Crazy In Love | Buggy

n i n e t e e n

For a short couple of minutes, I managed to completely forget all of my hatred and resentment towards Buggy. The glass walk, his praise, the cheering, all of it together seemed to blur my memory. His clowns cleaned up the glass, and I realised that Buggy was still holding on to one of my hands.

He hadn't seemed to notice it yet. I wanted to say something, tell him to let go. I should want him to, shouldn't I? He was a disgusting, horrible monster. Yet... his touch against mine felt electrifying.

I decided to allow it to go on for just a little while longer. Where was the harm in that? He continued to yell out to the crowd but I wasn't listening, wasn't really paying attention to anything other than the feeling of his hand against my own.

Finally, he finished speaking. He turned to me, smiling down at me with a big wide grin across his face. "That was fun, wasn't it?"

"Fun isn't the word that I'd use. Terrifying would be more like it."

He shrugged. "Terrifying. Fun. Same thing. From now on, you can do the glass walk every time."

"You're never getting me to do that again," I told him firmly. I watched as his clowns cleared away the glass, collecting it into a big barrel. Apparently they kept and reused it. "That was the scariest experience of my life."

"That's what life is about."

I furrowed my eyebrows together in confusion. "Life is about glass walking?"

"Life is about new experiences. That's what I live for. Plus, look at you. You were incredible. It was... magnetising watching you."

My face blushed at that. Nobody had ever described me like that before. I wasn't too sure how to feel about it. "Well, either way, I won't be doing it again. My whole body is drenched in sweat from the fear."

He grinned at that. "I can tell. Your hand is - "

Suddenly, it seemed to hit him that we were still holding hands. He dropped mine immediately, taking a couple of steps back. He reacted as if my touch was burning hot. He got this awkward look across his face, which seemed so unusual for him. He wasn't the type of person who felt awkward.

"Sorry," I offered. "I didn't realise - "

"Neither did I. Sorry. Too." Neither of us looked at one another. Finally, he cleared his throat. "We should go."

"Yes."

I followed him out of the big top tent and back into the town. As I did, all of my positive feelings towards Buggy melted away as I saw the sight that awaited me.

It turned out that not all of his clowns had been a part of the show. A bunch of them had stayed behind, smashing shop windows, looting everything valuable in sight and getting drunk in the street. The chaos only got worse as the clowns from the show joined in on the destruction.

The hatred of him and his crew bubbled up inside of me, growing even bigger than it had been previously.

"It's worse than what they did to my town," I mumbled out, feeling tears spilling out of my eyes as I watched the horrific sight.

"The whole point of us coming here was to get more supplies," he responded, with no emotion in his face whatsoever.

"Yes, but they're not just getting supplies. Your clowns are destroying this place. The people aren't even fighting back - there's no reason to cause so much damage."

Buggy sighed as if he was annoyed. "My crew likes to have fun. You can feel free to tell them to stop. I doubt they'll listen, though."

He was being so nonchalant. It was driving me crazy. Realistically, I should have been used to it by now. But I kept giving him more credit than he deserved. His shred of sympathy towards me back there had made me see him as someone kinder than he was.