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There were very few cars on the old country road but the ones that were there were not used to seeing a four-horse team pulling a giant glowing pumpkin that looked at them as they drove past.
Horses and carriages weren’t illegal on roads in Montana, but Linda hoped they wouldn’t run into any trouble.
“Who finished painting the barn?” Linda asked the woman across from her as they rode along comfortably.
“Raccoons.”
“Raccoons turned into humans or just raccoons?”
“Raccoons turned into humans.”
“Because raccoons have little hands so they could paint without being turned into humans.”
“But why would regular raccoons paint a barn?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know how this works.”
“You’ve read the stories. You know how this works.”
"I don't," Linda said, running her hands along the sparkling interior of the giant plastic Halloween bucket she was riding down the street in.
The carriage was moving quite fast; the mice driving the vehicle enjoying themselves.
“I guess we could have just used the horses from the barn. This would have been great exercise for them,” Linda thought out loud.
“Yeah, but this way they all match.”
Linda poked her head out the window, removing her hat, to take a look at the matching horses. They did look quite majestic; muscular, strong, and clean. Even the horses seemed to glow and have some kind of sparkle to them that didn't really make any sense (well, it did in the context), but she noticed that their tails were too long and, as the wind whipped through them, she could see that, underneath the horsehair, they were long and mouse-like.
She sat back inside the cabin and hoped that a passing hawk didn’t send them all flying into a ditch.
“Everything changes back at midnight?” Linda asked.
The old woman nodded.
“Why was there an invitation to the barn dance with my address on it?” Linda asked.
“Because I was going to mail it to your house.”
“You made the invitation?”
“Who else?”
“How did you know my address?”
“Magic,” the old woman said but she smiled like she was kidding.
Then she did something that clearly was actually magic, putting her two hands together with the wand between them to make it disappear, and yet for some reason, Linda didn't feel the need to ask about it.
It was also magic how the mice knew how to get to the rodeo, or at least Linda assumed it was because she hadn’t heard the woman give them directions, but either way, after a short drive, they came into town and approached the rodeo grounds.
Linda became anxious that she might have missed Blake’s ride. She had gotten caught up in all the mice turning into humans and had temporarily forgotten that, if they ever found Carl again, his life would depend on Blake’s bull ride. Even if Carl never came back, Linda would be held responsible for him and owe the money she promised or, as she had agreed, she would lose everything.
"I'm just going to run in and I'll catch up with you later," Linda said, wanting to quickly make her way into the rodeo.
“That’s fine,” the woman responded.
The mice drove Linda right up to the front gate of the rodeo and she hopped out and ran.
There was a small band of protestors out front, as there always were, holding signs that said, “Condemn speciesism,” and, “End animal oppression.”
Some of the signs read, “Would you have a PUG scramble?” with “pug” replacing the word “pig,” alluding to the event where young kids chased scurrying pigs around the stadium, trying to catch them. Ironically, kids chased pugs around quite often.
Another sign read, “What if it was DOG riding?”
“Wow,” one of the mice atop the carriage said. “What is it with humans and dogs?”
“Yeah,” the other mouse agreed.
“Hey! What about mice!?” the mouse yelled to the protestors.
“Yeah! What about mice!?” the other one yelled.
The protestors looked at each other, as confused as they had ever been in their lives.
“What?“ they asked.
Linda ran past the booths, the torn ticket she had just purchased still in her hands. She moved quickly under the bandstands, walking while she texted Blake, trying to make her way to the far side where the bullpens were.
The crowd was cheering above her and, as she came upstairs on the end of the stands, she saw a bull rider in the arena, jogging away from a bucking bull he had just been thrown from. Blake had not returned her message and she looked for him frantically behind the chutes.
As the announcer rattled off statistics and commentary and the crowd awaited the next ride, Linda looked at the jumbo screen to see if Blake had been placed yet. She waited for the replay on the screen to end.
“Linda!”
Blake, from behind an animal pen next to the arena, was waving at her.
She waved back and made her way down to the fence that separated the audience from the riders and animals. Blake met her there.
“You made it,” he said.
“Did you ride yet?” she asked.
“You look great in that dress!” he said.
“Blake, did you go yet?”
“No, no, that was the first rider. He’s going again because his bull disqualified.”
Linda breathed a huge sigh of relief, still nervous after everything.
“Relax, Linda,” Blake said, “Now that you’re here, this thing’s a sure bet.”
“What makes you so sure?” she asked.
“You still don’t know.”
Blake and Linda super awkwardly kissed through the chain link fence and then she climbed the stands and found a seat. At the end of the arena where she was, there were very few people; mostly parents with small children who needed room.
Looking at the people there, Linda discovered that she wasn’t overdressed after all. Many of the women, whom she took to be rodeo wives, were very well made up in country attire with full hair and makeup.
Little children in little boots and cowboy hats orbited the women, hanging upside down from the seats.
“Come on,” the women said as they put them upright, “come watch daddy.”
Linda wished that she had her own little cowbaby to humiliate with funny hats and boots, but she settled in and leaned back, took a deep breath, and watched the rodeo like she had when she was a girl and had waited so long to do again.
But something was different now. As she watched one rider after another get tousled and tossed around by the enormous animals, she began to feel nervous. It was not for her own sake or Carl’s, but for Blake’s.
She supposed that the little girl she used to be was much braver than she was now, able to get caught up in the action of the sport and remain unconcerned with the safety of the riders.
And yet, it wasn’t really the riders she was thinking about even now. It was Blake. And as his ride came closer, her nervousness only grew stronger.
Her feelings for Blake had ruined the rodeo.
"Great," she said under her breath, realizing it.
She hoped that, over time, she would overcome her fear, but when the loudspeaker announced for the crowd of hundreds, “Up next we have Blake Lockwood,” and the crowd erupted into uncontainable cheer for their local Montana boy, Linda felt her lungs whip a breath of air in past her lips and hold it inside.
She did not release the breath until after the gate man released the bull, the crowd went absolutely bananas for eight seconds, and Blake landed on his behind in the dirt and rolled away.
She was sweating.
“It never gets any easier,” a nearby woman holding a child in her lap, who had recognized Linda’s reaction, commented. “The first time is tough,” she said, “Was that your first time watching?”
Linda watched Blake as another rider helped pull him over the arena wall. He swatted himself off, smiling and laughing, amazed by life.
Stars appeared in Linda’s vision from holding her breath but she breathed slow and started to relax. Blake looked up at her with a big smile and, when their eyes met, the tension finally left her.
“Second,” she said.
Even if this was how she had to live life from now on, she knew she wasn’t going anywhere. The man she had just watched ride on the back of an un-rideable animal for eight seconds was just as impressive to her as he was when she was a wide-eyed child. Since the day she first saw him, her heart had joined his team and she would never leave. She was Team Blake.
Three more riders took to their bulls one by one and the announcer clarified who on the board was now guaranteed a check, regardless of what the scores of the upcoming riders were. Blake was one of them.
Carl would live.
Linda would keep her job.
The stables were not lost.
And out front, there was an enormous, chewed up plastic jack-o-lantern with wheels on it waiting for her that she would climb inside of while mice turned into humans drove her safely home.
It seemed like a good time to celebrate.