The Fairest of Fairs


Chrissy, on the other hand, just announced that there was going to be a sleepover a week before the fair, so they could assemble the presentation board.

I asked what I could bring. “I mean, I have HEARD about popcorn and pillow fights and blanket forts and…”

“And I heard about the debate stick in the dream,” Chrissy said. It was the voice she uses when her opponent misquotes her for the purpose of making a strawman argument. Then she drew a single finger across her throat.

“I gulped theatrically,” I said, “to convey the fact that the message was received loud and clear.” Then I swallowed theatrically.

The girls laughed. Chrissy held out a fingertip and Electra slapped it for a high five point one.

I promised to have the charts and the carrier ready on the announced date, so she could just take her home from school that night. “My boss, however, will insist on at least one video of the process. For completeness.”

“Be at my front door at 8:00,” Chrissy said. “We’ll be doing finishing touches. In, out and back on your bicycle by 8:20.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said.

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The biggest news, though, was the night of the fair. Chrissy, Chip, and Jennifer (for that night) begged the class officer who assigned projects to tables for them to be all together.

I hemmed and hawed. Chrissy’s project had to do with detergents and stains, Chip’s was breeding strategies for the cattle on his family’s ranch. “So that’s chemistry and biology. She’s engineering. What am I supposed to do, alternate project categories rather than bunch them all together? It makes a mockery of the sorting system!”

“So,” Jennifer said, “what you’re saying is that you already did it.”

“The order is: Biology, Chemistry, Engineering, Physics, Psychology, Biology, Chemistry, Engineering, Physics, Psychology, Biology-“

“OKAY!” Chrissy said. “We GET it!”

“But I’m not done yet! There weren’t enough Psychology experiments so…” I checked my clipboard. See how important I am? I got a clipboard.

Okay, I had to go buy it myself, but no one took it away from me at the door.

“At table 23 we shift to Biology, Chemistry, Engineering, Physics, ECOLOGY, Biology, Chemistry, and Trees.”

Those whose legs were long enough to reach the floor walked away from me.

“Trees?” Jennifer asked, curious despite her disdain for my meticulous system.

“One of the knuckledraggers,” I said. “His project is ‘Are Trees.’”

“Are trees what?” she asked.

“I think he meant ‘our’ trees, but that’s not what he wrote. On the form OR on the poster.”

She giggled.

I had nothing left to contribute to the night, so I stood beside the table with Jennifer Beatty’s project on it.

Chrissy was between us and Chip, so when his family came by we studiously did not make eye contact or reveal that we knew him.

He did introduce his girlfriend’s project to his siblings. Silence about the girl he’d known for five years, including at least three family fishing trips. Not one of them paused as they swept by us.

Humans amaze me sometimes.

But I was starting to get worried about my parents. Half the judges had come by and asked their questions already, no sign of Mom and Dad.

Jennifer noticed, but she was more nonchalant. “I kinda thought they’d be by, but then, it’s not like YOU’RE competing.”

“Jennifer, in case you haven’t noticed, it’s EXACTLY like I was competing. You keep calling them Mr. and Mrs. Loudon, but they feel… More like you’re a very close cousin, at the very least.”

“Really?” she asked.

“Are you stupid when it comes to people, or do you just have a blind spot where parents are concerned?”

Chrissy’s parents came by before she could answer. They obviously remembered Jennifer and her project.

Me, they didn’t know until I held my hands as if taping the video.

“Oh, ah, um, the camera guy.” Fame. I hope it doesn’t change me.



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Index

36. Isolating The Annoying Squeak

38. Guests (N)