfecting the mechanical bull with a rag and spray.
Her black hair thrown back over her shoulder.
I never understood how she could maintain her hair down while working.
I needed my hair pulled back whenever I needed to do something.
Even when I ate I needed my hair back and out of my face.
My dark blonde hair was pin straight and thin, wispy down to just past my neck.
I basically lived in a ponytail just because it made things easier, but I couldn’t bear to cut it.
“I come bearing gifts,” I announced and held up the bucket of lemonade by its purple handle. The ice sloshed around inside, the strawberry syrup swirling around with some of the light pulp from the fresh squeezed lemons.
“Hell yeah, dude,” Eve smiled.
I sat on one of the risers and she came over and sat beside me.
She took a drink of lemonade, and I ate some kettle corn.
We sat in comfortable silence, the kind that only comes from years of familiarity with someone.
Eve’s eyes were staring off in the middle distance, either deep in thought or just zoned out.
My mind kept thinking about what the lemonade server had said.
Wishes and whether I would accept a wish coming true if it were offered to me.
“If you had three wishes, what would you wish for?” I asked, my eyes unfocused, following a particle of dust in the air.
“Or would you even take the wishes? Like, isn’t the lesson of the stories that you have to be careful what you wish for?
It always ends up twisted into something else with random unpredictable side effects. ”
Eve took a bite of kettle corn and hummed as she chewed. “I think I would take the wishes. Otherwise, I’d always regret it.”
I fiddled with the cuff of the sleeve from the plaid shirt tied around my waist. “So, what would you wish for?”
“Three wishes?”
“Let’s say there’s only one. Just to make it easier,” I say. I wondered if she would ask me in return, would I be brave enough to tell her the truth. That I’d want to have a happily ever after with her?
“I’m not sure, I mean, I know that I’d have to word it carefully. I’d probably need you to help me with wording it. You’d make sure I don’t fall into any traps.”
“No pressure,” I teased, blinking my vision back into focus. “I would probably never find the right wording.”
She ran the flat surface of her thumb nail along her bottom lip. “Are we doing basic genie rules? No bringing people back from the dead, no additional wishes?” I nodded in agreement. “Oh, and you can’t make someone fall in love.” Internally, I jolted. “What would you wish for?”
There it was. She had asked, but I couldn’t get my mouth open to say the word running around and around in my mind.
You. You. You.
I didn’t want to make her fall in love with me, I just wanted us to be together on the off chance she ever did want me in that way.
I just wanted to know if it were on the table, and if I went for it, would it work out?
Just to have the reassurance. I shrugged, scared once again away from revealing the truth.
Eve stood up, and it was only after she moved away from me that I fully realized how close she had leaned in.
Suddenly I wished she was closer, I wished I could go back a few moments to make a different choice, try a different outcome.
“It’s so hot in here,” Eve whispered. She was right.
The thick tarp walls of the tent did not allow for easy air flow.
A sheen of sweat covered her arms and face like a veil.
I had an intense flash of imagining wiping the sweat away and kissing the salty skin beneath.
I shook my head. This was getting out hand
“Here,” I said, “I can open the entryway. Are there ties or anything to secure the flaps open so we can get some air flow?”
Eve nodded and fanned herself with her black cowgirl hat.
“Yeah, I have some in the work truck. I’ll go get them.
” She came over and took a sip of lemonade.
Her eyes closed as she savored the cool drink.
“There’s an oscillating fan over there by the control panel, could you turn it on? ” Eve grabbed her keys and walked out.
I took a drink of lemonade. Would this be the closest I would ever get to her lips?
Despite all my protestations to the contrary, I knew that I wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation if I had a magical wish.
Holding up the lemonade, I let myself imagine it was a magical lamp and gently swiped my thumb across it in small back and forth motions as I held it and made my wish.
“I wish Eve and I had a chance to be together.”
The bucket did nothing, as buckets tend to do, and my cheeks felt warm.
What had I been thinking? As if playing pretend wishing games would cause something magical to happen.
It would be ridiculous to entertain the idea, so why was I disappointed?
Placing the lemonade on the small shelf near the control panel, I leaned over to plug in the standing fan when the shirt tied around my waist caught on a small bolt sticking out from the stool chair next to it.
“Fuck,” I tried to pull it off without tearing the material, and in doing so bumped my hip against the control panel.
A few things happened all at once. The sloshing of the bucket of lemonade, the dumping of the liquid following the popping sound of the lid coming undone, the splash against my leg.
“No, no, no, no, no…” I wrangled myself free and looked up in horror.
The lemonade bucket was completely empty, and the control panel was drenched.
I’m pretty sure I even saw a spark or two.
My stomach dropped and I frantically tried to wipe off the pooling liquid with my hands.
It was no use. I had no idea how to work this machine, let alone fix it.
Eve’s money situation was tight, and mine wasn’t much better.
Repairs on this would set us both back by a metric fuck ton.
We’d probably have to take out a loan. Multiple loans.
“Well, I’ll be, that’s a predicament,” a male voice with a vague southern accent commented from behind me.
Leaned against the risers, an honest to goodness cowboy was looking at me.
Tan from hours in the sun, tall and built for labor.
Thick brown curls peeked out from under his cowboy hat.
He had a slight amused smile on his square face, large brown eyes and a snub nose.
He was wearing a black tank top under a cream colored vest - was that fur?
- covered in spots of tan and brown. He had matching chaps over blue jeans.
It looked like he was wearing some kind of cow hide.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you come in,” I said too quickly.
“We are having some, uh, technical difficulties. I’m just watching the booth for a minute; my friend works here.
She’ll be back in just a moment.” I chastised myself internally.
I was blabbering. He was attractive. His round muscular shoulders, the valley between them and the rise of his biceps was mesmerizing.
Yep, I thought, I’m still bisexual. I grabbed the rag Eve had used to disinfect the bull and tried to soak up the lemonade.
“I’m sorry, maybe check in a few minutes? ”
He placed a hand on mine, I hadn’t even noticed him get closer. “I’m not going anywhere, Mady.”