“Fine, if you get murdered in the haunted house, I will not go out of my way to find the killer to avenge your death. I will wait for the F.B.I.,” I say.
He’s laughing even more now. Until he stops.
“Wait. Why am I getting murdered in the haunted house and not you? You’re the pretty one. And the type to get seduced by Ted Bundy.”
“Not a brunette. Not his type,” I say, correcting him. He reaches over and holds a piece of my blonde hair, studying it. There’s a faint smile on his face and I don’t know what exactly he’s thinking—or remembering—but just as quickly as he picked up the strand, he lets it go.
“Can we go have fun now and debate who gets killed later?” he says and hands over our tickets to the operator who clicks them, old-school style. I follow him through the gates.
There’s a spring in Xander’s step. I’d say the guy’s a morning person, but I don’t think that applies when you don’t sleep—ever. Maybe he’s a carnival person. There’s an adorable lighthearted wonder to him as his eyes scan from left to right. Between Xander calling me pretty and me even thinking Xander is adorable, the evidence is undeniable. Dating is the death of love and lust.
I follow Xander’s line of sight and spot a clown.Gross.
Em wouldn’t come within a ten-mile radius of a carnival. The phobia of clowns is strong in that one. Although to be fair, there’s nothing creepier than a grown-ass man hiding behind a fake smile, basically plotting your death. One Halloween at university, one of the fraternities all dressed up as clowns. They roamed the campus scaring the shit out of everyone. We were on our way back from a party, Em in her Buffy costume and me in my Giles costume, you know, fromBuffy the Vampire Slayer.One of the clowns ran out from behind a tree. There was a cackle behind us and so I turned and kicked that clown right in the nut sack. He bitched as he went down.
And that’s how I learned that it’s simply a matter of realizing that a clown is just a sad man in a costume. And they all have a crotch you can kick them in, should you need to.
“First stop,” he says cryptically, interrupting my thoughts. He takes my hand and gently pulls me farther and farther into the carnival, turning back to wink at me, which I want to say is grosser than the clowns but I can’t. Because it gives me a little dopamine hit and I find myself smiling.
We weave our way through the legs of the guy on stilts breathing fire and an elephant wearing an ugly hat, which I’m pretty sure constitutes animal cruelty, my feet continually tripping up as I start to process my surroundings. The soundtrack is basically an electronic keyboard whose battery is about to run out and die. The shrieks of children remind me I should not be here. The only other adults are those chaperoning the children. Whichever Buzzfeed correspondent wrotecarnivalinto their list of Top 10 Date Ideas should be fired.
And then I smell it. The scent of deep fried everything. And sugar. And it smells so good, my mouth starts watering.
Okay, maybe the carnival isn’t so bad.
Xander stops us directly in front of the cotton candy booth and turns to face me. “This is the only way one should consume sugar,” he says, before ordering the puffiest cloud of sugar on a stick.
Then, he holds the stick with a cloud of candy bigger than my head between us and proceeds to rip off a massive chunk and shove it in his mouth. There’s a bit of cotton candy sticking out that his tongue sweeps up in a matter of seconds. He’s the one eating cotton candy, and I’m the one who’s drooling.
“Is this the ‘fun’ you were talking about?” I say.
Xander takes another chunk and holds it inches from my lips. “You tell me,” he says, waiting.
The longer I wait to swipe the cotton candy, the more suggestive this gesture gets. So I open my mouth and lean ever so slightly forward to take the chunk while trying to avoid his fingertips, but I misjudge and only get the tiniest whisp of spun sugar between my lips.
Before I know it, Xander’s palm is over my mouth, essentially shoving the entire chunk in. Something I’d expect from Em, not my “date.”
The cotton candy melts in my mouth on contact, but I’m too distracted to care that I’ve just mainlined sugar in the tastiest format. “Hey!” I say, reaching for a hunk of cotton candy myself. I shove it in his mouth.
He ducks my first attempt, a twinkle of mischief in his eye, but I get him on my second one. The difference between us is that I keep my hand over his mouth.
“Oh, this is the only way one should consume sugar, is it?” I say, mocking him. He tries to say something, but it’s all just muffled noises. “Are you enjoying it?”
He’s eyes widen and before I know it, he bares his teeth and takes a nibble of my palm.
I pull my hand back really quick. A smug expression is on his face.
“Do you know where these hands have been?” I say, cocking my head. “From the sleep study to the carnival. I haven’t washed them, once.”
“Ew, gross,” he says, trying to channel the sass of a preteen who found out girls have cooties.
We both descend into fits of laughter before he grabs my hand and we’re off, past the food vendors and into rows and rows of rides.
“This way,” Xander says, as he does a double take before veering us off the path. He pushes me up against the back entrance to the haunted house, keeping us out of sight.
I look down and his chest is so close to mine that if I take a breath, we’ll be touching. So I don’t. Then, he leans forward and looks past me. The problem? His neck is inches away from my lips. And that signature smell dares me to nibble on his skin.
Okay, so turns out carnivals aren’t just a great place to murder someone. It also seems like a great place to hook up with someone. So many places to make out off the path, hidden between rides, and moaning so loud no one can hear you.
