Page 131 of When Sky Breaks
“I’ll be feeding her and my baby, not the animals,” he counters with a smirk on his face.
August laughs and the rumble at my side soothes any negative thoughts I had. The idea of Trek becoming a father is growing on Foster and he insisted Trek invite Hazel to hang with us at the festival.
He looks frail, sitting on a bench catching his breath, but he was adamant about coming.
“Quit looking at me like I’m going to keel over, honey. Enjoy your time. Go. I’ll be okay,” he says, shooing me away.
Once I exhausted all my tears on August’s shoulder following the phone call with my Aunt Loren, I told Trek and Foster. It was a group hug fest after that, and within the comfort of all their arms, I knew I could get through whatever life threw at me.
August steers me toward the firehouse and The Villain’s Playground to see how all our hard work has panned out.
“I guess you were right.” August squeezes our laced fingers.
I look up into his gray eyes alight with amusement. “And what is that?”
He squints at all the booths, the people, the Halloween decorations. “I suppose all this fanfare is worth it.”
He tweaks the cat ears sitting on the top of my hair. I somehow convinced him to dress up as something other than a traveling photographer. I told him that was cheating. Who knew he’d look just as cute with his own set of cat ears? It’s obvious he only agreed because it would make me happy, but I appreciate it all the same.
“Wish you were on duty taking pictures?”
He angles his head down, holding onto the headband before it slides off his head. “Not at all. I like seeing it from your eyes this time. I asked Alex to take them for me. She’s not half bad with a camera. Reminds me a bit of myself when I started working with Colonel.”
“Did I tell you I was a tiny bit jealous of her when I went to Snaps before cornering you in the cemetery?”
August pauses near a booth with shirts hanging on a rack for sale. Most have silly sayings stitched across the front. My favorite reads, “Dead Inside, But Caffeinated,” with a skeleton holding onto a steaming mug of coffee.
“Jealous of Alex? She’s like a little sister to me.”
“It’s not like I knew that. The only thing I did know was my ridiculous feelings meant I hadn’t gotten over you. I’m glad things worked out and you’re here with me. It feels like another proper date.”
“I owe you a million proper dates, Shortcake.”
“We have time for them now.”
He grins and takes my hand, squeezing my fingers in response. My heart swells a fraction, blocking some of the negativity I brought with me.
We round the back of the firehouse, the manicured lawn bustling with activity. Families huddle close, sharing fried elephant ears and powdery funnel cakes, laughing and enjoying themselves.
Ginger waves at me from her position next to a nearly smiling Colonel, and I wave back, a small grin indenting my cheeks. I love this little slice of small-town life. The sense of community and closeness is sometimes rare to find, even rarer to sustain over time.
August and I stand at the back of the line for the haunted house. I couldn’t very well construct this thing and not know what it looks like, completely finished and running.
We hear screams accompanied by a cackling Halloween soundtrack. Strobe lights positioned along one side of the house flicker and flash in time to spooky music. “The Monster Mash” brings a round of singing from the people in front of us.
“You doing okay?” August asks.
He’s asked every day since that phone call and I respond by hugging his arm tighter, the canvas of his jacket scratching my cheek. I love how much he cares and how much he shows me by checking in on how I’m doing. No matter how many nights I’ve spent at his house, waking up in his arms, I’ll never get over how positively in tune with my emotions he is.
The line moves us forward, the doors thwacking off each other as the next set of people walk through, dry ice seeping from underneath the wood. In a weird way, I’m grateful for that dry ice. It’s what put me back in August’s orbit five years ago.
“If it’s okay with you, I think I want to go through it alone.”
“Are you sure?” Concern wrinkles his brows.
“Positive. You didn’t seem all that interested in going through it, anyway.”
“I would for you, though. I can handle it. Just worried I can’t control what my fists will do if something jumps out at me.”