Swept Away (28 page)

I know another thing too.

I love him. Truly and really. I love him. Simply and with no reservations.

And shockingly, given my usual state of insecurity, I know he loves me, too.

Not wish. Not hope.

Know.

I also know he's leaving. Every time I think of it my heart squeezes. But I keep focused on the micro. Today. This minute.

Which is just about perfect.

I
haven't been to a state fair since I was . . . I guess about your age,” Oliver's mom says.

Alice is driving Oliver, Cynthia, and me to Franklin to meet up with Patti and Kyle, Lexi, Joanna, and Vicki. I sit in the backseat with Cynthia, all too aware of the tension she and Oliver are both pretending doesn't exist.

It makes for a weird drive.

“How about you girls?” Alice looks at us in the rearview mirror. “Do you come every year?”

“When we were younger,” Cynthia says. The state fair is one of those things that's super fun when you're a little kid, and great to do when you're older and can go to the nighttime events. But when you're not dating, and can't drive, it's less of a “thing.” ­Cynthia hadn't been all that pumped for this outing, but she wants to hang with Joanna and Patti before they head for home.

“It'll be fun,” I say, hoping I'm right.

The fair is set up in the same spot every year since the 1890s. It features a midway with games and delectably junky food, a track where there are tractor pulls, a Native American dance performance, a crazy-cars parade (I'm relieved Oliver didn't know about that—he would have come up with some outrageous float for us to build in forty-eight hours!), vendors, a petting zoo, 4-H exhibitions, and lots of rides.

“It's really nice of you to drive us,” I tell Alice as she navigates the crowded parking lot. Trailers and trucks surround the wire fence draped with banners announcing the fair and various attractions. Oliver, Cynthia, and I slide out of the car. Oliver leans back into the window. “Thanks, Mom,” he says.

She takes a look at her watch. “How about I pick you up at seven? We can meet at”—she scans the lot—“that light at the far corner.” She glances at her cell phone on the dashboard. “It looks like there's a really good signal here, so if there's any problem . . .”

“I know the drill,” Oliver says. He pats the car and then she drives off.

Leaving me standing between my boyfriend and my best friend. Who aren't exactly fans of each other.

“We should look for the others,” I say. I figure there's safety in numbers.

As planned, the girls (and Kyle) are just inside the entrance. We buy our tickets (Oliver buys mine—so cute!), and Oliver immediately starts poring over the map and schedule of events. No surprise there. His complete (or is that “completist”?) absorption gives me a chance to chat with the girls as we decide what we want to do in a far less scientific and organized way than Oliver's.

By the time Oliver looks up from his papers, everyone has scattered. “Where'd they all go?” he asks.

“Don't worry. Plans and backup plans have been made,” I tell him.

Everyone has a different strategy for a day at the state fair. Patti seems to always be hungry, so she dragged Kyle to the food booths on the midway before doing anything else. Cynthia never eats until after she rides the most gravity-defying, stomach-­churning thrill rides, so that's where she and Vicki immediately raced to. Lexi and Joanna are into the carnival games, no matter how rigged they seem to be.

Me? I have something else in mind entirely.

Oliver pretends to pout. “And why wasn't I consulted?”

I grin and slip my arms around his waist. “You complained that it was a lot of work having to come up with things to do all summer. Today, I'm in charge!”

He wads the map and the schedule into a ball, tosses it into
the air, and catches it. “I put myself entirely in your hands.”

“Oh, really?” I run my hands up and down his back. “Sure you won't mind?”

“Oh, I'm sure,” he says. He leans down and lets his lips ever so lightly brush mine. “In fact,” he says, his voice husky, “I wish you'd never let go.”

I quickly duck my chin, staring at my vivid blue high tops. My eyes fill with tears, and I clutch the back of his T-shirt, ­willing them to disappear. He pulls me closer and his arms come up around my shoulders and his head tucks into mine. I'm ­completely enveloped, and it makes it worse and better and worse.

“I know,” he says shakily. “But we can't . . . dwell.”

I laugh and wipe my face, breaking the circle he made around me. “Don't dwell. That's exactly what I'm always telling myself.” I push him lightly in the chest, making him stumble back.

He looks at me in surprise. “What?” he asks, hurt all over his face.

“I was doing so good!” I wail. “Not dwelling. Not thinking! Just . . . being. And then you have to be so sweet and . . .”

He grabs one of my flailing hands and brings it to his chest. “You've been great. Probably a lot better than me.”

“Really?” I squint up at him. We're having this intense and personal conversation at the entrance to the state fair at high noon. Well, it is what it is. At least we're surrounded by strangers, not neighbors.

He nods solemnly. “Really.”

“Is it bad of me to be happy that you're having as much trouble with this as me?”

He smiles. “Very bad.” He gives me a ridiculous, lip-smacking kiss, complete with a loud
mwah!
I giggle and push him away.

“Come on,” I say, tugging his hands and walking backward so I can pull him in the right direction. “There's something I want to do first.”

“Hey, you're in charge. I'll follow you anywhere.”

I bang into a garbage can.

“Except for maybe there,” he jokes.

“Very funny.” I turn around and we walk side by side, hands in each other's back pockets.

We stroll through the crowds, taking in whiffs of fried goodies, and somewhere under there the scent of animals and hay. We pass the thrill rides as I lead Oliver to the area where the calmer, gentler rides are set up.

“This is where we're going?” Oliver asks as I buy tickets for the carousel.

“If we don't do anything else all day,” I say, “I want us to do this.”

He shakes his head and smiles that twisty smile that he uses when he's humoring me, but I don't mind.

The merry-go-round's tinkling music slows down as it comes to a stop. I gesture toward the horses. “Pick one,” I say as we step up onto the platform.

He walks among the horses and poles and chariots and finally settles on a light brown horse with a dark brown mane and tail.
He pats its backside. “Hello there, Trigger,” he says. He swings up onto the saddle.

“Scoot back a little,” I tell him. I grip the pole and in a completely awkward way manage to seat myself in front of him. We don't really fit, but that's okay. Oliver wraps his arms around me and rests his pointy chin on my shoulder. This is the third fantasy scene from my romantic montage from all the way back in June. And now it's real. Like everything else has been. Maybe more real than anything else in my life till now.

W
hy did I eat that last funnel cake?” Patti moans. She sits on the curb, holding her stomach. People stream throughout the parking lot—families with kids leaving, older teens and adults arriving—as we wait for Oliver's mom.

“You're not going to hurl in my car, are you?” Kyle asks anxiously.

“Aren't you glad you're riding with us?” I whisper to Cynthia.

“No lie,” she agrees.

“Are you sure you don't want this?” Oliver asks me, holding out a stuffed lobster he'd won at ringtoss. “Or does your aversion to seafood extend to toys, too?”

“Uh, every kid in Maine has one of those,” I tell him. “You keep it.”

Lexi and Joanna each chomp down on their grilled corn on the cob, while Cynthia fiddles with her ridiculous oversize sparkly sunglasses. She pushes them up onto her head. “I think they work much better as a tiara, don't you?”

“Definitely,” Vicki says. She's wearing her own absurd pair.

“You guys don't have to wait for my mom to get here,” Oliver says.

“Yeah, they do,” Kyle says. “No food in the car. Dad will kill me.” He waggles a finger at Patti. “And no puking.”

“I'll do my best,” Patti says, standing.

“There she is,” Oliver says, pointing at the silver car coming into view.

He waves her down, and we say good-bye to the group. I hear Kyle anxiously asking Patti if she was really ready to get into a moving vehicle as I slip into the backseat after Cynthia.

“Have fun?” Alice asks as she winds her way around the lot.

“Yeah,” Cynthia says, sounding a little surprised.

“We never made it to the 4-H exhibits,” I say to Oliver. “Hope that doesn't offend your completist sensibility.”

“His what?” Alice asks.

As we head away from Franklin, I explain the completist concept, which has Alice nodding and laughing. Cynthia just watches the streets go by.

Once we're on the highway, Oliver asks, “What did
you
do all day, Mom?”

“Actually, I finally went to the lighthouse,” she says. “It really is charming.”

“Oliver did a good job with Candy Cane Jr., didn't he?” I say.

“He certainly did.” Alice smiles at him. If she weren't driving, she'd probably ruffle his hair.

Alice takes an exit, and we're back in more familiar wooded terrain. “What do you think your mother will do now that the lighthouse is closing?” she asks.

Oliver looks over the seat at me and then at his mom. “How do you know about it, Mom?” he asks.

“She and I have discussed it quite a bit. She knows I'm a financials person, so we strategized possibilities.”

“Mom hasn't actually mentioned it,” I admit. “Oliver and I found out about it by accident.”

“Candy Cane is closing?” Cynthia asks. “It's not much, but it's the only reason tourists come to Rock Bottom. Why would they close it?”

Her tone tells me she's surprised, but it's not that big a deal to her.

“There's just not enough money for upkeep,” Alice explains. “The thing is, a business like that can't survive on just a summer economy. There's too much competition.” Her eyes catch mine in the rearview mirror. “I know Candy Cane is special to you, but you have to find a way to make it special to outsiders.

“The only way it will work is if it's generating income year-round,” Alice continues. “Which means locals have to support it, and not only with fund-raisers. Not to mention needing a large influx of cash, pretty much immediately.”

“There's the auction at the Good-bye to Summer Festival,” I say hopefully.

“Every penny of this year's auction will have to go to existing bills. There won't be anything left over for next season. In fact, it may not be enough to cover what's already owed.”

I shut my eyes. “We can't just let it close,” I murmur.

I feel Cynthia pat my hand. “We'll think of something,” she says to my surprise. “We always do.”

I
call this meeting of Operation Save Candy Cane to order,” I say.

We're not in the library, because I don't want Mom over­hearing us. She still hasn't told us about closing, and also if we don't come up with a plan, I don't want her to be disappointed. But we need the Internet so we're on one of the benches nearby. Oliver and I sit on the grass with Lexi. Cynthia, Celeste, and Vicki share a bench with Justin on Skype.

I lay out the problem. Everyone's shocked, of course, but no one has any ideas. “I don't know if anyone would want it,” Oliver says, “but I'll donate the keeper's house replica I'm working on to the auction instead of the art fair.”

I beam at him. “Thanks.”

“What would bring more tourists?” Vicki asks.

“Not just tourists,” Justin says from my laptop. “Oliver's mom said we need more year-round attendance.”

I look around the Square, watching people go in and out of the stores. “They stay open all year, so why can't Candy Cane?” I ask, gesturing at Main Street.

“Too bad the food at the café is so bad,” Celeste says.

“It might actually make more sense to close the café to save money,” Justin says. “It probably costs more to run it than it earns.”

I write that in my notebook as something to suggest.

“People go for those replicas and restorations,” Lexi says. “Maybe the Keeper's Café can be turned back into what it looked like in the 1880s or something.”

“That would probably take a lot of money,” I say, but write that idea down too.

I tap my chin with my pen, trying to think of what made the most impact on the visitors. “Stories,” I say.

“Stories?” Celeste repeats.

“That's what can make Candy Cane more special,” I say. “The stories.”

“Brilliant!” Oliver says, already getting where I'm going with this.

“Like the ones you told those tourists the other day?” Cynthia asks.

“But more!” I'm getting excited. “We . . . we act them out! We tie them in to holidays! We do stories based on history and made-up ones too!”

“From the archives!” Cynthia says.

Oliver laughs. “Yeah,
your
archives
and
the ones at the historical society.”

“This could work,” Justin says. “Something that people in town can do all year long.”

“Everyone's always trying to find things to do with their kids,” Vicki says. “I should know. I babysit a lot, and there's not much to choose from.”

“School groups too,” Celeste adds. “I remember going on trips for stuff like this in Cranston. Why not here in Rocky Point?”