Winter Loon(41)

“No, nothing like that. He used to operate this ride, is all.”

“Been with Nicky three years. On this bitch the whole time.” He shut the fur trap around his mouth and put his hand out for the tickets. Jolene scooted in next to me at the back of the ride. When the operator came by, he yanked the strap into our laps and acted like we’d never spoken.

The boat rocked back and forth, building momentum, the mouth of the dragon lurching toward the carnival lights and the rising moon. Jolene was joyful and thrilled, throwing her hands up, her head back as we swooped down on the dragon’s tail. I clenched my teeth, gasping more than breathing. Somehow in that built-up pause between rising and falling, I thought I would die—that the strap would fail and I would be ejected or worse, sucked out, away, not thrown to the ground but disappeared into the colding fall air. Each sweep of the pendulum, I felt death swiping at me, like it had missed me by a claw in January, and here it had another chance. I squeezed my eyes shut and gripped the bar until my joints ached. It was only when I felt Jolene’s hand on mine, prying my fingers up gently, that I opened my eyes. The waves subsided under the dragon boat as it slowed. Alive with relief, I knotted Jolene’s arm with mine and kissed her hand, a silly gesture that made her laugh. “I think you’d have rather kissed the ground,” she said. We unstrapped ourselves and moved quickly to the exit. It was then that I saw her: army jacket, black jeans, peroxide-blond spiked hair. She looked like a stalk of corn leaning against the junction box across the midway. Nicky Barbie, the Barbosa sister in the Barbosa family. Not a woman to forget, and I hadn’t.

We caught up with Nicky, breathless from the ride, winded from the chase. I’d dragged Jolene by the hand, ignoring, for the most part, her questions. I touched Nicky’s arm and she turned on me like she was ready for a run-in. “Yeah?”

“You probably don’t remember me,” I said. “I was little when you saw me last.” And I was Little then, my dad’s nickname for me as long as I could remember. “I’m Wes Ballot. My dad’s Moss.”

She sized me up, nodded. “You look like him.”

“Do you remember I was with you guys for a while one summer, long time ago?” Jolene squeezed my hand then, and I knew she was with me. I gave her a quick smile but returned my attention to Nicky.

“Lots of kids come and go here. But sure, maybe.” Someone hollered for her from a game booth and she gave a double-handed wave that said she’d get there when she was good and ready. Her eyes squinted with memory against the lights. “Boy, you sure look like him alright.”

“I get that,” I said, though it had been a while since the two of us were side by side for people to make any kind of comparison. “I’m wondering if you’ve seen him recently.”

“Took off on you, huh?” The barker yelled for Nicky again, and she held up a finger. “I have to deal with this. It’ll only take a minute.”

We stood by while Nicky dealt with the man. Jolene slipped her arm behind my back and I put mine over her shoulder, pulling her into the crook, where she fit perfectly. I took it in then, the carnival, not through the eyes of a kid anymore. What I hadn’t seen before, I saw now—the reckless boredom of a barker playing mumblety-peg with a balloon dart, dangling cigarettes glowing at every operator’s stand, the distorted reflections paneling the House of Mirrors, everyone not quite what they seemed. I saw Kathryn then, standing in line for a ride, flanked by her friends from the river. I could tell by the look on her face that she’d been watching us, that we hadn’t been spotted only then. She turned her head hard, away from me, and stiffened her back in a way that made me think she was holding her breath. Jolene saw her, too. “Kathryn.”

“I know.”

“You think you should go talk to her?”

But Nicky Barbie put herself in front of us. “Sorry about that. What’s your name again?”

I repeated myself and introduced Jolene. I didn’t feel the need to tell Nicky the whole story about my mother and the lake, about Gip and Ruby. I said I was staying with my grandparents and expected him to come around soon.

“All I can tell you is he’s not with us. I don’t think I’ve seen Moss Ballot for I’d say five years or more now.”

I remembered what else was missing that had been there before. “Whatever happened with the Wandering Freaks?”

“Oh, you remember them, do you? Yeah, we had to shut that bit of the operation down. Started rubbing people the wrong way, I guess. Sorry to put those folks out of a job, I can tell you that.”

“My dad had a friend. Topeka. Always wore a funny hat.”

Nicky’s face lit up. “Oh, Topeka’s still with us. He’s with Vince out west of here somewhere. Montana, South Dakota, Wyoming. Whole different crew. Only thing we share now is the winter warehouse.”

“Montana?” My father had talked about Montana in the hospital. “Is there any way you could get a message to him, to Topeka? Maybe he’d know something.”

Nicky shook her head, bunched up her red lips. “We don’t really cross paths until about mid-October. He usually helps Vin with the haul out when we get everything squared away. Got a warehouse in South Dakota. Brookings. Couple weeks there maybe, doing a few repairs, dealing with inventory. That would be your best bet for finding him if you really want to.” She dug a pen out of one of her coat pockets and wrote on a pack of matches. “Send a letter there. He’ll get it. Otherwise, you can give me your information, and I’ll try not to lose it.”