Gypsy Girl and Horse Lovin' Boys (5 page)

I whimpered slightly before clenching my jaw to silence myself.

“I’m here.” Josh rubbed my back lightly.

I glared at Ezra, swallowed hard before taking a step closer to hand Noah the ponytail holder.

“I’m fine,” I said to convince myself more than anyone else. Gripping the stall door, I let Ezra nudge me for attention. My heart wanted to escape my chest again as my hand welcomed the horse, running my fingers down her neck. When my feet actually stayed put, I smiled.

Noah handed me a ponytail full of Ezra’s mane. “I needed to cut more off for her bridal,” he said.

I held it up in front of me. “I like it. Now I’ll think of that fifty shades joke instead of the horse thanks to Josh.” I bumped my shoulder into his.

“At least you’ll remember me. Most people don’t.” Josh smiled and stuffed his hands in his pockets. He must have figured I wasn’t going to run away anymore.

“You want to come in here with your sister?” Noah asked.

“Not yet. Maybe tomorrow though. Cessie, are you ready to come down?” I asked.

“No, never. I could stay here forever.”

“I don’t know about that. We need to go home to check on Peppy real quick and make sure he hasn’t thrown poo all over the Caravan.” I forced my mouth to stay serious as I glanced at Josh.

“Seriously?” He gave me a disgusted look.

I laughed at him. “Seriously, it has never, ever happened. I just wanted to see the look on your face.”

“I didn’t know I was so entertaining.” Josh turned and kicked at the straw to feign being hurt. He side-glanced up at me and smiled.

“I hope you aren’t mocking me,” I said.

“No, I’m sorry. I wouldn’t do that.” He touched my arm lightly to reassure me.

“I just wanted to make sure.” I stepped out of the way when Noah opened the door to the stall.

“Can we hang out at your ship castle again?” Josh asked.

“We can hang out inside. Mom doesn’t want fairgoers to get any ideas about climbing all over the outside of the Caravan.”

With the stage floor up, the Caravan was cramped with merchandise boxes stacked along the wall. It always smelled like a zoo inside after a few hours once everything was closed up.

Cessie promptly removed Millie’s water cup.

When I took Peppy out and clipped the leash on him, Josh stood up to leave.

“I need to go outside.”

Perched on my shoulder, Peppy groomed my hair. We were blocking the hall so Josh had no way to leave.

“I thought you were kidding,” I said. “You know, trying to make me feel less embarrassed over my irrational fear of horses.”

“No, I wasn’t.” Josh sat back down on the pillow bench and scooted back.

He flinched, pulled his legs up, and covered his face when a brown glistening blob plopped on the floor.

“I told you! I told you monkeys always fling their poop.” Josh pointed at the floor and scooted even farther away from Peppy and me.

I bent down to examine it. “What is that?” Leaning closer, the brown pile looked familiar and didn’t smell bad. I made Peppy get off my shoulder to check his pants.

“I don’t know what that is.” I couldn’t identify it .

Noah kneeled down across from me and sniffed.

Before we dared to touch it, Cessie wiped it up with a paper towel. She held a chocolate pudding cup in her other hand.

Noah pointed at it with his mouth wide open.

“I did it. My pudding burped.” Cessie smirked. “You kept talking about poop. It just made me want some chocolate pudding.”

We laughed until our sides hurt. That was all of us except Josh.

I set Peppy’s tray of fruits and vegetables inside his cage and he went in willingly.

Cessie handed me a filled water cup for Millie’s cage.

“Did you do that on purpose?” I whispered.

“Duh.”

“I don’t call you Cesspool for nothing.” I bumped my hip into her side.

“I’ll admit to earning that gross name this time.” She couldn’t stop giggling.

The four of us left the Caravan for the rides again.

We were all laughing when we stumbled out of the House of Mirrors. Josh checked his phone so intently that he almost bumped into someone.

“Sorry.” Josh apologized to the stranger. He tugged on Noah’s sleeve. “Look what Bree posted.”

Josh’s faced flushed and his eyes were full of fury. When Noah finished watching, he was furious too.

“What is it?” I asked trying to take a peek.

“Nothing,” they both said in unison.

Pressing my lips together, I placed my clenched fists on my hips. “If you’re both angry, it’s not nothing.”

Josh rubbed his phone against his shirt and looked at Noah.

Noah hung his head, hitching his thumbs in his pockets. “We probably need to go talk to the girls. There’s a problem.”

“Do you have to go?” Cessie asked, disappointed.

“For a little while,” Noah said.

“What is it?” I folded my arms. The way they shifted their weight from foot to foot and took their hats off, rubbing their heads, they had to be keeping something from me. “Please tell me so I don’t imagine the worst.”

“One of the girls posted a Vine, and I don’t know where else she posted it, from when you fell earlier today.” Josh’s face reddened even more. “It wasn’t Kelly and I don’t have any dirt the other two girls to line them out. You know, they were perfectly nice girls until Kelly got to them. How about you stay with Sera, Noah. Make sure nothing else happens.” Before Noah could answer, Josh stormed off.

I felt paralyzed and all the blood in my body must have collected in the pit of my stomach. I was about to be sick. Falling had been bad enough with only a few people there to witness it. Now everyone could watch me fall all over again.

“Don’t worry. He’ll take care of it. I’ll make sure you don’t have any more issues with them tonight. Are you ready to go home?” Noah steadied me on my feet.

“You promised we’d go on the small Ferris wheel. The line is short now,” Cessie whined.

I gave Noah a questioning look. I couldn’t speak yet, I was about to cry.

“I think we shouldn’t let the girls ruin an otherwise really fun night.” He held onto my arm as we walked to the line. He didn’t let go until he was sure I was able to stand steady on my own. Actually, I think he liked having an excuse to hold onto me and I sure didn’t mind it at all.

As we waited in line, Cessie told Noah all about the Ferris wheels at other fairs. I folded my arms tight against my chest, keeping an eye on the crowds around us, and wondered if the girls were lurking somewhere.

Finally, it was our turn to get on. Noah made sure I sat in the middle while Cessie complained about sitting on the end.

“Look, I’m on an end too. So you’re just like me.” His comment calmed Cessie down. He rested his arm on the back of the seat once we were latched in. I gripped the bar and sighed. I really wanted to enjoy being with him but I couldn’t.

He whispered in my ear, “It will be all right.” He rested a hand on my shoulder and pulled me closer.

“If I just go do my own thing and stay away from you guys the rest of the week, do you think they’ll stop?” I blinked back the tears seeping out of the corners of my eyes. I discreetly wiped them away.

“Why would you want to do that? Then they win.”

“I wasn’t out to play a game or pick a fight. I just wanted friends and I seem to be creating enemies with all
your
friends.”

“When you met us, you caught all of us together on a good day. You don’t know Kelly. She likes getting her way and she wasn’t going to get it when it came to me. I guess the timing of all of us meeting you is the problem. She has misdirected her negative attention to the wrong person. She should be lashing out at me.” He hugged me. When he moved his arm from my shoulders, his watch tangled up in my hair. As the Ferris wheel went round again, I had to turn my head and face him, like almost stick my face in Noah’s while he worked on freeing the buckle from my hair. When he pulled my hair by accident, he cradled the side of my face with his free hand, “I’m so sorry.” He rested his forehead on mine for a second. That just made my heart race and I welcomed the tugs and pulls on my hair so he’s be sweet to me again.

Noah continued to struggle to free his watch from my hair with one hand. We laughed at our predicament when our heads bumped together once the Ferris wheel abruptly stopped.

I was finally detached from Noah when it was time to get off.

“Man that was awkward.” He rocked back and forth on his heels while we waited for a text from Josh. The few minutes we waited felt like forever. He pulled out his phone. “Josh wants to meet us at the far end of the carnival.”

Once we met up with him, he said he wasn’t able to resolve anything. He couldn’t find the girls. All that was left to do was walk us home.

“I’m sorry the night ended on such a downer.” Josh stared off in the distance while we stood in a half circle in front of the Caravan.

“Me too.” Noah briefly brushed my arm with the back of his hand.

It gave me chills and I smiled, glancing at him. We were standing in the shadows and his pinky caught mine for a second before he followed Josh.

Josh turned to wave as they walked away.

When Cessie disappeared inside, relief washed over me. I was so tired of listening to her whine. Thankfully, we had worn Cessie out completely so she wouldn’t be whining much longer.

I leaned against the Caravan and watched the boys as they headed back towards the carnival on their way to the campground. I knew for a fact that Noah liked me more after our fun that night and it wasn’t a figment of my imagination. He was discreet with his flirting when Josh was around, though. Then it struck me. Josh wasn’t just friendly and funny with me to be nice. He liked me too. My chest tightened with feelings that were more anguished than warm and fuzzy.

When I entered our room, Cessie carried on with her sniveling. I crawled across the bed and out the window. Settling on the roof with my tablet, it was sinking in that I suddenly had more problems than I thought.

I used Noah’s Facebook friends list to look up Josh. I hadn’t friended him, but I could see he was tagged in the video that was posted on his timeline from that morning’s fall. My finger hovered over the screen to play it. I changed my mind. All the likes and comments that said it was so funny brought tears to my eyes. I finally let go and cried. I struggled to read Josh’s comments through my tears.

Josh: There’s nothing funny about this.

Rachel: You were trying not to laugh and would think it was funny if you didn’t like Seraphoney so much.

Josh: I do like her. Why be mean? What did she ever do to you? You, Bree, and Kelly are just jealous. Get over it and leave Sera alone.

Their comments continued to go back and forth but I didn’t want to read on. I went to Noah’s page. His Timeline had the pictures of the three of us when we were posing on the Caravan. I smiled and wiped away my tears. I slid each picture across the screen. There were the ones Josh took of the four of us on the rides together. They made me laugh. I didn’t realize Josh was making so many funny faces. When Noah took pictures and Josh was behind me, I remembered his hand on my shoulder, but I didn’t remember how he posed so close to my face. I could actually see it in the pictures. He liked me. How come I didn’t pick up on that when we were together?

I examined my own face in all the pictures. There was the reason why. I was focused on Noah most of the time and didn’t notice Josh’s flirting. I hugged the tablet against my chest and squinted at the rides to blur the lights so they blended and swirled. How was I going to handle that? Noah was showing more interest in me and I hadn’t noticed Josh was showing even more. I’d never had one boy like me for long and this time I had two. Mom would say it was feast or famine. I rubbed my forehead when my head started to ache.

Sunday

Sunday’s shows went well and the day was mostly uneventful. Josh texted, wanting to meet up when the last show was over so the four of us could hang out again. I went to the barn willingly for another visit with the horses for Cessie’s sake. Noah even convinced me to go into the stall with Ezra. I wasn’t going to chicken out. I did have to manage my fear so it didn’t show as I kept my back against the wall, far from the horse. Freaking out all over inside, I thought I would pee my pants if the horse did anything I didn’t expect. Thankfully, I didn’t have to suffer any more humiliation. Ezra didn’t do anything out of the ordinary.

When we went to the Carnival, I encouraged Cessie to ride some of the rides she’d never been on because I had been working on my fear with horses for her. This time I paid attention to how Josh flirted with me compared to Noah. He touched me more often, he cracked more jokes, he was protective. Noah was subtle, he bumped into me when Josh wasn’t looking, rested his hand on mine when no one could see, touched the small of my back when we were sitting together. His foot bumped mine. He didn’t crack jokes the way Josh did, but he enjoyed Josh’s sense of humor thoroughly. Then it hit me, maybe I shouldn’t favor either of them or else I could be the source of messing up their friendship too. I decided then and there that things wouldn’t go any further than the flirting that was already going on. It was innocent enough.

Everything was going fine, no confrontations with the girls at all, as it was getting late. Cessie yawned and whined that she was done. However, I really wanted to ride the Zipper.

“I’m not riding that. I’ll wait here with Cessie,” Josh said, pulling out his phone.

Noah playfully pushed me ahead of him. I pressed my lips together while my chest filled with flutters and hid my smile when both his hands rested on top of my hips as he guided me between the rails to the end of the short line. Noah’s fingers brushed over mine on the rails teasingly. I tried to catch his fingers with my thumb. When I caught one, he leaned closer and his chest pressed against my back briefly.

“I love the Zipper.” Remembering to keep some distance, I turned to lean against the rail and watched the caged seats flip and spin as we waited for our turn. We were next.

“Aww. I hoped you’d be scared so I could hold your hand in the confines of that cage where no one can see.”

I wanted to ask him if he meant so Josh couldn’t see. “Well, I didn’t say that I wasn’t scared, I think being scared is what makes me like this ride so much.”

“It didn’t work that way with horses.”

“Stop reminding me.” I scowled at him.

“Sorry.” Noah squeezed my hand.

Guilt washed over me. He really meant it.

We climbed in our seat and were safely latched in by the carnie. Cessie and Josh were standing on the side where they could see us load. He was engrossed in his phone until he looked up at us, or actually at our cage.

I couldn’t tell for sure, but he looked mad like he had been the night before. I didn’t want to know. Having things go so well all night was too good to be true. I shook my head, gripping the bars in front of my face. Noah’s hand covered mine at first. Once the ride started, he quickly moved it over to his own bar. I screamed and he did too. We laughed and screamed some more as we flipped upside down and all around. Once our ride was over, Josh walked off as soon as we stumbled down the ramp.

“He said for me to tell you see you later?” Cessie was confused.

Noah ran off after Josh.

Somehow I already screwed things up. I waited with Cessie while Josh and Noah argued.

Noah pointed at Josh’s phone as he explained something to him. Josh shook his head, pointed at me before storming off, leaving Noah behind.

He wasn’t smiling anymore when he returned. “Josh is upset for sure. He’s totally jumping to conclusions.” Noah stuffed his hands in his pockets. “I’ll walk you two home.”

I didn’t prod him. I figured I’d find out soon enough. When he stood outside the door of the Caravan after Cessie went inside, I rested my hand tentatively on Noah’s chest.

“Before this new mess happened, I had decided that I wasn’t going to get in the middle of your friendship. I have a feeling I unintentionally did just that,” I said.

“It’s not your fault. Someone’s meddling again. He likes you a lot and can’t see reason right now.” His hand covered mine and he gently removed it from his chest. He held my hand longer than I expected.

“I didn’t realize he liked me that much until last night.”

“For real? You didn’t?”

“No. But I’ve never had this problem before, boys liking me. I’m somewhat clueless.” I shrugged.

“I find that hard to believe.”

“I don’t go to school and don’t have friends that can clue me in on this stuff. I have a pain-in-the-butt sister that is great at pointing out my flaws to anyone with ears, a monkey, a bird that mocks me, and a mom that never stays put. I mean, I couldn’t be more gypsy. I’ve tried really hard not to be one. But I guess I can’t help it.”

“I guess not.” He moved a few wayward strands of hair off my face. “I better go so I can fix this. I can usually win him over pretty quick when these things happen.”

“This has happened before?”

“Yeah.”

“How many times?”

“I don’t know.” Noah took his hat off only long enough to rub his head. “That sounds awful doesn’t it? You have to remember, we’ve been friends a long time. This problem goes all the way back to elementary school. I’m going to go before you decide you don’t like either one of us.”

“I don’t think that will happen. It seems like it would be the other way around with how things are going. I’ll be lucky to have one friend by the time the week is over.”

“I promise if that is the case, the one friend will be me.” He squeezed my arm and he let his fingers slide down to my hand. His fingers linked in mine for a second before he ran off.

I needed space from Cessie so I immediately climbed out to the roof to work out my ever-growing problems. Mom always stayed at the concerts until way late and who knew what else she was up to.

After I stealthily removed the tablet from our room without Cessie knowing, I pulled up Facebook and on Noah’s page was a picture of when his watch tangled in my hair. That’s not what it looked like at all, though. I turned my head to the side trying to figure out how whoever posted it made it look like Noah was kissing me. I couldn’t see his face but I could see how that assumption could easily be made. I didn’t recognize the name of the person that posted the picture. I sighed. My phone vibrated. I expected to see a text from Mom. It surprised me that it was from Noah.

Noah: Didn’t work this time. He won’t let me in the tent. Can I come over?

Me: Yes

Noah: Almost there

I peered over the edge and there he was, hunched over and dejected with his hands in his pockets, walking across the grass to the Caravan. I tossed the rope ladder over the side and waited for him.

Noah sat beside me on the roof. “I guess he wasn’t willing to hear reason and wants to stay mad.” He pulled off his hat and set it beside him

I kept glancing at him. Noah wearing a hat was so imprinted in my mind that he looked completely different without it and even more endearing. All I wanted to do was run my hand through his hair to fix his hat hair. Of course that was just a great excuse to touch him. It wasn’t nice to have flirty thoughts like that when Josh’s feelings were hurt because of me. Or was it that Josh realized Noah liked me too? It didn’t matter. Josh was hurt.

I sighed again. Silly boy problems were complicating everything.

“You were right. It is really pretty up here watching the rides at night.” He leaned back on his arms. One hand was behind me.

“Yeah, that’s my favorite thing to do since we’ve been here. I don’t always have a great view of the lights in some places we have been, but here, this is the best. Try squinting. It makes the lights look different and even prettier.”

Noah did. He looked as if he was giving me a cheesy smile. I laughed.

“What? You told me to do it.”

“I did. You looked really cute that I couldn’t help but laugh.” I leaned back onto the pillows I pulled through the window and Noah leaned back too.

He turned on his side to look at me.

I tried to ignore that he was staring at me.

He started tickling my arm.

“Isn’t this why Josh is mad at you?”

“He already knows how this is going to turn out.”

“How’s that?”

“That you liked me first. That maybe I’ll get the first kiss.”

I didn’t expect him to say that. A shock-wave washed over me and my cheeks warmed. I clenched my fists, my toes curled, and I made sure I didn’t start breathing too fast when my heart sped up.

He lightly tickled my arm all the way down to my hand. Noah rested his chin on my shoulder as he continued to stare at me.

I focused my attention on the rides. Even though I was pretending he wasn’t there, I could feel his entire presence. His warm breath on my neck, his gaze locked on my face, his hand holding mine, the warmth coming from his chest. He was so close to my arm that I could feel how fast his heart was beating.

“I told you I didn’t want to mess up your friendship,” I whispered.

“He’s upset because he already knows. He told me. He knows we didn’t do anything, at least not yet, and that it was inevitably going to happen.”

I practically trembled with how he was talking. Had he come just so he could kiss me? Was he trying to get back at Josh?

“Did Josh really kick you out?” My voice trembled.

“Yes.” Noah rolled onto his back. “I’m moving too fast. I’m sorry. This just has the perfect set up for the perfect first kiss. You’re right. I don’t need to push this while Josh is all upset.” Noah sat up and hugged his knees. He didn’t say anything for a few minutes. However, it seemed like forever. “I like how the pattern changes on the giant Ferris wheel. We haven’t been on that one yet.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. What had I done? But what did I want? I sat up, crossed my legs, and inhaled deeply to give me courage once I knew. I drew the letter ‘I” on his back with my finger. Then I wrote ‘a m s o r r y” and waited. He shook his head and I wrote it again. He looked at me and smiled, letting his hand fall to my knee.

‘K I S S M E ?’ My heart was pounding in my ears as I wrote each letter and I waited.

When he figured it out, he turned, cupped his hand on my cheek, and pressed his soft lips against mine. The rush consumed me all the way to my toes. The kiss was better than I expected. I opened my eyes when he pulled away and he was looking at me. He pulled my ponytail holder out of my hair and kissed me again, holding my face close to his as he kept kissing me, making me lie back on the pillows. He slid closer beside me, kissing me over and over until he paused.

I let my hands slide into his hair. So soft. The big loose curls tangled around my fingers. He closed his eyes. I stroked his cheek with my thumb. He leaned down to meet my mouth again. He held me close as he turned onto his back and stopped kissing me. I rested my head on his shoulder. He trailed his fingers lightly on my arm.

“Will your mom be home soon?” he whispered.

“Maybe. I don’t know. There’s a bar at the bowling alley that’s open later than here and sometimes she meets friends there.”

I closed my eyes as his heart rapidly drummed against my cheek. I wanted to feel his voice rumble in his chest.

“Can you tell me why you’re so sure Josh will get over this so easily?”

“Are you going to stop wanting to kiss me if I tell you?” Noah held me tighter.

“No. It’s not like we are going to be girlfriend and boyfriend after this week or anything.”

“Are we having a fling?” He lessened his hold on me.

“I guess. That sounds unimportant though.”

“I agree. This is more special than a fling.” Noah sighed. “It’s complicated with me and Josh. We are great friends. I don’t know what I’d do without him. I also don’t know why girls tend to like me first. I do know why
you
did. We met first.

“What’s worse is most of the time girls don’t even like him second. He tries pretty hard, though. If I’m there, he doesn’t get far. The other problem might be that we go to a small school. Everyone has known us both for a long time. I had girlfriends starting in fifth grade. He wished he did. In sixth grade, he did get his first, but she was just using him to try to get close to me. Then in junior high, I had a few girlfriends. I quickly got tired of it. I found I didn’t really care for most of those girls once I got to know them. The girls kept trying. I figured out that they didn’t necessarily like me because of me. They either wanted to hang on me and show me off or they used me to get close to the horses. Horses typically attract more girls than flies. When I discovered that, I thought it was gold at first. Then the girls were all about the horses all the time. I love my horses, but that wasn’t working for me either. In high school, I’ve avoided the ones we’ve known forever. I got burned by plenty of them.

“Now there is you. You don’t care about the horse thing and you want to be with us because we’re fun, not just something nice to look at.”

I rubbed my cheeks. They started to warm a little. “But one of the reasons I liked you was because you are kind of nice to look at.”

“So are you. There’s nothing wrong with that. Actually, I think it’s your rainbow colored hair I like the most. I don’t remember seeing that the first time I met you. The whole looks thing was just a bigger deal to those other girls, totally superficial like a status thing. You know, like an expensive pair of shoes they wanted to be seen in.”

“I get it.” I rubbed his chest. The T-shirt material was my favorite and so was his chest. I wished he could stay right where he was all night.

Noah held me tight and tilted my chin up. I thought he was going to kiss me again. He gazed at me instead and played with my hair. I rested my chin on my hand against his chest.

He wrapped his other arm around me and pulled me up so my face was close enough to kiss. Noah started with my forehead. Next, he kissed my nose and then my mouth. He lingered there, kissing me slowly several times. “I need to go before your mom comes home.”