to talk to the owner or manager or something. This isn’t right.” He doubled over, groaning. “If I die, it’s going to be your fault.”
The line stirred again; several people turned and walked away. Someone said something nasty about carnivals. Skye frowned, studying the boy. He looked kind of weird. His jeans were strictly high-water, his hair cropped unevenly, as if done by hand with a pair of kitchen shears. The front of his T-shirt was emblazoned with the name of a rock group that hadn’t been popular in a year, and instead of tennis shoes, he wore some kind of funky work boots.
Weird, she thought again. This kid wasn’t for real. He was trying to scam Marta, no doubt about it. She had seen a hint of a smile tug at his mouth as he bent over the last time. Skye cocked her head, indignant. But why? What did he hope to gain?
Money, no doubt. She folded her arms across her chest, disgusted. The lengths some people would go to for money.
“Abner Marvel’s the owner,” Marta was saying, obviously anxious to get rid of him before he tossed his cookies. “You can probably find him at the little top. That’s the sideshow tent.” The woman pointed. “At the end of the midway. If he’s not there, try the main ticket booth.”
Still clutching both his stomach and the hot dog, the kid turned and hobbled in the direction she’d indicated.
Skye narrowed her eyes. She made it her business to know everything that went on at Marvel’s. She knew what all the members of the troupe were up to, including who was doing what and with whom. A person couldn’t burp on the lot without her finding out about it.
She meant to get to the bottom of this, too. Nobody was going to pull a fast one on Marvel’s, not if she had anything to say about it.
She started after him, keeping him in sight but keeping her distance, too. After he had gone some distance, he straightened, glanced back at Marta and the concession stand, then smiled. A moment later, he tossed the hot dog into the trash can and started walking again—this time both upright and quickly.
Skye made a sound of triumph. She knew it, the creep was up to something.
“Hey! Brat-face!”
Skye stopped and glared over her shoulder at Rick, the kid who ran the shooting gallery, a particularly odious creature. When she and her mother had first joined Marvel’s, he and a couple of his equally gross friends had tried to scare her by locking her in the fun house after closing. Instead of scaring her, he’d made her mad. When one of the roustabouts discovered her and let her out, she’d found Rick and popped him square in the nose, bloodying it. He had never forgiven her for that. But he’d never tried to scare her again, either.
She propped her fists on her hips. “What do you want?”
“I gotta take a break.”
“So take it. I’m busy.”
“Marvel sent Benny to cover the coaster for a while. If I don’t get to the john, I’m going to piss on one of the customers. Get over here.”
Skye looked at the mystery kid’s retreating back, then at Rick. She sniffed. “Do you always have to be so gross? You’re disgusting. Find somebody else.”
“If you don’t get your ass over here, I’m gonna beat the shit out of you.”
“Yeah, right. I’m so scared.” She cocked her chin up. “Pretty clever, the way you sneaked off the lot last night to meet that girl. Hardly anybody saw you. Except me. What do you think Marvel would say about that?”
His face turned beet red. He glanced at her, and shoved his hands in the back pockets of his blue jeans. “You’re such a little twit. I wish you’d fall off the face of the planet.”
“And you’re a brainless butthead.”
“You’re just jealous ‘cause no boy’s ever going to want to sneak out to meet you. You’re probably a queer, you act more like a boy than a girl.”
For a moment, Skye couldn’t find her breath. Her eyes burned and her chest ached. Horrified, she struggled for a comeback, struggled to keep Rick from seeing how much his comment hurt.
She tipped her chin up again, as much for show as to keep it from wobbling. Why should she care if Rick thought she was ugly and unlovable? So what if he thought she was a…queer. He was gross and stupid, and she hated him.
“You better watch it,” she said, “or I’ll get my mom to put a curse on you.”
Rick snorted with amusement, but only after a moment’s telling hesitation. Showmen were notoriously superstitious. They believed in bad luck and gris-gris and witches. And the truth was, her mother’s ability scared them silly. They thought that, somehow, if Madame Claire could see their future—which she could—she could also change it. For the worse.
Because of that, they kept as far away from Madame Claire as possible.
Skye grinned. Silly, superstitious delinquents. It didn’t work that way, of course. But if they wanted to believe it did, that suited Skye just fine. Her mother wasn’t interested in being one of them, and Skye liked being able to yank their chains every once in a while. Sometimes a girl needed a little threat to hang over a bully’s head; it was a way to even the odds a bit.
Skye knew using the other trouper’s fear of her mother’s ability that way didn’t make her too popular, but that was tough nuts. She was used to not being liked, to not having friends. Besides, when she and her mom left, she wouldn’t be leaving anyone behind. Goodbyes were a real bummer.
But detest Rick or not, she was part of the troupe. And he needed her help.
Skye took one last look at the direction the mystery kid had disappeared, sighed and turned back to Rick. “Go already. But hurry back. I’ve got things to do.”
Chapter Five
Chance had taken one last glance behind him—the woman at the concession stand appeared to have forgotten all about him—and tossed the remainder of his perfectly edible hot dog in the trash.
This had to work. Abner Marvel had to give him a job.
He had no contingency plan.
Chance wiped his damp palms on the thighs of his newly resurrected blue jeans. He had dug them, a T-shirt and the remainder of his pre-Lancaster County things out of storage, dressed, packed, then written his aunt and her husband a note. Then he had headed out into the night to hitch a ride.
From there he had winged it. The food-poisoning routine had been a last, desperate attempt to find a way to get to the carnival’s owner. Before he had come up with that scheme, he had asked a half-dozen carnival employees who the owner/manager was and where he could find him; each time, his inquiry had been met with surliness and suspicion. All had told him the same thing—no jobs available.
Then he had realized his mistake. He had done it all wrong—to get to the owner he needed something better than the truth, he needed a scam.
If there was one thing people understood, it was liability. If nothing else, Chance had learned that from his father. The bastard had considered Chance a liability. And nothing else.
Thus
