Mayne Attraction: In The Spotlight (16 page)

She laughed and scooted to the end of the
bed, taking my hands in hers.

“Do you think that when I’m married to
Trevor we won’t be friends anymore?”

I shook my head.

“No. We’ll always be friends, I know. But
things will be different. I mean…I’ll be totally happy for you and
everything. Trevor’s awesome. But you two will need time to be…you
two…not…we three.”

I sighed and smiled at her, trying to be
reassuring.

“When I’m on my own more, I know I’ll start
wishing I had what you have. You’re so happy and in love. I want
that too. It’s hard for me sometimes.” I laughed and continued,
“You scared me just now. I thought I had lots of time to get used
to the idea of Mrs. Samantha Redmond.”

She laughed too and squeezed my hands.

“Okay. Here’s the deal. He asked me if I
would marry him…someday…and I said yes, someday. There’s no ring,
no date, nothing official. I’m going to go to school, he’s going to
work and save up some money. Then, in a couple of years we’ll tie
the knot. Does that meet with your approval?”

I reached over and hugged her tight.

“Oh Sam! That’s wonderful. I’m so happy for
you. I knew this was going to happen. The first day he came…I knew
it then.”

She reached up and smoothed a tear off my
cheek. I was surprised at myself.

“These are tears of joy, right?” she asked,
unconvinced.

I tried to wipe my face with my forearm and
nod in the affirmative at the same time.

“Don’t be sad, El,” she said, hugging me
back. “Right now there’s a boy out there wishing for you just like
you’re wishing for him. You’re both on paths that will cross
someday, just like mine did with Trevor’s.”

My path crossed with one boy’s all the time
already. But it was probably too much to hope for some kind of
destiny with him.

She patted my shoulders and then reached up
to push my hair behind my ears.

“So here’s the plan: Keep rolling. That day
will be here before you know it, and when it finally happens, all
this fun we’ve had on the way there will be just like hors
d'oeuvres before the main course, or like fun stop offs on the road
trip of destiny. You’ll see. There’s plenty of happy to be had
right now, all along the way. Speaking of which, do you want
popcorn or cookies?”

She reached over and picked up the grocery
bag.

“Popcorn. Is there any Cherry Coke in there
to go with it?” I asked, jokingly.

To my delight, she pulled out a couple of
the small size twelve ounce bottles. They were still pleasingly
cold.

“Here’s to destiny,” she said.

Then she opened her bottle and took a sip. I
took a sip of mine too, and smiling big I added, “And sugar
comas.”

Chapter 15
–
King's Island

It was the third Friday in April. My mom was
very pleased with the arrangements I’d made to spend the weekend
with Sam. Sometimes it was difficult to gauge who was happier that
I had a best friend now, my mom or me. When I’d first introduced
Ms. Sun to my parents, I’d been careful to do so only after it was
well established that my new friend was the highlight of my life.
That way when they met her, out of pity for me and a desire to keep
me happy, no matter what the cost, they would smile and be pleasant
to my horrifying Goth girlfriend, instead of diving in front of me
like secret service agents when they saw her for the first
time.

But just like with any truly good person,
the shell seems to become less and less important as the inner core
becomes more and more apparent. Sam was extremely mature and easy
going and engaged my mom’s affections instantly. Her being good to
me was truly all that was necessary, though…and she excelled at
that.

I suppose Mom thought that we were just
going to hang out at Sam’s after school and then have a sleepover.
She didn’t ask for specifics and I didn’t offer them. The real plan
was to cut school and head to Mason, Ohio, a northern suburb of
Cincinnati, and the home of King’s Island amusement park.

I had been extremely skittish about cutting
class and leaving the state overnight, but it was in the name of
fun and Sam was counting on me. Her insistence that I always be
present when Trevor was around had never diminished, and with a
hotel reservation mixed into the plans, she’d made it clear that my
presence was mission critical. She didn’t use the term, but
eventually it dawned on me that I was their chaperone.

Goths needed chaperones?

Mine did, apparently. Maybe it was the
‘sophistication’ I added to the trio. Probably it was that they
needed a normal looking person to represent them in front of the
authorities. Whatever the draw, I was, as always, flattered and
grateful to be included.

A day at King’s Island was the opposite of
my idea of a good time, but I simply couldn’t say no to them.
Though, I had made it clear that I would only ride one roller
coaster one time. And that if I even sensed the mental vibration of
coercion to do any more than that I would hide from them the rest
of the day until the fireworks at ten o’clock.

Leaving the house at our normal time for
school put us at the park at exactly the time when the gates were
opening. I had debated about how I could let my security people
know my plans, but short of writing a leave-behind confession in a
diary, there didn’t seem to be a way to tip them off appropriately.
Instead I decided to let them earn their keep and scramble, the way
they would if I didn’t know about them. So when our car took the
ramp toward I-71 north, instead of staying straight on our way to
school, I knew that several people were on their way to having a
bad day…or maybe just an interesting one...hopefully.
Unfortunately, nobody would have time to pack clean underwear or a
toothbrush.

They had those things in Ohio, right?

Because it was a weekday, the crowd was
sparse, though some people had come to celebrate their Spring
Break. Neither Sam nor Trevor had ever been there before and they
were both very excited about the opportunity to ride everything
with absolutely no waiting. Though I felt sick with dread, I
dutifully marched them straight into Rivertown, the neighborhood of
the park that was the residence of ‘The Beast.’ It was a fitting
introduction to their experience at King’s Island.

For a person who hated roller coasters so
much, I still proved to be an excellent source of historical and
technical information about the world’s most famous roller coaster.
I explained interesting details like the fact that it’s the longest
roller coaster in the USA and the longest wooden roller coaster in
the world, sprawling over thirty-five acres, and producing a ride
that tops out at nearly seventy miles an hour, but still takes over
four minutes to complete. Some forty million riders had experienced
The Beast since it first opened in April of 1979. As of this
morning it would be forty million and three.

Though they thought I was humoring them,
which certainly worked to my advantage, I had other reasons for
riding The Beast. It was a connection to the past, and to my father
and grandfather, who had indoctrinated me with all the technical
data related to this attraction. Both of them were G force junkies,
and this ride provided three G’s on the big one hundred forty-one
foot drop of the first hill. I always rode with my eyes closed and
this day was no exception. In fact it was a helpful way to
facilitate the fantasy that I was riding with my dad by my side,
instead of Trevor. It was bittersweet. The last time I’d ridden it
on a cool spring day like this, my pilot dad was holding my hand,
hooting and hollering like a kid. The discomfort was worth the
memory, though, and surprisingly, I didn’t cry—because of the
discomfort or the memory.

Once my duty was fulfilled, I took up
residence at a table in the sun near the food court area of
Rivertown. They hurried off to experience the Diamondback roller
coaster and its seventy-four degree two hundred fifteen foot
drop.

No thank you.

I’d been itching for a chance to read my
latest paperback purchase, the third book in a best-selling
series—a story about a teenager like me and her dark and mysterious
love interest, an older man who also happened to be a vampire.
Apart from the supernatural, there were some seriously relatable
factors at play here.

Sam had recommended the story when we first
met, back in the fall. It wasn’t normally my kind of story, and I
wasn’t inclined to read anything remotely romantic at that time,
but she assured me that I would love it—which of course I did—until
I got to the second book in the saga. The story took an unexpected
turn down heartbreak highway and I could barely get through it. In
fact, when I realized that the hero was planning on leaving the
heroine for her own safety, I wanted to jump into the story and
warn her, suggesting that she take off on him instead, and see how
he liked being left high and dry. I even designed an exit strategy
for her, because after researching it I learned that Forks,
Washington actually does have a Mailboxes Etc. in town.

When I had angrily confronted Sam about the
upset the turn in the plot had caused me, she said, “Ellery, the
sad part of the story is important. It makes the happy
parts…happier.”

“Well, can I skip it or will I miss too
much?” I countered still very miffed.

“Yeah, you’ll just miss whatever you
skip.”

Her logical assessment along with my own
burning curiosity helped me muscle through the unpleasant parts of
the second installment. The story was very well written, but the
stunningly accurate descriptions of the feelings that go with
losing a loved one and losing the future you’d planned to have with
them were nearly too much for me.

Ultimately, Sam was right, and by the end of
the story, things had gotten back on track, more or less. I was
eager to see where things would lead in the third book of the saga,
blocking out all sensation of where I was to escape into a much
more interesting and enjoyable fictional landscape.

The scopophobic sensation, however, could
not be blocked. I fought it for a while, but then I had to look up.
Even a normal person would do that periodically, I told myself, if
for no other reason than to look around for her friends. So I
allowed myself brief glances at regular intervals. I smiled
internally with slightly pernicious satisfaction over the fact that
the security team would have to work extremely hard to stay out of
site today, since practically no one was here besides the Goths and
the attraction operators, and the cashier at the Steak Fry and
Funnel Cake shack.

The Goths were aglow with excitement and
pleasure from all the death defying amusement they’d been hopping
around to, unimpeded by others getting in the way trying to do the
same. This really was the right time to come. Besides there being
no line at any ride, it was also quiet and nice for reading. The
fact that I’d paid forty-eight dollars to do so was just part of
the ‘stupid tax’ for which my abnormalities and insecurities and
preferences made me constantly liable.

I had explained to Sam in the car on our way
north about the concept of ‘framily’. In life, you can’t choose
your family. And sometimes certain family members aren’t
necessarily your friends. But you can choose your friends, and when
you love them as much as family, that makes them framily.

It was my sad and pathetic little way of
explaining how much I loved them. They liked it, though, and agreed
about all of it—especially the part about the family not always
being friends, an obvious side effect of life as a Goth…or maybe
the cause?

Throughout the day I would take breaks from
my book to join them on Ellery-approved, and therefore totally lame
rides and attractions like Scooby-Doo and the Haunted Castle, the
Grand Carousel and the king of lame rides, the King’s Island and
Miami Valley Railroad. There was lots of vindictive pleasure to be
had in making everyone ride in a circle at five miles an hour
around the park on an old fashioned train ride. But they did it
anyway, because despite all that was backwards and unlikely and
lame about me, I was still, after all, framily.

Chapter 16
–
Great Wolf

We didn’t stay at King’s Island until it
closed at ten o’clock. Thank goodness for that. There are only so
many times you can ride roller coasters with no waiting, over and
over again, until you get bored with it…even if you are mentally
unbalanced enough to enjoy riding them in the first place.

We finally pulled away from King’s Island
around four o’clock and pulled in right next door to our hotel,
Great Wolf Lodge. Once inside our room that had three queen size
beds, one of which was positioned in a cool upstairs loft, with its
own bathroom up there, we took turns cleaning up.

Sam went first in our shared bathroom and
Trevor used his own private facilities in the loft area. I was
surprised when he came down looking completely normal. I’d seen him
this way only very rarely…just a few times during the winter. It
was a little unsettling because it wasn’t what I was used to,
though he was so incredibly handsome I felt sure I could get used
to it pretty quickly.

Why couldn’t they both just be gorgeous all
the time? But then again, how would I feel about myself if they
were? Makeup notwithstanding, I would always be the odd one out,
but it would still be worth it. They both had their reasons for
going Goth, though, and I loved them no matter how scary or
gorgeous they chose to be.

I was sitting on my bed digging in my wallet
and dumped out a handful of change. I had noticed a pop machine in
the hallway on our way in, and I wanted to get a bottle of Cherry
Coke that I could stash in the refrigerator for later. As I
carefully picked through the coins, I separated out the quarters I
would need for my drink from the special quarters (state quarters)
I hadn’t had the chance to review and isolate since I’d received
them in change earlier in the day. I’d been distracted at the time
thinking I’d seen Ash, but it was a false and disappointing
alarm.