Cat Got Your Crown

by Julie Chase

  Scarlet finished organizing the cups, then looked me up and down, seeming to notice my bull outfit for the first time. I looked a lot like her for a change, minus the red hair, skates, and helmet. “I like what you did with the pieces,” she said, casually circling me. “Fierce eyes. Adorable horns.”

  “Thanks.” I’d found a leftover devil’s headband in a box from Halloween and popped it on top of my blonde barrel curls. I’d added lots of thick black mascara to reaching false lashes, smoky black-and-gray lids, and sweeping liquid eyeliner wings in an effort to look like one of the derby girls.

  Scarlet grinned, dropping her gaze from my makeup to my T-shirt. “Imogene was wrong about your blessings. Looks like they fill the shirt out just right.”

  I laughed. I’d stretched the skinny T-shirt over a corset-tight undergarment that whittled my waist and pushed the girls up to my collarbone. It was nothing short of a miracle that the fabric held up. I’d taken the liberty of cutting a V in the scoop neckline to relieve a bit of stress on the material. I’d added a horn-shaped applique to each cheek of the red short shorts I’d slid on over longer Lycra leggings and come to terms with the fact that my midriff wasn’t covered. The T-shirt Scarlet had given me couldn’t be everywhere at once. All in all, the outfit was thoroughly over-the-top, and I was feeling sassy. I’d needed to cut loose for weeks, breathe, take a break from worries about costume orders, shop sales, baking, Grandpa Smacker, my mother, and everything pageant related. Add the last few days of awful, and I’d never been so glad to get out of my routine.

  “You know,” Scarlet said, a mischievous smile spreading over her pretty face, “I have an extra pair of skates in my car, in case you change your mind about being a bull.”

  I hung my head, desperate to do something thoroughly New Orleansy and knowing I’d better not. “I can’t,” I said, raising my head. There was only so much I could realistically expect to keep from my mother, and if I showed up on camera in this outfit while some news crew covered the event, Mom would have multiple consecutive strokes and die, then come back to haunt me. “Why do you tempt me?”

  “Because you’re incorrigible,” she said. “And you’re doing a great job as a committee lady for your mom, but sometimes I wonder what you’re doing for Lacy.”

  “I do things for me,” I said. “I love my job.”

  “Okay,” she said. “I just want you to find a balance so you don’t wind up resenting her and this place all over again. I just got you back, and I never want you to leave again.” Her smile faded. “So, put on the skates.”

  “I’m not going to leave again,” I said, suddenly heartbroken. “I would never. I was eighteen and trying to find myself the last time, but when times got tough, New Orleans was the only place I wanted to be. This is my home. You’re my people, and this is where I belong.”

  Her eyes glossed with unshed tears, and she nodded hard and fast. “Good. No more leaving?”

  I drew a cross over my heart.

  She lifted her pinky toward me, and I hooked mine with hers; then we bumped our hips together.

  A slow clap erupted as Chase headed our way smiling and whistling. “My, oh, my,” he said, pressing his palms to his heart. “You look like you just stepped right out of my best daydream.”

  “In this?” I asked, batting enormous false eyelashes and dragging long blonde hair over my shoulders.

  He cocked his head and let his gaze trail over me until I was half certain he could literally undress me that way. “Damn.”

  “Language,” I said, tugging his red neckerchief.

  He looked adorable in his all-white outfit and red sash.

  I tried to imagine Jack in Chase’s costume but couldn’t. I wasn’t even sure what he’d think about me in mine.

  The back-up beeper of a truck turned the three of us toward the corner where Chartres, in front of us, met St. Ann Street, several yards away. A trailer hauling live bulls was reversing into position, and a group of men dressed in elaborate, sequined bullfighter costumes were locking metal fence pieces into a corral.

  “What is that?” I said. “What are they doing? There aren’t supposed to be any real bulls at San Fermin en Nueva Orleans.”

  The derby girls on either side of Jackson Square began to hoot and pound their red and white whiffle bats against the ground.

  The bulls in the trailer paced and grunted.

  Chase crossed his arms and smiled at the new arrivals.

  I ducked behind him and peeked around. “They can’t leave real bulls here.”

  “They’re fine,” Chase said. “They’re inside a fence and there are only four of them with six cowboys. Besides, I thought you loved farm animals.”

  Cows, I liked. Chickens, pigs, goats—anything that wasn’t wearing two big goring weapons on its head while I was dressed head to toe in a color it liked to kill. “Those cowboys can’t stop a stampede with their bare hands,” I said, rubbing goosebumps off my bare arms. “I can practically feel the heat from their flaring nostrils.”

  The bulls were offloaded from the truck and into the pen.

  The bullfighters perched on the railings and spoke with people closing in for a better look.

  Next, a pair of oxen pulling a massive wagon of watermelons set up shop near the bulls.

  “What on earth?” I asked. “What are all those watermelons for?”

  Chase craned his head for a look behind himself, where I hid. He stepped out of my way, then pulled me around where he could see me. “There’s going to be a street party here after the run. The watermelons are being cut, sliced, and distributed to anyone who comes back this way.”

  I turned my head slowly in each direction, keeping my eyes locked on the bulls. It might’ve been my imagination, but I thought the bulls looked antsy.

  I reached for Scarlet’s hand, careful not to lose sight of the bulls and trying not to imagine them running me over. “Maybe I’ll take those skates,” I said.

  She pulled them from beneath the table’s long white skirt.

  “I thought you said they were in your car.”

  “I thought you said you didn’t want them.”

  “Touché.” I took a seat on the lid of her rolling cooler and laced them up, then took a minute to get used to them. It had been at least a decade since I’d been on skates. I stood slowly, finding my balance, then did a loop around the table, dodging tourists, onlookers, and passersby.

  Scarlet clapped.

  “How’s the nanny hunt going?” I asked, pressing the bulls out of my mind.

  Scarlet tracked me with her eyes as I got braver on my new wheels. “Not great,” she said.

  I went a little farther each time before boomeranging back. “Why? What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, wiping humidity from her forehead and adjusting her helmet with giant red mâché horns. “There are a lot of weirdos out there.”

  I spun on my skates and adjusted my horn-appliqued booty shorts. “You’re not kidding.”

  Scarlet squatted near the table and came up with a helmet. The horns on this one were white and doused in glitter. “Here. If you’re going to go that far on the skates, you need a helmet.”

  I skidded to a rough stop at the table’s edge and made doe eyes at her before taking the helmet and hugging it to my chest. “You made me a helmet.”

  “Well, you’re no good to me dead,” she said, “and you never were the best skater.”

  “Hey,” I said.

  She shrugged. “Put it on. I just saved your life. You’ll repay me when we sit down to screen all the cuckoos from my inbox full of nanny video applications.”

  “Done,” I agreed.

  “How’s it going at the pageant?” she asked. “How are Eva and your mom?”

  I strapped my helmet over what felt like ten pounds of sticky blonde hair and silently cursed the ridiculous tropical temperatures. “Eva’s doing okay, all things considered,” I said. “I’m a little worried about what Mom’s going to do with he
r time once she no longer has a national pageant to orchestrate. She’ll still be feuding with Mrs. Hams, but the aggressive fund-raising will be over for five minutes. I’m hoping she goes back to redecorating her house and doesn’t turn too much of her attention on me.”

  Scarlet slid her eyes my way. “Yeah, right. She’s going to be on a manhunt for your most suitable future spouse the minute they close the curtain on this thing, and you know it.”

  I pushed that horrifying idea immediately out of my mind. “You know what she told me about Jack?” I asked.

  “I can’t begin to guess.”

  “She said it wasn’t a good idea to marry a cop. That I’d spend my life worrying about him, and he could die anytime he went to work, and where would I be besides brokenhearted?”

  Scarlet made a face. “I hate to agree with your mother, but …” She let the sentence hang.

  “Are you serious?” I asked. The heat of betrayal curled in my stomach. Scarlet and I had a standing lifelong agreement never to agree with the other friend’s mother, and while I’d never had a serious talk with Scarlet about my feelings for Jack, it was something she was just supposed to know.

  “Hey, to each her own,” she said, “but there are definite benefits to marrying a lawyer. For starters, they rarely die on the job. They never come home soaked in someone else’s blood, don’t get stalked by lunatics or put their kids and wives in danger as a result of their work.” She started ticking fingers off her opposite hand. “Carter works normal business hours. He’s available for school plays and soccer games. We go on a date every Friday night. It’s nice.”

  I gave Chase a long look. He’d wandered off to talk to the sequined bullfighters.

  “He’d be good for you,” she said, sliding into position beside me.

  “I’m not looking for a husband,” I said. “I like my life the way it is, possibly more than I ever have.”

  Scarlet stared at the side of my head until I looked her way. “You’re the most die-hard romantic I know. You always have been, and I get that you were burned while you were away in Virginia and that you’re hesitant to put your heart on the line again, but tell me the truth about something.”

  I didn’t respond. I couldn’t.

  “You might not be looking for a husband,” Scarlet said slowly. “I can’t be sure on that, but you are looking for love. Aren’t you?”

  My cheeks heated and my heart skipped. I watched Chase laugh and joke with the men across the way. His handsome face and congenial personality, brains, brawn, and money probably made him the world’s best catch.

  “Lace?” Scarlet prodded.

  I wet my suddenly dry lips. “Yes.” She was right. I believed in true love. I saw it in my parents and in Scarlet and Carter. They had the kind of love I’d only read about in story books, and I wanted it too.

  She pulled her gaze off my cheek and turned her face back in her brother-in-law’s direction. “You know he loves you, right?”

  “Yeah.” Emotion stung my eyes and burned my nose. I couldn’t look away from Chase’s bright smile, couldn’t deal with how incredibly, unfairly stupid my heart could be. “He’s basically perfect, but he’s not …”

  “Jack?” she interrupted.

  A small gasp ripped free from my lips. “I was going to say he wasn’t the one.”

  “Were you?”

  I blinked tear-blurred eyes at my best friend. “Yes, but how do you know about Jack?”

  She gave me a sad smile, then slung an arm over my shoulders. “Sweetie, until this moment, I thought you were the only one who didn’t know.”

  Chase broke away from the bull pen and headed back in our direction, smiling wide. He whistled upon approach. “Look at you in your horn helmet and skates. The fantasy is complete.”

  I rolled my eyes and choked a laugh as Scarlet moved away. “Everything okay over there?” I tipped my chin toward the sequined bullfighters.

  “Yeah. Those guys said their bulls are used to a crowd. They do shows with them all the time.” He bumped his shoulder to mine and smiled. “If you get nervous, you can grab onto me anywhere you’d like.”

  “Jeez.” I pushed him back with a laugh.

  A man’s voice interrupted us as it echoed through a microphone somewhere unseen. His words pumped from every telephone pole speaker for blocks, thanking sponsors, runners, and bulls, advising on events to follow the run and how to sign up for next year.

  The bat thumping and hooting grew steadily into a crescendo on either side of us as anticipation thickened the air.

  The sea of folks in white were suddenly still and vibrating with intent to run.

  My heart raced with adrenaline and endorphins as Scarlet tightened her chin strap. She gave my bottom a whack with her bat, then skated over to join the other bulls. I cruised behind the table and brought up the camera app on my phone.

  Chase gave me a slow-motion thumbs-up as he jogged backward into the sea of white.

  I snapped his picture. “Have fun!” I called.

  “Always,” he answered.

  Music suddenly replaced the man’s voice coming through the speakers. Heavy bass echoed and vibrated in my chest as fifteen thousand people joined in for one passionate chorus of “Born to be Wild.”

  The buzzer sounded. The crowd screamed, and the runners were off.

  The roller derby girls were released by a second buzzer several seconds later, their wheels chomping up the pavement as they chased the runners down.

  I clapped and waved and hooted until the sharp peal of a woman’s scream turned me to face the bulls.

  The oxen reared up on their hindquarters, bucking and stomping the pavement underfoot. Their wagon rattled and groaned behind them until the cart’s driver was thrown from his seat. He landed on the ground near their feet with a heavy grunt and curled himself into a ball for protection. The wooden guardrails gave way a moment later, rocked loose from the cart by the continued fit the animals were throwing. Watermelons plummeted from the massive pile, crashing and breaking on the street. Skaters tripped, slid, and fell in the mess as they tried to angle around, but there were just too many people. Too little space, and the squealing guitar solo of a classic rock hit long past its time wasn’t helping anything as it writhed through every speaker on the square.

  The sequined bullfighters rushed to calm the oxen. They helped fallen skaters up and redirected the remaining derby girls like six shiny pieces of tape trying to plug the holes in a dam.

  I watched in horror, unsure what to do, how to help or if I could.

  The sounds of screeching metal tore through my chest as the unattended bull fence collapsed with a sudden crash, instantly trampled beneath thousands of pounds of angry animals.

  I froze as the mini stampede headed right for me.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Furry Godmother’s gentle reminder: A proper lady never swears, unless she has to.

  I screamed and fled into the square, looking behind me as often as forward, racing recklessly on borrowed skates. The earth rumbled beneath my feet as the bulls tore through the table where I’d stood moments before, tossing water bottles and cups into the air with a calamitous sound and dragging the table by its skirt, tangled in their powerful legs.

  I dared another look behind me, and the lead bull lowered his head and horns. The only word I could think of burst from my lips on repeat as I dove into the circle of grass behind the fountain, and I wished I wasn’t in the shadow of the cathedral as I said it. My adrenaline-fueled body crashed and rolled across a row of pristine flower beds, like an actor in an action adventure. Unlike movie stars, I landed roughly on my knees, then fell forward on my head, busting off one glitter-coated horn and scraping the side of my face through black mulch.

  The first bull careered past me as I crawled full speed toward the historic marble statue of Andrew Jackson and pressed my back to the sturdy stone base. I closed my eyes and promised my maker I’d never dress like a bull again if he kept the stampede from killi
ng me.

  My phone vibrated in my shaking hand, and I pressed it to my ear. “Hello?” I choked as the next three bulls charged around the circle, allowing me to live another day.

  “Lacy!” Jack’s voice boomed through the phone.

  I made a strangled sound of confirmation.

  “Dispatch requested all available units to the Quarter. Are you there with Scarlet?”

  “Yeah.” I patted myself down with my free hand, checking for fatal injuries or missing body parts while my heart attempted to push itself directly through my rib cage. Bumps. Bruises. Scrapes. Nothing that would need stitches, and I’d miraculously managed not to break an ankle or leg on the skates. I turned a reverent look on the towering white cathedral. Thank you, I mouthed.

  “What’s happening?” Jack demanded.

  “Bulls!” I screamed as a group of terrified tourists ran past.

  “Bomb?” Jack’s voice neared red-alert levels. “Where are you?”

  “Jackson Square,” I said. “No bomb. Just bulls.”

  “Derby girls?”

  “No.” I tipped my filthy helmet back until it rested on the stone base of the Jackson statue. The bulls were across the street and headed for the river with a collection of sequined bullfighters and local law enforcement giving chase. The square was suddenly, deafeningly quiet.

  Tears began to fall. A small sob broke on my lips before I could stop it.

  “I’m on my way,” he said.

  “Don’t.” I wiped the unbidden tears away with resolve. “I’m fine. I need to find Chase and Scarlet.”

  “Where did they go?”

  “They ran,” I said with immense, chest-filling gratitude. My best friends had gone in a completely different direction than the crazed bulls.

  Sirens screamed and bleated in the distance, but aside from me, there were only a smattering of shell-shocked tourists in sight, probably ones who’d arrived after the bulls were long gone, and a bunch of looters collecting unbroken watermelons.