Carousel Nights

by Amie Denman

  She handed her clipboard to the neatly dressed usher and headed toward their table.

  * * *

  FRESH, LIVELY, FUN. The three words she repeated to her dancers and crew every day. That’s what people were looking for in a day at the Point and a live show. The word escape always played in her mind, too. People wanted a day away. They didn’t want to think about their dog’s shedding, their aunt’s bad habit of dropping in, their kid’s nightly struggle with math homework. She didn’t try to convey the idea to her summer crew, though. Mostly young, carefree and doing exactly what they wanted—working in a quality live show—they weren’t likely to be inspired by an audience member’s need to escape life for a day.

  They were having fun on stage, and their energy spread through the audience like juicy gossip. The exit surveys glowed with praise, the sun was shining and a cute little boy was waving at her like he knew her.

  The bright sun, especially after the darkness of the theater, was blinding. She squinted to see the boy and the man with him, deep in shadow under the umbrella. It didn’t take long to identify the set of his shoulders, tousled hair and obvious height as the man stood.

  Although she and Mel had not officially crossed paths in the long week since Christina’s nearly fatal heart condition, June knew Mel was thinking of her. Each day, the sound technicians went to work on the parade truck, but the work was already done when they got there. It was wired, lit and loud. Ready for its inaugural run today. She knew she had Mel to thank, even if he hadn’t appeared enthusiastic, and this was her opportunity.

  She handed off her clipboard and started walking, hardly thinking about her sore feet. Seeing Mel in a T-shirt and shorts having lunch with his son jolted her. No uniform, no tool belt, no professional armor. Not that his armor had much effect on her anyway. Their positions at Starlight Point brought them together over and over, but she wondered what would happen if they were just a man and a woman. No complicated past. No complicated future where he was married to Starlight Point and she was devoted to her dream of Broadway.

  “Sorry to drag you over here,” Mel said as she approached the table.

  “That was some serious waving,” June said to Ross. “I was afraid it was a distress signal of some kind, like you were out of mustard or fries.” She smiled. “Or both.”

  “Actually, Ross had some important feedback for you,” Mel said. “Why don’t I buy you some lunch and he can tell you all about it.”

  June checked the time on her cell phone. “I have an hour before the parade lines up. Wish I had the whole day off like you two, but I sure wouldn’t turn down lunch. Especially if it comes with important advice.”

  “Want me to grab you a menu?” Mel asked, shooting her a smile as he used a napkin to wipe off a seat for her. While the picnic tables started off every day spotless, countless diners tended to leave their mark.

  “Thanks,” June said. “I’ve sat in sticky stuff before, but this is a new skirt.”

  “It’s nice,” Mel said. “Dog and fries?”

  “Why not? I’ll walk it off in the parade.”

  “Be right back.”

  June studied Ross while his father strode over to the food window. Even with ketchup smeared around his lips, the kid was cute. More than cute. No doubt he would have his father’s good looks when he grew up.

  Looking at Ross with his adorable smile and sunny attitude, June wondered how anyone—especially his mother—could resist him. Someday, he’d be stealing hearts as he worked a summer job at the Point. If he was like his dad, he’d be around here for a long time. Something tugged at June’s heart and she wondered for a moment what it would be like to watch Ross grow up.

  “What’s the parade like?” he asked, suddenly looking up from his fries.

  “Loud and shiny.”

  “Sounds good. Does it have those big floats like the parades on TV? And giant balloons?”

  “Just one actual float, and it’s more of a fixed-up old truck painted shiny.”

  “Oh,” he said, looking deflated.

  “But there’s a band.”

  “A rock band?”

  June laughed. “Nope. A high school band. Different one every day.”

  Ross nodded, sipping his drink.

  “And dancers. With colorful costumes,” June added.

  “Can they dance and walk at the same time?”

  “Uh-huh. They sort of move along with the shiny truck and dance at the same time. The band goes first.”

  “Sounds awesome.”

  An idea flashed into June’s mind and she almost said it aloud, but Mel returned with a plastic tray laden with an enormous hot dog and a cardboard container of fries. He carried a soft drink in his other hand and set it all down in front of June.

  “Thanks,” she said. “But I’ll never eat all this.”

  “Got the employee discount,” he replied, winking. “And Ross will finish whatever you don’t eat. Five-year-olds are garbage disposals.”

  “Almost six,” Ross protested. “I want to get a job here at Starlight Point. I’m good at lots of things.”

  June smiled at Mel and he raised both eyebrows.

  “What kind of job are you thinking about?” she said. “I know the owners and might be able to help you out.”

  Ross looked serious, holding one hand out flat and ticking off the fingers with his other hand. “I like cars, and I know a lot about ’em. I also like trains and I know lots of stuff about trains, too,” he said, two fingers down. “I know where everything is because I spent my whole life pretty much here. I could be a tour guide or something. I could also work for Aunt Augusta and sell cookies. I’d be real good at selling cookies. And I can fix stuff. Dad lets me help,” he added, using up all his fingers and looking satisfied.

  “That’s quite a list,” June said. “Will you help me right now by returning this tray and asking the lady at the window for some more napkins?”

  Ross took off, obviously anxious to be useful.

  June laid her hand over Mel’s and leaned close across the table. “Thank you for getting my parade truck ready.”

  He shrugged. “I didn’t do much.”

  “Yes, you did. My tech guys told on you.”

  “I had help.” He didn’t pull his hand from under June’s and they sat under the umbrella, connected. “Have you heard how the girl is doing?”

  June nodded. “Released from intensive care, and now she’ll go home and enter a treatment program. She didn’t want to. She doesn’t want to give up the stage.” June swallowed. “But it will kill her if she lets it.” She shook her head.

  Mel glanced over at Ross, who was chatting with the lady at the counter as she reloaded the napkin dispenser.

  “Did things turn out okay with your ex-wife’s visit?” June asked. She took her hand off Mel’s and tried for complete neutrality in her voice.

  Mel kept his eyes on his son and avoided looking at June. “She attempted to play mom for a few days, got tired of it and left.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Not your fault.” Mel attempted a smile.

  Ross had a fistful of napkins and was about to return to their table.

  “I didn’t want to say anything without asking you first,” June said quickly, “but what do you think of Ross riding along in the parade?”

  “Today?”

  “Any day. He’s adorable. He could ride in the cab and toss out candy to kids.”

  “I don’t know,” Mel said.

  “Why not? He’d be a great mascot. He’s here every day anyway. We could pull him out of the hotel day care for an hour every afternoon. It would be fun,” June insisted.

  “Slow down a minute.” Mel pulled his hand away and took a drink.

  “What could it hurt? I could ask Gloria to
whip up a cool costume for him. He’d love it.”

  “He’s my son,” Mel said, his voice dropping low. “I’ll decide what he loves and whether he gets pulled from day care.”

  Ross slid onto the seat next to his dad and overheard his last word. “The day care is nice. They give us cookies and we play games. In the summer, we get to go on field trips and ride rides.”

  “See?” Mel said.

  “It gets a little boring after lunch sometimes, though. But it helps when Grandma Virginia comes over with her dog and tells us stories. She’s funny.”

  June snorted and got soda up her nose. “Sorry,” she said, coughing.

  “The dog usually sleeps in a wagon. I think she’s older than Grandma Virginia.”

  June handed her nearly full French fry container to Ross. “You can split these with your dad. I have to go line up the parade.” She sent a meaningful glance to Mel. “Right outside the gate behind the depot in the Wonderful West.”

  “I know where it is,” Mel said. “Good luck.”

  “See you around, Ross. Make sure your dad takes you on the Swirler,” she said, grinning. She walked away but heard Ross say, “I thought you hated the Swirler, Dad.”

  She didn’t risk a glance back because she knew Mel wouldn’t look pleased. Not many people knew that the big, tough head of maintenance—the man who’d walk the tracks on the tallest coaster—hated spinny rides. In fact, they brought Mel to his knees, begging for mercy and a puke bucket.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  WHY WAS HE saying yes to an idea that made every possessive gene in his body break out into a cold sweat? Handing Ross over to wave and smile at thousands of people in the daily parade was like sending him off to college. Okay, maybe Mel was panicking out of proportion. But Ross was all he had and he was all his. For at least another decade.

  Still, the kid was excited about having a “summer job,” and Mel knew no one at the Point would let any harm come to Ross—they’d be afraid Mel would pull out a power tool and exact an excruciating revenge.

  He had to let go once in a while. Today was just a little test.

  Clutching his son’s hand, he walked Ross to the employee gate behind the train depot in the Wonderful West. June had mapped out a course winding from the West, up the Sea Devil midway as it was now called, up one side of the front midway, a tight turn at the front gates, and then back the other side of the midway and through the Wonderful West to the depot gate. The entire course was almost two miles.

  Mel had walked this course a thousand times, driven it in a pickup or ridden in a maintenance cart. Never had he been part of a moving spectacle like a parade, complete with a high school band and light-footed dancers. Today, he would be a stalker moving alongside the parade, keeping his eye on his son.

  “Sure you want to do this?” he asked as he used a key from a large ring to unlock the gate. Even on his day off, he had keys to almost everything in the park. Just in case.

  “Uh-huh. It’ll be fun. I get to ride in the front seat and throw candy. It’s an important job.”

  Mel nodded seriously. “You’re right about that.”

  He spied June talking to a small group of performers standing behind the silver parade truck. He imagined her giving them last-minute orders. She still wore the trim navy blue skirt and white blouse she had on at lunch, but she’d added a sparkly silver vest. He hoped she was wearing comfortable shoes. Starlight Point was a beast on the feet.

  She turned quickly, seeing the gate swing open or sensing their movement. A wide smile crossed her face when she saw Ross and she motioned for him to come over. Mel had to jog a little to keep up.

  “This is the young man I was telling you about,” June said, presenting him to the dancers. “Ross Preston. Lucky for us, he’s available nearly every day, so he’s going to be our official mascot and candy tosser.”

  The summer performers all smiled at Ross and welcomed him while June swung open the back door of the truck and rummaged for something. She reappeared, grinning at Mel, as she presented Ross with a sparkly silver baseball hat.

  Mel grimaced at the sequins. He wanted to say something about sparkly stuff being for girls, but he held his tongue in deference to the other male performers who flashed and glimmered in the sun like silverfish.

  “Cool,” Ross said.

  “Very shiny,” Mel said, addressing June.

  “I knew you’d like it,” June replied, shooting him a challenging look. She knew he wouldn’t wreck this for his son no matter how much he hated the shiny hat. And the shiny beer truck.

  “You’re getting a little sunburned,” June said. “Maybe I should get you one of these. Really deflects the sun.”

  “No, thanks, I’ll just stick to the shady side of the parade route.”

  “Good luck with that. It’s going to be a long walk.”

  “I can hardly feel my feet anyway.”

  Mel had no idea where the idea came from—well, maybe he did. Maybe this thought had been in his head for as long as he’d been trying to get June out of his head.

  “Are you busy later?”

  “Later?”

  “This evening,” Mel said. “Ross is still going strong—especially if you let him ride in the truck and have candy. He won’t want to give up on our day of fun until the lights go out on the midway.”

  “And?”

  “And I’ll almost be desperate enough to pull a main breaker and shut down the park about eight o’clock tonight. I’m going to need reinforcements.”

  “Come on,” June said, tapping Mel playfully on his chest. “You’re used to long days here. Don’t tell me you can’t handle spending twelve hours hitting the rides with the cutest boy in the state.”

  “Working twelve-hour days is easier.”

  “How?”

  “I can put my feet up on my desk while nobody’s looking.”

  June raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “We also get free massages at lunchtime since maintenance is the heart and soul of this place.”

  “No kidding?”

  “Bet you didn’t know about that part. I’m pretty sure it was Evie’s idea.”

  “Right. That sounds just like my practical accountant sister whose favorite question is ‘How much is that going to cost?’”

  “And when I’m working, I have my own cart,” Mel continued. “And a truck. My feet—”

  “Give me a break. You’re wearing sneakers, so you don’t get to whine. Look at these,” she said, pointing at her shoes.

  Mel took the opportunity for a long look. He started where her skirt ended just above her knees and let his eyes linger on her shapely calves, trim ankles and feet he’d like to massage the miles out of.

  “They’re dancing shoes,” June supplied.

  “I imagine.”

  Ross barreled over, looking at the ground between his dad and June. “Is there a cool bug or something? Spider?”

  “Nope,” Mel said. “Just feet.” Ross sighed and returned to the back of the truck where the performers were gathered. He put on his hat and joined the circle, looking like he took his new job very seriously.

  “So, you were attempting to ask me something?” June asked.

  “Want to play with us this evening? Ride some rides?”

  “Will you stop complaining about your feet?”

  “Probably not. But I’ll move on to my head or my ears or something.”

  “If you didn’t scream so loud on the kiddie coasters, you’d be okay,” June said.

  “Maybe you should hold my hand.”

  “Not in front of Ross. I’d hate for him to think his dad’s a fraidy-cat when it comes to rides.”

  “Only the spinny ones,” Mel said.

  “I could take mercy on you and
send you out for ice cream while I ride those with Ross. It’ll be our little secret.”

  June stood very close, the sun lighting her cheeks and making her hair shine in waves over her neck and shoulders. Heat seared Mel, and it wasn’t just the white-hot concrete they stood on. He was probably inviting trouble by asking June to spend the evening with him and Ross.

  But there was almost nothing he could touch or think about at the Point that didn’t have a little piece of June attached. Even if—when—she left for good at the end of the season, she would leave an indelible mark everywhere. Especially on him.

  The visit from his ex-wife should have reminded him how foolish it was to open your heart to someone who had no intention of sticking around.

  He was being a fool.

  But if he only had a little longer with June, then he had a right to enjoy it. Maybe it wasn’t fair to drag Ross into it, but the little guy would also be a safety barrier between them. And Mel needed it more than he was willing to admit.

  * * *

  JUNE DROVE HOME in the late afternoon and changed her clothes. Nondescript shorts with a secure pocket for money, T-shirt, sneakers. Nothing extra they’d have to store in the bins on the coaster platforms. She and her siblings often had play nights in the park when they were younger, when they wore nothing to identify them as the owners’ kids. Now owners themselves, they still had good reason to go undercover.

  When they were teenagers, June, Evie and Jack would try to break their own records for the number of rides in one evening. They’d racked up countless trips on the coasters, Skyway cars and carousel. They’d been thrown off the kiddie rides by summer employees who didn’t recognize them as the Hamilton trio. They’d spent an excruciating summer evening trying to see how many round-trip excursions they could tally on the steam train.

  “You look happy,” Mel said, coming up on June’s blind spot as she watched a young couple trying to decipher the park map while fighting a small breeze off the lake. They’d probably end up in a fight in another five seconds and June had been considering helping them out when Mel and Ross arrived.

  “I was thinking,” June said, “about all the fun I had with my brother and sister on summer nights like this one.”