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I don’t know whose idea it was originally to come to the carnival. Like most group plans, it sort of happened all at once, and incredibly last minute—to the perpetual annoyance of both Kris and Bronwyn, who are planners and could tear their hair out at everyone else’s laidback style. But regardless of who actually planned it, Kris and I have definitely taken control of the afternoon. The carnival grounds are large and expansive, and with all the people around, it’s damn near impossible to find what we’re actually looking for. It doesn’t help that Luis stops every five minutes to note down the whereabouts of another game, and Bronwyn wants to look at every tent selling art. I have to keep stopping and turning around to pull Addy out of tents selling bags of candy, and Maeve has been dragging her feet–along with Nate–practically since we got here.
In short, it is as chaotic as, well, every other group outing we ever attend.
We’re leading everyone through the packs of parents and children, trying to catch sight of some food before we all split up to play the carnival games. I can’t see any food trucks, but something else catches my eye, and I pull to a stop, Kris doing the same next to me.
“What’s that, Kris?” I ask, pointing at the squirrel with a bright grin on my face.
It’s one of the few English words he still cannot pronounce and he immediately flushes bright red.
“A rodent,” he says, dismissively, and I shake my head, my smile growing even bigger.
“What is it, specifically?”
He gives me a sour look. “I hate you.”
I begin to laugh. “You can do it.”
Maeve looks in between us slowly then she starts to smile, too. “Can you not pronounce squirrel?”
“It’s a stupid word,” Kris says defensively. “I bet none of you can say eichhörnchen.”
I just stare at him, smiling smugly until he breaks down.
“Fine,” he sighs. “It’s-“ he pauses, frowns, then looks at me. “Say it again for me.”
“Squirrel.”
He blinks, pursing his lips. “You have an accent,” he complains. “Okay. Squir-“ he gets caught on the r sound, then tries again. This time it comes out more as a w. He presses his lips firmly together. “Squir-“ he rolls his eyes, giving up. “Whatever,” he says as we descend into fits of laughter. He’s bright red, and he smacks me across the chest. “Don’t bully me. You can’t speak multiple languages, you don’t get to judge.”
“I do,” Luis points out. “Can I judge?”
The defeat on Kris’s face makes me burst into laughter, and he sighs. “Sure.”
I’m about to make another joke, when Addy almost pushes me to the side. “Food,” is all she says, before rushing off in the direction of the food trucks. We all watch her purple head weave through the crowd, expertly dodging oncoming families as she makes her way to the food trucks.
I link hands with Kris. “Hungry?”
He smiles at me. “I have to eat if I’m going to beat you at all these carnival games.”
I roll my eyes at him. “A likely story.”
Bronwyn manages to make eating carnival food look almost graceful, her napkin placed delicately over her striped shirt. It's a pretty hilarious contrast to her sister, who is currently having various food combinations all but smeared into her face by an overenthusiastic Luis. She lets him go on far longer than she would let any of the rest of us, but eventually she lets her temper bubble over, shoving him with just enough force to send him toppling off the picnic table. Which of course makes Nate happier than he's been since we got here, and sends Addy into a giggling fit that makes her choke on her food. I only just manage to avoid the same fate. Kris barely holds back his own laughter as he pats her on the back to help her breathe, ignoring Luis's indignant rant about how it "wasn't that funny! Stop laughing!"
It's undoubtedly a relief to the families around us when we separate, each heading toward the things that interest us most.
Kris and I don't get far before we walk past the pitching game. I immediately start to laugh, and Kris pulls out a few dollars to hand to the man running it. “Go on, babe,” he says, barely managing to disguise the humor in his voice. “See if you can get one.”
The man grins, obviously buying Kris’s attempt at making me sound like I might fail, and hands me three baseballs. His smile falls quicker than what should be humanly possible, as I sail all three 85+ mph straight down the middle.
Kris all but cackles as the man reluctantly picks out one of the biggest prizes and hands it to me. It’s an oversized plush baseball with a little smiley face embroidered on it, hands and legs sticking out. It looks like a very uncreative mascot, but it’s kind of cute. I hand it over to Kris and he smiles at it, holding it up so I can see.
“What should we name him?”
I laugh, running a finger along the seam of the ball. “Um. Bally?”
Kris pulls a face. “God. You are not naming our children.”
A warm feeling rushes over me at even the implication of having kids with Kris, and we both let out boyish laughter before tugging each other in close. The others left shortly after food, splitting off into groups and rushing after various games. We’re meant to go and meet back with the others to try and find our way through the corn maze, but Kris spots something else first.
It’s just a bunch of air hockey tables, and I grin as I put Bally down on the edges of one of them. “You wanna go?”
He nods, raising his eyebrows at me competitively. We drop the puck in, and then we’re loudly and almost violently bashing it back and forward at each other.
Kris’s hair is beginning to fall into his eyes, and he pushes it back with one hand, exposing the concentrated look on his face. I’m still staring, mouth slightly ajar, when he knocks the puck into the goal one final time.
Kris grins at me smugly from across the table.
“You cheated,” I whine and he snorts.
“Just because you lost does not automatically mean I cheated.”
I frown. “You definitely cheated.”
He rolls his eyes as he makes his way toward me, pulling me in close to his chest. “How do you even cheat at air hockey?”
I bop his nose seriously with my finger. “You distract the other person.”
He smiles at me, winding his arm around my waist. “Really?” he teases. “How did I do that?”
I pull him in for a short kiss. “By looking like that.”
“Well if that’s all I have to do, I think you’re in for a losing streak.” He grins at me and I swat at his chest, annoyed.
“You’re delusional if you think you could beat me at any of these games.”
“I just did,” he points out.
“By cheating,” I stress and he laughs again.
“Okay,” he relents. “What if we make a deal?”
I raise my eyebrows at him. “I’m listening.”
“We play all of the games here, and whoever has the most wins by the end of the day has to buy the other dinner.”
I grin smugly at him. “You are so going to lose.”
He shakes his head, looking amused. “I don’t think so. I just found out I have super powers of distraction.”
I can’t help my snort. “Let’s go find the others, then you are on.”
It doesn’t take long to round the group back up. Bronwyn and Nate were by the cotton candy machine, though Nate has not stopped complaining about how sticky his hands are now. Bronwyn looks pleased, delicately picking off another piece to melt in her mouth.
“You’re not supposed to put your whole hand in the bag,” she points out and he rolls his eyes.
“It’s spun sugar. I don’t know how you eat it, it’s gross.”
Halfway through their bickering, we spot Addy, Maeve and Luis at the bean bag toss, where Luis is unsurprisingly kicking their asses.
We wander over just as Luis lands his final bag, in the top ring, cheering far too enthusiastically for a 20 year old man winning a children’s game.
“Congratulations, you’re a winner,” the stand worker says, handing over what is potentially the largest stuffed bear I’ve ever seen.
Luis makes a big show of presenting it to Maeve, who rolls her eyes but looks secretly pleased. The bear is big enough to almost engulf her entire body as she tugs it close to her.
“Look,” Addy points out. “You just gave her a new boyfriend! She doesn’t need you anymore.”
Maeve cackles as Luis goes pale.
“Wait, give it back,” he says and she laughs, evading his grip.
“No, I love my new boyfriend.” She hoists it high over her shoulder, sticking her chin out defiantly.
Luis opens his mouth to say something, but is interrupted when Addy realizes we are here.
“Maze time?” she asks, excitedly.
We all nod, and she takes Maeve’s hand with a little squee, and starts pulling her in that direction. Maeve literally drags her feet, almost causing Addy to pull to a stop, but with the superhuman strength she seems to acquire whenever she's excited, she manages to drag an uncooperative Maeve anyway. Luis freezes for a moment, before realising he's about to be left behind, then takes off running after them.
“Children,” Bronwyn says dismissively.
“Bet I could bet you there,” Nate says, nonchalantly. He stuffs his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, and looks in that moment like the last person on earth who would consider racing someone to a corn maze. Which is perhaps the reason Bronwyn looks so dismissive of the idea.
“I’m not racing you, Nate,” she says.
Nate hums, and then quickens his pace, just a little.
“I’m not,” she says, a little more insistently. “Nate!”
He breaks into a jog, and Bronwyn pulls up the edges of her skirt to sprint after him.
“Damn,” I mutter under my breath. “I was totally going to follow her. She’s going to find her way out of there way before I can.”
Kris smiles at me. “Don’t worry, you can follow me.”
I stick out my tongue. “I don’t need to.”
“You literally just said–”
I grab his arm. “C’mon, babe.”
“Unbelievable,” he mutters, but he follows me down anyway.
The maze is huge, and overwhelming, and we immediately lose sight of the others. I tug on Kris’s hand and we wander aimlessly through the stacks of corn until we come to a perfect split, one path going left, the other going right.
“It’s this way,” Kris says, indicating down one side of the maze.
I pause, eyes lingering on the other exit. “I think it’s that way.”
He smiles at me. “You’re wrong.”
I give him an offended look. “How do you know?!”
He just keeps grinning. “I just do.”
“I’m going the other way,” I tell him, just because I want to win.
He nods, leaning softly against the bushes. “I’m so certain that it’s this way, that I will just wait here until you come back.”
“You’re impossible,” I inform him and he waves me off.
I head down my own path, twisting around for a while. It all looks the same, and I can't be sure that I haven't walked around in circles. I'm only just beginning to doubt myself when I inevitably come to the closed off ending. “Shit.” I stare at the wall for a moment, as if expecting it to suddenly disappear and provide a clear path.
When it fails to do so, I head back in Kris’s direction, who begins to laugh the moment he catches sight of me. I put my hand up to his face. “Shut the fuck up.”
"I didn't say anything." He puts his hands up innocently, but his smirk says enough.
I walk right past him, keeping my hand up so I don’t have to see his smug expression. He laughs, wrapping me in a hug from behind with enough force that we both stumble. My facade drops instantly, and I start laughing too, bringing my arms up to cover his.
“This doesn’t count as a win, just so you know.”
He nuzzles into my neck. “Whatever you say, handsome.”
Addy leaves Maeve and Luis to their own devices once she realizes that Kris and I are gonna require a third person to hold all of our prizes. She’s trailing after us now, picking out her own prizes and adding them to her ever-growing pile. We try to get Kris bright colored toys, and me blue or green ones, so we can tell who won what. Of course, not every stand had what we wanted, so Addy also has various colored stuffed toys, candy, baseball cards, and even one slinky wrapped around her wrist. Kris and I have hit every game here, and I’ve honestly lost track of who has won more.
Not that I would admit it to Kris, who I smile at smugly. “You tried.”
He fixes me with an incredulous look. “I succeeded?”
There’s every chance that he actually kept count, and knows this for a fact, but I’m not going to give up the victory unless I have to. “Sure thing,” I tell him sarcastically.
Addy jostles the prizes around in her arms. “Well, I have no idea. But I do think I should get to keep these as a consolation prize for holding them.”
Kris snorts. “You can take whatever you like.”
I spot the familiar crowd of dark hair, and take Kris’s hand. “There’s the others.”
As we make our way over, Bronwyn’s voice carries across. “That is unreasonably large, Maeve.”
Maeve pulls the stuffed bear closer to her. “It’s cute,” she defends. “Though I’m not sure where I’ll put it.”
Luis grins smugly. “She loves it.”
“That might be an exaggeration,” she says automatically contradicting Luis, but she clings onto the oversized bear tight enough to potentially behead it.
We’re all pretty covered in them now. Addy’s pile big enough to put Maeve’s to shame.
“This is ridiculous,” Nate mutters, twisting an arm around Bronwyn’s shoulders. “We’re adults carrying around stuffed toys.”
“Don’t be jealous just because you can’t win one,” Luis tells him and he creases his face in protest.
“Don’t worry Bronwyn,” I say to her, plucking a teddy from Addy’s arms. “You can have one of mine, I’ve won more than anyone anyway.”
Kris squeezes my hand. “Liar! I’ve won more than you.”
I turn back to him with a grin. “I will literally stop and make us count, don’t think I won’t.”
He shrugs. “Maybe you just don’t want to buy me dinner,” he teases.
I smile back at him. “Maybe. I don’t have any money.”
He snorts, dragging me into a kiss.
“Gross,” Luis says lightly, and I punch him in the shoulder.
“Okay, so, dinner?” Addy asks, placing Bally back in my hands. I squeeze the plushie tightly, until his little baseball face looks all messed up.
Kris gently pulls one of my hands away until I’m no longer crushing it. “Leave Bally alone,” he says, then screws up his face in disgust. “Oh God, I cannot believe I am accepting that as its name.”
I push the plushie into his face teasingly. “You love him.”
Kris bops his finger on the space where Bally’s nonexistent nose should be, but otherwise ignores me. “There’s a diner I saw a few miles back, next to the grocery store? We could go there.”
“Great,” Addy says, sagging exaggeratingly under the weight of the prizes. “Maybe they’ll have a shopping cart for me to put these in.”
Bronwyn giggles, plucking some of the more colorful ones out of Addy’s arms, and straight into Nate’s. “You’ll help, won’t you babe?”
Nate feigns a very disgruntled expression. “No,” he says, but he adjusts his grip so he can hold both the toys and Bronwyn’s waist.
“Let’s go,” Luis says. “I’m starved.”
I turn to Kris, a mischievous grin already forming on my face. “Last one to the car has to pay for dinner.”
He frowns. “We just had a whole competition to see who has to pay for dinner.”
I shrug. “Sounds to me like you’re afraid you’ll lose.”
“I’m not,” Kris begins, but I’ve already taken off, sprinting in the direction of the car. “You’re unbelievable,” he says, making me laugh maniacally.
I can hear the sigh, then the thunder of his footsteps as he takes off to follow me. “This is not fair, you had a head start!” I’m way ahead of him now, and I can hear him laugh, both exasperated and amused.
“COOPER!”