The Summer of Cotton Candy (5 page)

Just then, Candace spotted her target and grabbed Tamara’s arm before she knew what she was doing.

“Who?” Tamara asked, swinging her head around. “Zorro?” Candace nodded.

“He’s built.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Ah, so I take it you know this Zorro?”

“Not exactly. I’ve seen him a couple times, though.”

“So, you’re crushing.”

“Affirmative.”

Zorro did a slow spin in the street, showing off for some tourists.

“Definitely crush worthy,” Tamara noted.

Zorro turned toward them and nodded, flashing a smile at Candace. She felt her heart skip a beat even as she forced herself to wave nonchalantly.

Tamara was staring at her. “Now I get why you wanted to work here.”

“No,” Candace said with a smile. “He’s just one of the perks.”

It was Friday, her second day of work, and although Candace had woken up with her alarm, run a few errands for her mom, and gotten to work on time, she still wandered around for twenty minutes unable to find her cart. She had started in the Kids Zone where the cart had been the day before. The spot where it stood was empty. A referee who worked at the Painting Wall told her it had rolled on toward the Thrill Zone earlier that morning.

In the Thrill Zone, a referee at the Rimshot Coaster pointed her toward the Extreme Zone. When she hadn’t seen the cotton candy cart in the Extreme Zone she’d continued on into the Splash Zone, where she now stood, looking around.

“Cotton Candy, what’s up?”

She turned around and saw Josh. Her frustration and anxiety eased somewhat upon seeing him. “I’m trying to find my cart. I was supposed to start work almost half an hour ago, and the cart wasn’t where I thought it would be.”

He nodded. “Depending on the time of day and how much activity is happening in different parts of the park they move the carts around. There’s a big event today with some astronauts over in the Exploration Zone, so I bet it’s over there.”

“Real astronauts?” she asked.

“Yeah. They’re here to kick off the first day of Space Camp.”

“Seriously? We have a space camp here?”

He laughed. “Wow, Candy, you sure have got a lot to learn about what happens here at The Zone.”

“I guess so.”

“Give me a minute, and I’ll find out for sure where your cart is,” he said.

“Thank you,” she said, relieved.

She followed him to the entrance of Kowabunga, where he reached under the podium for a walkie-talkie.

“What number is your cart?” he asked.

“Five.”

He spoke into the walkie-talkie, “This is Josh over in the Splash Zone, and I’m looking for the whereabouts of cart number five. I’ve got a cotton candy operator here who needs to know where to go.”

She could hear the answer come back, “Exploration Zone, in front of The Atomic Coaster.”

“Thanks,” he said before putting down the handset. “You know how to get there?” he asked.

She nodded. “If I’d gone one Zone farther I would have found it on my own, sorry.”

He shrugged. “No big. Just watch out for Becca,” he said, turning to deal with some players.

“Who?” she asked.

“You’ll see,” he said.

Shaking her head, she resumed her walk. Three minutes later she found the cart in front of one of the most popular attractions in the park.

It was called The Atomic Coaster. Huge and imposing, it dominated the landscape in the Exploration Zone. It looked like a giant atom. Three oval tracks, one vertical and two diagonal, circled around a small ball in the center. Around the entire thing was a horizontal oval track which served as part of the loading mechanism. It was beautiful, and the glistening metal soared several stories high. Tourists called it by name, speaking of it in hushed, reverent whispers as though all the mysteries of science and the universe could be discovered by riding it. Season-ticket holders brazenly called it the Atom Bomb, pretending that, after a hundred trips spinning around like a whizzing electron, it didn’t scare them. The referees called it the Twirl and Hurl.

Candace walked up to the girl who was handing a cotton candy stick to a little boy. He turned and ran off, and the girl straightened to look at Candace. She was blonde and petite and, despite working with the cotton candy, had perfectly manicured nails. She glared at Candy.

“Hi, Lisa,” Candace said, reading the other girl’s name tag. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t find the cart. I thought it would be in the Kids Zone where I was yesterday.”

“They go where they’re needed. If you had checked in with the manager before coming into the park, you would have known that it was here.”

Candace opened her mouth to tell her that she had checked in with the manager who had said nothing about the cart’s location. She changed her mind, though, and snapped her mouth shut, gritting her teeth. The other girl had the right to be miffed about getting relieved late. “I’m sorry,” she said finally.

“You should be,” Lisa said. She turned and left.

“That could have gone better,” Candace mumbled.

“What could have gone better?” a voice asked just over her shoulder.

Candace jumped, startled, and turned to see a girl standing there wearing khaki pants and a striped khaki shirt, the outfit for Exploration Zone referees.

“I… uh… that is… it was nothing.”

“Oh, good. I thought Lisa was being mean to you. She can be a bit cranky.”

“So I noticed,” Candace said, smiling.

“Careful, she can play some dirty tricks too.”

“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You’re new, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I’m Candace,” she said holding out her hand.

“Becca,” the other girl said, shaking hands.

Just watch out for Becca
, Josh had said. Candace wondered what he had meant. After two seconds she already knew that she liked Becca a whole lot better than Lisa.

“What attraction do you work here?” Candace asked.

Becca inclined her head toward one of the smaller buildings. “I work at the Muffin Mansion.”

At the mention of muffins, Candace’s stomach growled angrily, reminding her that she had missed breakfast. She blushed. “I love muffins.”

Becca shrugged. “They’re good, but I prefer cotton candy.”

“I’d rather have the muffins,” Candace laughed.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea. You know if you sell food you get one free helping for yourself each day, right?”

“I remember vaguely someone saying something about that,” Candace said.

“Well, it’s true. Since you’d rather have a muffin, why don’t I trade you my free muffin for your free cotton candy?”

Candace stood for a moment, trying to figure out what the downside could possibly be. It seemed like a fair trade, and Martha had told her she could have one cotton candy a day. “Deal,” she said, shaking Becca’s hand again.

“Great! I’ll run over and get you a muffin. What kind would you like?”

“What kind do you have?”

“You name it, we probably have it. We have seventeen different types of muffins.”

“Chocolate with chocolate chips,” Candace said instantly.

“Excellent choice. I’ll be right back.”

Candace busied herself with the cart and had two customers before Becca returned with the muffin in a bag. Candace made her up a cone of the sticky pink sugar and handed it to her.

“Cool. Well, I gotta run. I’ll see you tomorrow, Candace,” Becca said, skipping off.

As she watched her go, Candace made a mental note to ask Josh why he had warned her about Becca. It made no sense. Maybe there were two Beccas. Or maybe he had confused her with someone else, like Lisa. Candace shivered.

It only took her a couple of minutes to realize that she had a perfect view of the ceremonies that were just beginning. A rudimentary stage had been set up, and she could see four astronauts sitting on it along with a couple of men in suits. In chairs on the ground were about a hundred Space Camp kids who were all wearing matching baseball caps with the NASA logo on them. From what she could tell, the camp officially started on Monday, but this event was for campers, parents, and fans of the space program.

After her lunch break, things were winding down in the Exploration Zone. Kids and parents scattered, and the guests of honor were hurried off field by referees. Twenty minutes later the zone seemed empty. The silence was eerie, and she half expected to see a tumbleweed blow through.

“Well, I guess it’s just you and me, cart,” she said.

As if in response, the cart gave a series of loud, high-pitched chirps. Candace jumped, startled. A low sound like a car motor began, and Candace took a step backward, suspicious and not sure that it wasn’t about to explode.

Suddenly the cart lurched sideways and began to move. She yelped and dove after it, grabbing the edge of the counter and pulling. It was no use; the cart kept moving forward, and since it was bigger and heavier than she was, it began to drag her along with it.

“This is so not happening!” she shrieked. She began to flail about with her left hand, trying to find the red panic button under the counter that Martha said would summon security. All she got for her effort was two broken nails and a third that bent backward painfully.

She glanced up just as the cart reached the railroad tracks. Candace let go of the counter and stepped back. The cart lumbered slowly over the tracks as Candace heard the whistle of the train.

“Not good, not good, not good!”

Even before she had started working at The Zone, she had heard the stories about Crazy Train Guy. Rumor had it he tried to run down referees and had succeeded on more than one occasion. She glanced toward the train. Maybe it wasn’t him. Maybe someone else was driving the train. She couldn’t tell. Even if she had been able to clearly see the figure in the engine, she wouldn’t have known because she wasn’t sure what he looked like.

The cart had almost reached the other side. She couldn’t lose it. Besides, the train was far enough away that it should be safe to cross. She stepped forward and instantly the train began to accelerate towards her. She jumped forward and tried to push at the cart — for the moment more terrified of something happening to it and her employer trying to take it out of her salary than concerned for her own well-being.

She could hear the train bearing down on her, the whistle piercing the air around her and making her head throb. And suddenly she was sure she was going to die. Two more jumps and she would be safe. She sprang, but her foot caught in the track and she started to fall. Twisting, she grabbed hold of the cart. She kicked her foot free and the cart dragged her off the tracks, banging her ankles hard against the pavement.

She and the cart reached the other side and the train roared past. Candace let go of the cart and fell onto her hands and knees. She twisted around to a sitting position and, raising her fist, shook it at the retreating caboose. She just wanted to sit and cry. She glanced down and saw that her ankles were bleeding. Unswayed by ankles and trains, the cart continued on its way. She scrambled to her feet and followed it, limping, until it came to a stop just inside the Game Zone.

Looking around at the kids in their baseball hats and the harried fathers trying to win stuffed animals and other prizes, she saw where everyone from the Exploration Zone had ended up.

And they all wanted cotton candy. Candy held up a hand to fend them off. She was still bleeding, and there was no way she was dispensing sticky sugary goodness in that state. Now that the cart was stable, it was seemingly easy to find the red button. And to their credit, security was there inside twenty seconds.

The lead guard took one look at her, called something in on his radio, and took charge of the situation. “This cart is temporarily closed,” he told the gathering crowd.

His partner, a guy that reminded her vaguely of some TV cop, put an arm around her and moved her quickly away. “It’s off to the nurse with you,” he said.

Fortunately, the nurse’s station wasn’t that far away, and Candace soon found herself sitting on a table while a grandmotherly sort swabbed and bandaged her cuts and scrapes.

“And just what happened to you, dear?” the woman asked sympathetically.

Candace blurted out the whole story. To her relief she did so without crying, although she could feel her lower lip trembling.

“They put those new carts in last year. They’re all computer controlled. When they decide business is slow and another location would be better, they move on their own. There’s nothing you can do to stop them,” the woman explained. “Someone should have warned you about that,” she sighed. “I think it’s become a bit of a prank to play on newcomers not to tell them.”

“It’s mean,” Candace said.

“Yes. It’s just lucky you weren’t injured more seriously by the cart or the train.” She gave Candace a cup of water and some aspirin. “Honestly, that man’s a menace. I’m surprised they let him play with those two trains. Eleven cars each — that’s an accident waiting to happen. I wouldn’t trust him with a toy train around the Christmas tree.