All the Pretty Things by Emily Arsenault

Author:Emily Arsenault [Arsenault, Emily]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2020-03-17T00:00:00+00:00

FIFTEEN

Spinning cotton candy is actually therapeutic.

That’s why I asked my dad for the job at the beginning of last summer, when he first became the boss of everything.

The buzz of the machine helps me drown out the noise of the rest of the park. And I love that moment when you start to see the first few wisps begin to fly up the metal cylinder of the machine. It really is like magic, how they appear out of nowhere. And I love corralling the gossamer threads onto a little paper cone, twisting them into a cloud.

Kids love to watch the spinning. Stay behind the bubble, kids, I say as I put on my latex gloves. I think it all looks like something quite expert to them. It’s a cheap thrill for everyone involved.

I spun, looped, and bagged a couple of blue batches to have on hand, letting the noise of the machine calm my nerves from Dad’s shouting at Carla earlier. Then I waited, perched on my stool, for customers. After a few minutes, a wave of parkgoers came off the Ferris wheel, a handful of them wanting fresh-spun candy. But after they’d gone, I was alone with my grim thoughts again.

I’d screwed up royally. I’d thought I’d been talking very casually to Drea, but she’d turned around and told Maura, and then big trouble ensued. For Carla, for my dad, probably now for Morgan. Because even if my dad was willing to overlook Morgan’s role in the whole thing, people would certainly be talking about it. At the hospital, Morgan had said she wasn’t comfortable in Danville anymore. Whatever that meant, I’d just made it worse.

“Shit,” I muttered. And of course, two little girls—about kindergarten age—chose that very moment to walk right by, probably within hearing distance. Then I saw Anna Henry following close behind them. Her perfect black bobbed hair always stood out in a crowd. People at school used to call her Helmet. I resisted the urge to yell that.

“Anna!” I called instead. “Your friends want some cotton candy? It’s on me.”

The girls came running to my stand, Anna chasing after them.

“I guess that’d be okay,” Anna said. “You giving it out for free today, or what?”

“No…just…free for you guys. I’d been hoping to run into you or Lucas.”

“Ava and Portia!” Anna exclaimed rather suddenly, almost as if she hadn’t heard me. “Do you recognize Queen Elsa here?”

The two girls stared at me. One of them—the one with curly blond pigtails—put a thoughtful finger up her nose.

“You were at the parade?” I asked. “I guess I didn’t see you.”

“Yeah,” Anna said. “This is my summer babysitting job. Ava and Portia aren’t sisters, but their parents both pay me for the two of them so the girls can hang out and the parents can get a cheaper sitter. They send us here, like, once a week.”

“Sounds like a good deal,” I said, nodding at the machine. “Pink or blue, girls?”

The girls whispered to each other for a moment, and then the finger-up-the-nose one chirped, “Pink.

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