Finding Joy

CHAPTER 13: THE SPRING FESTIVAL

The four of them stand at the entrance of the Spring Festival and they're all wearing matching light-up headbands and red long coats. The area is decorated with light-up inflatables and lanterns that lit up every inch of the area. Inside are endless rows of food stands and carnival games. There is so much to do that one couldn't possibly finish in one night.

Of course, they had to go to Mr. Owen's stand first. He served them their complimentary portion of noodles topped with fresh local vegetables and a vegetable broth- with extra toppings of course. Despite the cold weather, the broth warmed them right up.

Edan picks up a bok choy from the noodle soup and blows on it to cool it down to the perfect temperature. He then held it up to Joy's mouth.

"Eat it."

Lily watched then and giggled. Then she whispered in Nick's ear. "They're totally meant for each other."

And Nick, with his mouth full of food, returned an incomprehensible reply.

Lily, proud of her work, interrupted them for a brief moment. "Joy, Edan," she announced, "Nick and I have somewhere to be. You two have fun now!"

As Lily dragged Nick away, Joy told herself that she was going to have fun today. She wouldn't let her ex-boyfriend keep her from being happy and having fun. It would be hard, but it would be worth it.

"Let's go eat until our stomachs burst!" Joy said cheerfully. "My treat!"

Stuffed and fried potato pancakes, beer batter fried chicken kebabs, and apple pie pops. Next were two small cups of boba, and they each took a sip while intertwining their arms. They ate until they were stuffed.

As they worked on finishing the rest of their drinks, they happened upon a carnival game, "Turtle Scooping", where your goal is to catch a baby turtle swimming around in the large, but shallow tank. The rules are simple. You are given a small flimsy disk attached to a stick. If you successfully scoop up a baby turtle and put it into the small bowl, you get to keep it.

Joy paid the fee for two and they were ready to go turtle fishing. They took off their coats and Edan rolled up his sleeves to prepare for battle. Edan thought this was the perfect chance to woo Joy.

"I'll get you one.."

"Really? I think I'll get it first."

Edan scoffs. "I'm clearly stronger."

"Sure you are. Remember when we first met? You had the daylights knocked out of you."

Edan's expression darkens and Joy, remembering that he wanted to avoid the topic, said, "Ah, I'm sorry. Pretend I never said that." while waving her arms.

Edan is relieved that Joy decided to avoid talking about how they met, since the more she would learn and think about it, the higher the chance it would raise suspicion. To steer the conversation away from the topic, he makes a proposition. Whoever would catch a turtle first would have their wish, any wish, fulfilled by the other.

However, after endless attempts, neither were successful. The baby turtles were surprisingly fast and agile swimmers. And since there were so many, it was hard to isolate just one. If they were lucky and managed to isolate one, they were unable to prevent the flimsy plate from giving in due to both the weight of the turtles and their surprisingly vigorous movement that shook the plate off of it's handle. Nevertheless, Joy was having the time of her life chasing after the turtles and having droplets of water splashed at her from the turtles escaping. Edan was also having fun, but it was hard to tell since every failure led to him getting more aggressive the next turn. Joy grabbed his arm before he got too aggressive and calmed him down.