by Eric Bower
“Maybe we could,” P said as he scratched his head. “But what if Geoffrey wanted to peek into the house late at night? I wouldn’t want an alarm to frighten him.”
“You can lock him up outside. Leave him in the barn overnight. That’s what most people do with their horses.”
My father looked absolutely horrified by the suggestion.
There was another knock at the door. I answered it while my parents continued to discuss potential security ideas, and whether horses should be counted as family members.
“Hi W.B.,” B.W. said.
“Hi B.W.,” I said right back. “Want a cup of tea before we go?”
“Sure.”
I let my friend inside, and, as we crossed the living room and headed for the kitchen, we spotted Rose Blackwood, who had just slipped out of her bedroom on feet that were noticeably unsteady.
“Oh dear!” she cried, as she narrowly avoided crashing into us. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you two.”
“That’s alright,” I answered. “We just . . . wow.”
I stared at Rose Blackwood, who looked like a completely different person. In fact, for a moment I was so shocked by her appearance that I literally couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even make the sort of grunts you’d expect to hear from a person who was raised by wolves. I was shocked soundless.
Rose’s lips were redder than usual. Her cheeks were pinker than usual. Her eyelids were bluer than usual. And her hair was straighter than usual. It was all very . . . unusual.
Sorry. When I’m shocked by something, I’m not good at thinking up descriptive words. In fact, I’m very . . . not good at it.
At first, I thought that Rose must have been suffering from some strange sort of tropical disease, but then I realized she had done all of that to herself on purpose. While I found the straightened hair and the application of face paint to be . . . unusual . . . I think what surprised me the most about Rose was what she was wearing.
She was wearing a dress.
Rose almost never wore dresses. In fact, the only other time I could remember seeing her wear one was several months earlier, when she had put on one of Aunt Dorcas’s high collared dresses because she was pretending to be my aunt. She was pretending to be my aunt because—well, it’s a really long story, a story that I’ve already told before, and I honestly don’t have time to get into it again. Sorry, I’m just a very busy kid. You’ll have to read about it some other time. Or you can just pretend that I never mentioned anything about Rose dressing up like Aunt Dorcas in the first place. That’s what I usually choose to do, pretend that something never happened. It’s easier that way. In fact, I’m going to pretend that I didn’t say any of that to you, so I can just move on with the story.
“What happened to you?” I asked Rose, as my shocked silence finally wore off. “You look so . . . unusual.”
She blushed, or at least I think she blushed. It was hard to be certain with all the pink stuff that she’d smeared on her cheeks. She also smelled different. Not that Rose normally smelled bad or anything, but at that moment, she smelled unusually good, like fresh flowers mixed with fresh fruit. I don’t think people were meant to smell that good. If people went around smelling that good all the time, then more animals might begin to wonder if they would enjoy the taste of human beings. It would make strolls through the countryside a lot more dangerous. That’s why I always make sure to stink a little bit when I go out. Just a little, though. It’s for the safety of mankind.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Rose said in a rather uncomfortable tone, as she crossed her arms over her ruffled blouse.
“Your face is different colors,” I told her. “And you’re wearing a brand new outfit. A dress. And you smell like flowers and berries. It’s weird.”
Rose frowned at me.
“I think she looks and smells very nice,” B.W. offered.
“Thank you, B.W.,” Rose said with a sniff. “It’s nice to see that someone around here has good manners. I’m going to go check on the pie that I have cooling on the windowsill.”
As B.W. and I continued walking to the kitchen, my friend turned to me and whispered “That’s a pie? Heavens to Betsy, I thought someone stepped in horse plop and was drying their boot on the windowsill . . .”
M, P, Aunt Dorcas, B.W., and I climbed into our horseless carriage and prepared to leave for the Pitchfork Fair. I was so excited that I could hardly sit still. B.W. had to press on my shoulders to keep me from popping out of my seat.
“Come on, Rose!” M called. “We’re going to be late!”
Rose poked her painted face out the door.
“I’ll meet you all there later!” she called back. “I want to put a few finishing touches on my pie first! I’ll ride Geoffrey to the fair. He looks like he wants to stretch his legs anyway.”
“Alright!” P said. “Make sure he wears his afternoon hat instead of his evening hat! I wouldn’t want him to look foolish!”
Rose quickly nodded her head before slamming the front door shut.
“I wonder what’s going on with Rose,” I whispered to B.W.
But my friend was far more interested in the horseless carriage than he was in the odd behavior of Rose Blackwood. Most people are fascinated by the horseless carriage the first time that they see it. In case you’ve never heard of a horseless carriage before (and I’m guessing most people haven’t), let me tell you that it’s exactly what it sounds like: a carriage that moves without horses. And if you want more information about it than that, then you should feel quite silly for having asked me.
“How does it work?” B.W. asked P. “What do you use to make it go? Is it safe? Why doesn’t everyone ride these things? You could make tons of them and sell them for a fortune. We’d never need horses again!”
“Don’t you ever say that in front of Geoffrey,” P warned. “The horseless carriage is actually quite a simple invention. You see, once you crank the handle on the front of the buggy, there is a greased, internal mechanism, which—”
And that’s when the funny music started playing in my head. It played for the entire trip across the Pitchfork Desert, until we reached the fairgrounds. A few times during the scientific explanation, my mother or father would turn to me and say something, expecting me to either respond with a “huh!” or a “wow!” which I did. But every time I tried to participate in the conversation any more than that, my brain would interrupt me with a new strange question to think about, like why it’s called quicksand when it seems to work slowly, or why rain will ruin a leather coat, and yet it doesn’t seem to bother cows.
After what felt like an eternity, my strange thoughts and wacky music were interrupted by the real wacky music of the Pitchfork Fair. Someone in the official Pitchfork Town Band was playing an instrument that looked and sounded like the sort of thing that my father would build if P ever showed any interest in musical instruments. It was a giant piano, with long metal tubes spouting from the top where the sound came out. There were buttons located above all the piano keys, which the player punched and pulled seemingly at random. It sounded like a thousand flutes being played all at once, and it added to the excitement of the event.
The fairground was marvelously decorated, with streamers and flags and brightly colored paper lanterns. Someone kept setting off explosions of rainbow-colored confetti. There were men and women with painted faces and brightly colored clothing who were doing all sorts of strange and fantastic things like swallowing fire and juggling fish, while doing somersaults and standing on their heads. There were booths set up where local people were selling unique trinkets, fine woodwork, leatherwork, jewelry, knives, candles, and tasty homemade treats.
Miss Katherine had brought her accordion and her “circus kittens,” which were really just her fifteen ordinary kittens she’d dressed up in flashy costumes; the kittens sat there and stared blankly at Miss
Katherine as she danced and played the accordion. There were various tents spread throughout the grounds where inventors and magicians and salesmen were showcasing fantastic new inventions, tricks, and gadgets. Miss Danielle had a tent set up where she was offering to teach people public speaking, though people were avoiding her tent like it was covered in bees. Strangely enough, the most popular tent was the tent that actually was covered in bees; Mr. Dadant, the beekeeper, was giving out delicious samples of honeycomb from his buzzing little tent. Mr. Silva, the blacksmith, was showing people how to smith. Mrs. Pyramus, the weaver, was showing people how to use her giant loom to weave blankets and rugs. There was a man having an argument with a little person who was sitting on his knee—at first I thought it was a ventriloquist show, but when I sat down and watched, I discovered that it was just a man having a fight with his tiny grandmother (though it was still pretty entertaining). The Pitchfork Choir stood on a stage singing our official town anthem, which no one knew particularly well, so it involved a lot of mumbling and awkward pauses.
At the far end of the fairgrounds, there were several shooting galleries and other mounted targets where you could show off your skills with a bow and arrow, crossbow, tomahawk, throwing knife, pistol, or rifle. People seemed to be enjoying those, despite the occasional bloodcurdling scream. I guess it would be fair to say that most of the townspeople didn’t have particularly good aim and would often let go of a tomahawk a bit too early. Also, I don’t think it was a particularly clever idea to set up the targets in front of the line for the outhouses.
In the center of the fairgrounds, there was a long row of tables with all the delicious fair foods that I craved: cakes and candies and cookies and tarts and pies and ice cream and caramel apples and corn smothered in butter and hamburgers and sausage sandwiches and hard boiled eggs and salted peanuts and popcorn fritters and pickles and fried chicken and . . . excuse me, I appear to have drooled on myself a little bit.
While Aunt Dorcas went to the judging tables to officially enter her pie and tarts in the Pitchfork Fair baking contest, M and P immediately headed for the tents where traveling inventors were showing off their newest scientific inventions and discoveries.
“Come along, W.B. and B.W.!” M called excitedly. “We want to tell that inventor over there, the one who invented a miniature camera, that he can get an even clearer picture if he simply uses a—”
Dooo doop bee doop baaah wooooop, the wacky music in my brain played on.
“Alright!” B.W. called to them. “We’ll be right there!”
Then he turned to me.
“You don’t care about the new inventions and scientific discoveries, do you?” he asked.
I shook my head no.
“You just want to go to the food tables and eat all of the sweets you can, right?”
I nodded my head yes.
“I thought so. Go ahead, W.B. I’ll let your parents know where you are.”
It’s good to have a friend who understands you.
Two hours later, I was cut off by the three ladies who were in charge of the pie table.
“I think you’ve had enough,” one of the ladies said.
She looked pretty nervous. I don’t think she’d ever seen someone eat six pies in one sitting before, and I could tell she was worried. The other two ladies simply looked like they were in shock. One kid started applauding me as though I’d just put on a show, which I suppose I had.
“You’re right,” I said, as I took a bow and held in a burp.“I should probably move on to the cake table.”
I slowly stood up, holding my swollen belly . . . but then I had to sit down again. I didn’t feel so well. I looked in a mirror that was set up nearby and saw that my face had turned a funny shade of green. It appeared that I’d eaten myself sick. I admit that I’ve done that a few times before, though this was the first time I’d ever done it with pie. I didn’t think it was possible. I loved pie, and pie usually loved me.
“Let me get you some water with baking soda,” one of the pie ladies said, and she quickly left the food area.
“That doesn’t sound very tasty!” I called to her as she disappeared into the crowd. “Maybe you could get me an ice cream instead? Or maybe some caramels?”
As I sat there with my stomach gurgling in discontent, my eyes scanned the swarm of people at the fair, some of whom I recognized, and some of whom I didn’t, until finally I spotted a very familiar face that I’d been waiting to see.
“Rose!” I called, waving to my parents’ assistant as I held in another huge pie burp.
At first she didn’t respond, but when I yelled her name again, she looked over at me and smiled awkwardly. She was carrying a pair of pies in her arms, and I must say that they looked much tastier than her other pies. There was nothing odd about the shape or the color. The pies also didn’t have that dead fish mixed with old socks stink that the other pies had, which was good. If I’m being honest, I must say that they appeared to be perfect, like the drawings of pies you’d see in a cookbook.
“Looks like you’re getting better at baking,” I commented, pointing to the piping hot baked treats in her arms.
She looked at the pies and then blushed. Without saying a word to me, she moved over to the tables where the judges were busy reviewing all the entries for best cake, pie, and tart. Without looking at Rose, they collected her desserts and marked them as officially being entered in the contest. After signing her name on the official entry sheet, Rose quickly turned and left, cutting through the crowd and exiting the fairgrounds as though she was being chased by a drooling wolverine.
I was happy that she’d finally found some success at baking (after producing so many nose-crushing failures), though as I sat there rubbing my aching belly, I had to admit that there were several things that confused me.
Actually, there were hundreds of things that confused me, probably thousands, but these were the things that were confusing me at that very moment:
I was confused how Rose could bake another pair of pies so quickly, and so well. Those weren’t the pies that were cooling on the windowsill. The windowsill pies had been as nasty and horrifying as all her other desserts, if not worse—one of them looked like the remains of a rotted pumpkin, and the other pie actually moaned at me, as though its filling was haunted. But the pies she placed on the judges’ table looked as though they’d been baked by a professional. They looked even better than Aunt Dorcas’s delicious pies.
I was also confused why Rose didn’t say anything to me when I called out to her, and also why she had fled the fairgrounds so quickly. Where was she going? Was something the matter? Why would she bother entering pies into the contest if she was just going to run away before they announced the winner?
But maybe the most confusing thing to me was the fact that Rose was no longer wearing the pretty dress and the face paint. She was dressed in her regular black shirt, black pants, red cowboy boots, and her hair was once again curly and out of control. She looked like Rose again, like the Rose Blackwood we all knew and loved.
It was all very confusing.
BURP!
My parents and Aunt Dorcas sadly shook their heads at me. I suppose I was a pretty pathetic sight to see.
I was lying on one of the empty food tables with the top button of my trousers undone. The pie ladies kept bringing me water mixed with powdered rhubarb and other bitter things, with the hopes that it would soothe my sick and achy stomach.
I’m willing to admit that this was partly my fault.
“How many pies did he eat?” M asked one of the pie ladies.
“Six,” one of them answered. “And then he snuck several cookies when he thought I wasn’t looking.”
“Only four cookies!” I protested weakly.
“And he also ate two tarts while Dr. Pearson was checking on him,” another pie lady said. “And when we went to fetch him so
me medicine, he ate a sausage sandwich, three pieces of fried chicken, and some peanuts and popcorn.”
“I needed some lunch,” I explained. “I can’t just eat sweets. It’s not healthy.”
“He also had five scoops of ice cream afterwards,” the third pie lady said sourly.
“Alright, maybe that was a bit much.”
“Oh, W.B.,” my mother sighed. “I hope you don’t get sick on the carriage ride home.”
My stomach suddenly felt as though it had turned itself over and inside out. I burped into my fist and closed my eyes. For the first time in my life, the thought of food didn’t sound appealing to me. I was actually full.
“I’ll try not to, but I can’t make you any promises, M. Say, where’s B.W.?”
“He’s waiting in the long line for the outhouses,” Aunt Dorcas said. “I warned that boy to use the indoor bathroom back at the Baron Estate. But like you, he just didn’t want to listen to reason. Why are little boys so foolish?”
“When have I ever acted foolishly?” I asked, and then I belched so loudly that a pair of old ladies standing across from me jumped and screamed.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” a loud voice cut through the air. “Please, everyone gather round! The judges of this year’s cake, pie, and tart contest have decided on the winners!”
“Ooooh!” Aunt Dorcas cried. “I’m so excited! My pie and tarts are surely going to win!”
“What do you get if you win?” P asked.
“A blue ribbon!” Aunt Dorcas stated proudly.
P rolled his eyes. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a spool of blue ribbon.
“Well, if you wanted blue ribbon so badly, you should have just said something, Dorcas. I always carry some with me. How long would you like the ribbon to be?”
“Dear?” M said to P.
“Yes, my little muffin?”