Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
“Daddy!”
Seven men turned to see who screamed “Daddy,” but it was only me that bent down to scoop up the screeching three-year-old.
“Daddy!” she smiled, both of her hands full. One hand with cotton candy and the other with what looked to be a cheese stick, but I couldn’t be sure. “Look what I have. Want a bite?”
I grinned and took the tiniest of bites of her cotton candy.
“What did you just go do?” I asked her.
“I’ll tell you what your kid just did,” an angry voice said, some male I’d never met. “She cut me off and made me let go of my balloons.”
He pointed upward, but my background made it to where I never looked away when someone was around me. Call it a hazard of being in prison, if you will. It’d been years and years since I’d done my time, but that didn’t change my ingrained habits.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “But you are at a circus, man. I’m not sure if you knew or not, but there are kids everywhere.”
“I don’t care if they’re fucking everywhere,” the man grumbled. “Those balloons cost over thirty dollars apiece, and I just let go of thirty of them.”
“How about you come here, sweetheart,” a deep voice said from my side.
“Uncle Wake!” my sweet three-year-old smiled. “Do you want a bite?”
“No, baby.” Wake sounded hurt that he couldn’t take a bite when in reality, he wasn’t as hip to share a spun sugar confection that looked like it might or might not have been dropped in the dirt. “Come play with my girls over here. They’re at the shooting ring.”
I waited until my daughter and Wake were well away from me before I said, “I’m sorry for the loss of revenue, but in this instance, I think your boss will understand.”
“You don’t know fuck all of what he’ll understand,” the man disagreed vehemently. “My boss is an absolute dick, and he’s never going to let me forget this.”
The man took a threatening step forward, and I took one, too.
The years had been kind to me.
I’d recovered almost one hundred percent from that bullet to the brain.
Though I had a few little instances where I had rough days, those were few and far between.
I could definitely handle myself now, and this guy was about to find out just how well if he continued with his threatening posture.
“Magnus,” I heard Keene’s drawl. “I suggest you head back to the tent and get more balloons. Leave our VIP guest alone.”
Magnus stiffened upon hearing Keene’s voice.
I smiled and watched him go, not bothering to turn to Keene until “Magnus” was well out of my space.
“You need to find a new balloon seller,” I grumbled. “He has an attitude.”
“He does,” Keene sighed. “It’s hard to find good workers nowadays.”
It was.
I’d found that out the hard way when I needed help with my business and couldn’t find any worthwhile.
I was on assistant number four at the moment, and it looked like I would be on assistant number five by the end of the year.
Luckily, I had a beautiful wife that dealt with the hiring process for me since I couldn’t stand doing it.
Speaking of my wife, she walked up beside Keene and bumped him with her shoulder. “You should allow me to run through your hiring process again if you’re having that much trouble.”
My wife didn’t work.
She did what she wanted to and always would.
That included butting into everyone’s business that she felt needed her help.
I waited for him to say no, but he agreed with a muttered, “sure.”
Then he disappeared when a kid screamed about a clown that stepped on her foot.
“So,” she said as she saw me. “It looks like you and I are kid-free for the moment.”
I grinned. “Oh, yeah?”
She took a step backwards and pointed at a tent behind her. “The Big Cat show just let out…it’s all empty.”
I caught her up around the waist and carried her into the tent.
She was right.
It was empty.
And like the seasoned parents we were, it only took us five minutes to make use of the emptiness.
When we were done, we went outside to find all of the sisters with our kids, lavishing them with attention.
All of them had enough candy to last them an entire year and big enough stuffed animals that they’d have to ride in a separate car on the way home.
“Momma!” our youngest daughter cried. “Look!”
We both looked.
It was a fish in a bag.
“Fuck,” Folsom sighed.
“Yeah,” I grumbled.
“Fish suck,” she said.
They did and they didn’t.
We got one every year.
And every year, they died within weeks and we had to replace them.
We currently had a pond full of circus goldfish or replacement circus goldfish.
One that I had to maintain, or they all got cranky.
“What’s one more?” I sighed.
“That’s what you said about our last child,” she pointed out.