Secret Life, an Emison Story

The (Un) Fair

Chapter 12: The (un) Fair

Ali's POV.

It had been a week since Emily started staying with us. We've been having the best time together. For once I feel like life isn't trying to torment me.

"What should we do today?" I ask Emily.

"I don't know."

"How about I take you guys to the fall fair?" Mom suggested.

"That sounds fun," I reply.

In truth I've never been to an actual fair, I've done movie scenes about them, but never really felt the whole experience. I imagine they are louder and more crowded than in the movies.

We took the bus down to the fair. I'm used to walking around a lot recently, but the bus was a new experience for me as well. You have to wait at a certain spot, at various times to get somewhere. If you miss that time, you have to wait for another bus to come which is between fifteen to sixty minutes. Also, bad luck if the last bus of the day leaves without you, you have to wait till the next day. Sometimes there aren't enough seats so you have to stand holding on to a bar.

"Ok girls, let's meet up at that little underpass for some food in, let's say, two hours and a half hours? Ok?"

"Ok, thanks," I told her.

"What should we do first?" Emily asks me.

Looking around I was right. This place was wild, loud, and very crowded. In the part of the fair we were standing in, there were rides surrounding us, with long crowded lines, games to our left. Each is stocked with adorable stuffed animals. Up ahead, there were a few convenience food vendors. One with popcorn, cotton candy, candy apples, and slushes. Another one was selling all different kinds of lemonade, blue, pink, I even saw one green one. There was also a food truck selling mini donuts.

"How about a ride?"

"Sure. I love the rides here, I come every year."

"You do?"

"Yep. me and the girls would spend the whole day doing everything imaginable." Was I separating Emily from her friends? I haven't seen them since the sleepover, and Emily has barely talked about them till now. I don't want to be a wedge between them, but I also don't want to be a fifth wheel that doesn't do anything, because of my social anxiety.

"Well, we can do the same?"

"I like that idea," she grins. The sun reflecting off her right cheek.

We go on some rides, I've never felt such a fun blood rush to the head. You get turned upside down, going at high speeds, spun around so fast that you want to puke. All the rides were just so incredibly amazing.

Next, we played some games. I saw this cute narwhal with a little monocle and a mustache. Emily threw three beat-up rough dirty baseballs at ten old-fashioned milk bottles, with milk in bulgy glass letters on the front. She shoots the first ball, Crash! Three bottles go down. She shoots the next ball, even more bottles crash onto the ground. Em shoots her final ball and the ball accidentally hits the carney's straw bowler hat with a red ribbon around the top. We both laugh a little, and Em apologizes, but the carney isn't having any of it.

The carney's face goes metaphorically red. If it was a cartoon, steam would've been coming out of his ears as well.

"So did we win a prize?" Emily asks. His head seemed like it was on the verge of exploding.

"No, you did not win a prize! You did not knock down all the pins, you only hit six of them! Now, how about you just leave and go crying to your mommys!"

"You're rude!" Emily shouts backs. "We might just report you, and you wouldn't want to lose this lower than minimum wage seasonal job would you?" Wow Emily standing up for herself was a sight to see. 

"And you think you can fire me, do ya?"

"I recall walking past a fair Gowers services booth don't you?" She asks me. I did remember an information booth, but not exactly a complaint office. Yet I decided to go along to support her, even though this had gotten a little out of hand.

"Yeah, we did."

"Just take your rat you rat!" A flying mouse plushie gets projectile in our direction. It wasn't a cute blue narwhal with a monocle, but it was still cute in its own way. I decided to name her Roz after the character in Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

I just love the fair, so much incredibly deep fried and just regularly fried food to gorge on. Mom's never been a fan of processed food or deep-fried food. I still got it from time to time, but it wasn't ever part of our normal diet. In the past month, I've eaten more junk food than I've ever had at once. It might not be the healthiest decision, but it tastes so good. My favorite kind of pizza is Hawaiian, and my favorite flavor of chips is sour cream and bacon.

I'm in the bathroom while Em is getting more popcorn for us to feast on when these two girls come in. I'm just minding my own business, yet they come over to me, closing in on me, making me back up against the sinks. The one girl has long curly auburn hair, and creamy white skin. She's around 5'7 including the two-inch heels she's wearing. Her shirt seems a bit too small but fitting at the same time, I realize it's a crop top. The jeans on her legs seem to have more holes than fabric, don't her legs get cold from the breeze. The other girl is short 5'3 at the most. She has no heels on just blinding white Vans. Her hair is short and blinding white platinum. Her shirt is really baggy and it has a lot of writing on it, but it's a bit unreadable from too many trips to the wash. At first, I couldn't see her shorts, but if I looked closer I saw a frayed end of denim poking out. Either her shirt was that oversized, or she was wearing really short shorts. Probably a mix of both.

"Look what we got here." The tall girl says. What does she mean, is she referring to the paper towel on the sink countertop or the toilet paper on the floor.

"I don't know, what do we have here, Chels?"

"We got the talk of the town here."

"The hidden Dilaurentis kid." The short one finishes. The what kid? What were they talking about?

"Where was your mom hiding you for the past thirteen years." These girls were messing with me, but I didn't know why. What had I done to them, but I'd learned from prior experience that a person doesn't need to know you to hate you.

"I can understand why she did it, she probably didn't want to bring more shame to your horrid family by letting people know you exist." They shove me against the sink and drop their drinks by my feet.

I just stayed there standing in shock. I just wanted to cry, but I couldn't, that would be pathetic. Nobody could know what had happened. I came out of the bathroom a few minutes later stone-faced, emotionless.

"I got the popcorn ready to puke our guts out?" She says happily. It takes her a few seconds, then she notices something is wrong.

"You ok?" Concern crosses her face.

"I'm fine."

"No, you're not."

"I am, so just drop it!" That was the first time I truly snapped at Emily.