It’s Friday night, I’ve just finished making dinner for Dorothy, Torvill, and Dean, and am rushing to get ready to go out when my parents finally come home from the mall. Mom had a fit this morning and decided she finally needed actual and brand-new maternity clothes for her ninth month. Now I won’t even have time to take a shower before Mike picks me up. I hate that.
I brush my hair, replace my spaghetti-sauce-stained white T-shirt with a black tank, pull on clean shorts, and quickly put on some mascara and lip gloss. I brush on some blush, too. Working at Gas ’n Git is not exactly helping to create a sun-drenched summer look.
I run downstairs and almost lose one of my black slides and wipe out on the way. When I regain my balance at the bottom of the stairs, I see my father sitting in the living room, taking Western clothing out of familiar-looking red plastic bags and laying them on the sofa. There is country music on the stereo.
This isn’t exactly a typical evening for Phil Farrell. What’s going on? I wonder as I look at the gingham shirts, bandanas, jeans with a rope belt, and brown suede pants with fringe.
“Is that stuff from Western Wear Bonanza?” I ask, incredulous.
“Yes,” Dad says. “Mr. Stinson wants me to evaluate them.”
“Evaluate?” I ask. “Why would you want to?” My father’s style is definitely not Western.
“I need a costume. They’ve asked me to put something together for the Rodeo Roundup Days. Mr. Stinson’s on the board of directors, so he’s outfitting me.” Dad picks up a red gingham shirt and holds it against himself. “I know you won’t skate with me, but could you help me figure something out? Am I a red gingham or a blue gingham kind of guy?”
“Um . . . neither? Dad, I don’t understand.” Or maybe I just don’t want to understand. I’m getting this horrible sinking feeling. “You don’t mean . . . skating at the rodeo. Do you?”
He nods.
I can’t believe this. “That’s where you wanted me to skate with you?” My father must not be getting enough sleep. He’s going insane or something. Like I’d ever skate with him at a rodeo? In what universe?
He nods and then he loops a bolo tie around his neck and tries to shorten it. “They’re trying to bring in different types of events this year, to attract a wider audience,” Dad explains. “And if this goes well, there’s a chance that Mr. Stinson and some others will sponsor me for my comeback. They very strongly hinted that they’d support me, if I helped them out with this.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. The plan is insane. “Excuse me. Dad? Ice skating? Where are they going to do this? It’ll be ninety degrees—in the shade. We can barely keep ice frozen in the freezer in July.”
“Listen, I’m with you, P. F. I told them it’s not going to work, especially when we only have three weeks to prepare, but they begged me. They’re converting the town rink—you know it’s right next to the fairgrounds. They’re closing it off and air-conditioning it. And they’re bringing in a walk-in meat freezer expert from Majestic—they say he knows how to keep the surface frozen. If it’s good enough for steak, it’s good enough for me. I don’t know.”
“Dad. If it doesn’t work . . . your reputation . . .”
“It’s only Lindville,” he says as he sets a black ten-gallon hat on his head. “And they’re going to pay me. Quite a bit of money, actually.”
“But Dad, you don’t have to do this,” I say. “You’re good. You’re an artist.”
“P. F., I’ve worn smelly fur costumes and dressed as cartoon characters. I’ve played Tweedledee. Being in the Rodeo Roundup Days isn’t that much of a stretch.” He takes off the black hat and throws it onto the sofa with a flourish. “P. F., there comes a time when everyone has to—”
“Make sacrifices,” I finish the sentence for him, then sigh. “Okay, but this one?” It’s going to be so embarrassing. My father is talking about skating at the rodeo. And he’s actually going to do it.
“Peggy, you know what they say. Every cloud has a silver lining.” Dad yanks off the bolo tie and throws it on the coffee table, then walks out of the living room.
Even Lindville clouds? I wonder.
I pick up a suede vest and hold it up against me, inhaling its leather smell. I try to picture my father skating with Justin boots fashioned into skates. I try to picture the two of us out there, together. My mind goes blank.
A car honks outside, and I drop the vest as if it’s radioactive.
“Be home by ten!” my father calls from the kitchen as I hurry out the door.
“Eleven!” I yell over my shoulder as the door closes.
“What’s your favorite thing about the rodeo?” Mike asks me as he parks the Geo under a sign in front of the stadium that says RODEO FANS ONLY.
We’re in the middle of what will soon be rodeo bedlam. Right now it’s empty booths, banners announcing different events, and chained-off areas ready for petting zoos and carnival rides.
“The day it’s over,” I say as Steve, Jacqui, and I climb out of the car. Especially this year, I think as I notice the skating rink on the other end of the stadium, which looks like a construction zone with tarps and scaffolding. Ray and Charlotte are parking right beside us, in Ray’s pickup—we all met up at the Lot about five minutes ago.
“What are they doing to the rink?” Steve asks, apparently following my gaze.
“Closing it off, because—” I start to explain, then stop. I don’t want to tell everyone about this—I don’t want anyone except Charlotte to know. “Actually I’m not really sure what they’re doing,” I say.
We head for the picnic tables already set up for the food concessions, with two pizzas that Mike brought from work. There must be about a hundred tables.
I don’t know how I feel about this. I get to hang out with Steve, but only if I do it when Jacqui and Mike are there. It’s like a very sorry logic equation on the SAT. The answer to “What do I like about this?” is “None of the above.”
I wonder if Steve gets jealous seeing me with Mike. I hope he does. Not that there’s anything between me and Mike, but if I can make Steve think there is . . . maybe he’ll feel as terrible seeing us together as I do when I see Steve and Jacqui. Maybe he’ll come to my rescue the way he did at that St. Patrick’s Day party.
Somehow I doubt it, but isn’t it worth a shot, at this point? Nothing else seems to be working, and we are constantly being thrown together on this awkward pseudo–double date.
“You know what I like?” Steve says. “I like seeing all the RVs and horse trailers and amusement rides pulling out of town. Because then we get the town back.”
“Hmm. Do we want the town back?” I joke.
Steve starts to laugh, and I look at him and think, You know, we could be having this much fun, like, all the time. If only you’d get rid of the girl with the plastic facial features and no brain.
“Wouldn’t we rather be in the trailers, leaving?” I ask Steve.
“Definitely. Stowaways.” Steve grins at me. “But I don’t know if we want to go cross-country with horses.”
So he does remember what we talked about, our vague plan to pull a Jack Kerouac.
“You’re riding across the country on horseback?” Jacqui asks, coming up beside Steve and taking his hand.
“No,” Steve says, shaking his head.
“Then what?” she asks.
“Never mind,” Steve says. “It’s not important.”
Yes, it is! I want to scream. It’s incredibly, vitally, excruciatingly important. And you are letting Jacqui get in the way of all of it.
I walk over toward Charlotte.
“Does the parade wind up here, at the end?” she asks me. “And then everyone parades around the stadium over there?”
“Usually,” I say. “It goes down Main Street and then—wait a second. You’re not still planning to be in the parade, are you?”
“Of course I am,” she says. “You’re still thinking about it, too, aren’t you?”
“No!” I glance ahead at Steve, remembering the streaking conversation at IHOP, and how embarrassed he got. “I mean, sure, I’m thinking about it,” I lie loudly, hoping he’ll hear me and be impressed. “But I’m not sure I’m going to do it,” I tell Charlotte. One major humiliation in the family during Rodeo Roundup Days is enough.
“You’re not?” Charlotte asks. “Not even if I can find a way for us to escape afterward?”
“We’d have to escape really, really far away,” I say.
“What are you guys getting away from?” Mike asks, tuning into our conversation as he opens the top pizza box and tears off a slice. Suddenly everyone is looking at us; everyone is tuned in.
“We need to get away from a situation,” Charlotte says. “Well, not now, but a few weeks from now. We’ll need to be picked up and whisked away.”
“Don’t keep saying we. I’m not doing it,” I tell Charlotte. I glance over at Steve. I’m not sure if he remembers Charlotte talking about streaking, that day at IHOP. He may have blocked it out.
“You’re doing it, Fleming,” Charlotte insists. “It’s going to be the highlight of the rodeo.”
“What is?” Mike asks. “What are you guys doing? Barrel racing or something?”
“Or something,” I say.
“Whatever. You guys are weird,” Ray says.
“Thank you,” Charlotte says.
We all wander around, waiting for someone to pick a table for us to sit down at.
“My favorite part of the rodeo is the games,” Steve says. “I could play those all day. I will, actually.”
“I thought you quit gambling,” Jacqui says.
“Hey, shooting at a metal duck is not gambling. Throwing a dart at a balloon is not gambling,” Steve says.
“Yeah, they don’t give you any money,” Mike points out. “Just stuffed animals, and how many of those can you use?”
“You’d be surprised. Last year I donated about twenty to the hospital for kids,” Steve says.
I am about to tell him how cool that is when Jacqui grabs Steve’s arm with both her hands. “That’s so incredible,” she says. “Wow.”
“Not really. They were pink and blue and they smelled funny,” Steve says.
“Still,” Jacqui insists, tugging at Steve the way Dorothy tugs at me when I’m on the phone and she wants attention.
Steve suddenly decides we should sit at the table that’s right in the middle of all of them. He and Jacqui sit on one side, while Mike perches across from them. I sit down next to Mike, scooting a little closer to him than may be necessary. When Steve sees me getting close to Mike, his jealousy will have to kick in, the way mine kicked in weeks ago when I saw him kissing Jacqui. Not that I’m going to kiss Mike. But we are spending time together—and that has to get to Steve eventually. Doesn’t it? Kick in, kick in, kick in, I think, as if I’m Torvill. Please.
But nothing seems to get to Steve, because when he and Jacqui are together they create this disgusting force field of happiness that rebuffs any approaches. Especially mine.
I gaze across the table at Steve as I eat a slice of pizza and try to ignore the fact that Mike has slipped off his flip-flops and is trying to play footsie with me. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. He’s good-looking and he has nice feet. But still, this has to go down as one of the worst Friday nights in history.
I found out my father’s going to embarrass me in public, and that Steve still wants to be with Jacqui and not me.
They’ve both got to be considered insane.