An Afternoon On The Wheel


“Sometimes I feel just like a gerbil, running around and around on his wheel!”

My best friend, Emily Pierson, glimpsed at me over her Styrofoam cup filled with steaming hot cappuccino. The one hand that was wrapped about the cup was slender and feminine, her long nails painted a gold-tinted ivory. Her bright blue eyes bored into mine as she stated drolly, “So buy one and then stomp on it till you feel better.”

I laughed at her morbid sense of humor even though I tried my best not to. “Why are you always so fatalistic?”

She shrugged one slender shoulder. “‘Cause I can be.” She threw a pointed stare at my half-eaten cookie, then glanced at me. “You going to finish that?”

I nodded my head as I stood. “You ready?” We were headed down to the carnival that came to town every five years. I often wondered where it went the other four years.

It was a great place for the family to go, or teenagers as was the case of Emily and I, and it always managed to have some new attraction. The last time it had been here, it had sported an exotic animal show. Lions and leopards and peacocks, tropical birds and snakes, even a crocodile that had scared the bejesus out of the both of us when it snapped and hissed.

There had been signs posted all over town, and since today was a Friday, Emily and I had both decided that tonight we would head down after our weekly Girl’s Night—or in this case, Afternoon—Out at the Coffee House.

Emily stood as she nodded her head, downing her cappuccino in two humongous gulps. I thought I heard her gasp in alarm as she followed me to the garbage, but when I glanced at her over my shoulder, she just smiled at me. “What?”

“Nothing.” I tossed my cookie into the trash, her coffee cup following quickly.

As we left the coffee shop, I frowned at her. “How do you do that? Drink all that hot stuff that quickly?”

She shrugged and gave me a mysterious smile. “I’m just that good.” She gave me a quick wink.

I couldn’t help but smile at her. “If you insist.”

As we made our way down the street, toward the outskirts of town where the carnival was set up on the old fairgrounds, Emily turned to me. “You think they’ll have that zoo-thingy again?”

I shrugged. “They might. It’s a different thing every time, though, so probably not.” I paused as I thought back. “Weren’t the lions your favorite?”

“Leopards,” she corrected. “They’re so cute!”

I arched a brow at her. “They’re killers.”

She glanced at me, something flashing in her eyes so quickly that I wasn’t sure I saw it. “That’s one opinion,” she answered as we got on line. “It’s all how you look at it.”

We moved up to the counter, paid our way in, then got our hands stamped. As we moved onto the grounds, I shoved my hands in my jean’s pockets. “Well, that’s how I look at them.”

She shrugged as her gaze searched the rides that were set up in front, pointing to the Ferris Wheel. “Whatever floats your boat. You want to ride the Wheel first or look for something else?”

I smiled. “The Ferris Wheel is fine.”

We spent the next three and a half hours wandering around the front part of the grounds, getting on all our favorite rides and eating all our favorite carnival foods: sweet and crunchy caramel apples, large hot and salty pretzels that always forced you to drink a bottle of water after eating it, steaming hot dogs fresh from the grill with mustard and ketchup, and, the best of all, lip-smacking funnel cakes sprinkled with powered sugar.

It was just after sunset when we finished our particularly fattening but delicious dinner. Since the food ‘court’ was located on the central grounds, we found that the games were toward the back of the grounds.

“Hey, you want to go play some of them?” Emily asked as she tossed her trash away, nodding toward the back of the grounds.

I arched a brow at her. “You do know that those games are rigged, right?”

She smiled at me, shrugging. “They’re still fun.”

I pretended to think about it. “Okay, after all, its not like—oh, wait, we are blowing our own money.”

Emily laughed.

After a quick search, we concluded that the zoo wasn’t here this year. “Sorry,” I said sincerely to her.

Emily shrugged one shoulder as we started toward the back. “Oh well.”

We wandered past a lot of the games, ones we knew we had no snowball’s chance in Hades of winning, and laughed to ourselves as the vendors tried to sell us with their hokey lines.

When we got to the very back of the grounds, we turned and were headed along the end when I got cold shivers down my spine, as if someone with bad intent were watching me. I froze, and Emily took two steps before realizing I wasn’t with her.

“Laurell, what’s wrong?” she asked, coming to stand before me.

“You don’t feel that?” I replied, answering her question with one of my own. I was surprised. Emily was usually very sensitive to other people’s heavy gazes.

She shifted her weight from foot to foot. “It is kind of creepy back here, in the dark,” she admitted.

I was grateful she felt it too, because I didn’t want to seem like a freak. “Let’s just keep walking,” I suggested, trying to keep my tone light, and she nodded.

As we resumed our movement forward, I kept a sharp lookout for anyone, or anything, out of the ordinary.

I was so intent, in fact, that I jumped a few minutes later when Emily grasped my arm and squealed in delight. “Look!” she cried lowly, excitement thick in her voice. “At that old-fashioned carousel.”

I glanced in the direction she was pointing, and gasped as well.

It was beautiful, painted in vivid hues of golds and reds, blues and greens and ivory, with a scalloped edge along the roof. Alight with soft white light that flashed and danced like fairies, it was decked with mirrors that reflected the light outward. Horses of different colors with billowing manes and tails were frozen in mid prance, zebras were dressed as if they were royalty, and leopards marked with gold and onyx crouched and slinked along the yellow-painted wood deck. It was absolutely gorgeous, and reminded me of the nineteen-thirties, for some reason.

“Let’s see if we can ride!” Emily squealed. Without waiting for me, she took off running, her long coppery curls flowing out behind her.

I followed at a much more subdued pace, hands in pockets, but I couldn’t help the feeling of queasiness that grew in my stomach with every step I took toward the carousel.

I don’t know why I felt that way, but I knew that I couldn’t let down my best friend, especially when she seemed so excited.

There didn’t seem to be anyone around as we climbed up onto the deck. “I don’t think we should be doing this,” I replied, suddenly very nervous. There should have been more people around.

Emily brushed me off as she wandered through the animals until she could crouch next to one of the more threatening-looking leopards. “Everything will be just fine,” she cooed. She stroked the leopard’s wooden head as if it were her favorite house cat.

I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or the leopard, but either way it creeped me out just a little. “What are you doing?” I asked, nervous about Emily’s sudden strange actions.

She blinked at me. “Nothing.” She stood and came to stand in front of me. “Its just that I’ve always adored these old carousels,” she replied. She pulled out a gold chain from under her shirt, showing me the carousel horse pendant.

“That’s pretty,” I remarked honestly.

She nodded as she fingered it. “It belonged to my great-grandmother, and has been passed down generation to generation. It’s my keepsake. I’ll always wear it, at least until I pass it on to my daughter.”

“Cool,” I replied. “I wish I had something like that in my family.”

“What are you two young ladies doing up there?”

We both turned at the deep, gruff voice to see an old, gray-haired man standing by the carousel’s operations.

“We just wanted to know if we could ride,” Emily said innocently.

The man eyed us warily, especially Emily, then nodded reluctantly, his pale blue-gray eyes flashing strangely for just a heartbeat. When he spoke, he sounded resigned. “I guess so. But only one ride, then you have to go.”

I nodded in agreement. “That’s fine. Right, Em?”

“Yep.”

We chose our mounts: For me, the prancing black stallion decked in blood red roses and a gold-and-green saddle and bridle; for Emily, the dancing zebra dressed in royal purple and orange sashes with a silver-and-blue saddle and bridle, next to the leopard she’d been petting earlier.

The old man started the carousel up, and we started going around slowly, then a little faster. The music was the same old annoying tune, but somehow it worked with the night and the ride.

After several rounds, I wondered why the old man didn’t stop the carousel. After all, they didn’t usually let people ride very long. Surprising.

As we went around for the fifth time, I looked for him, but he was nowhere to be seen. It was as if he had completely disappeared.

“Hey, do you see the guy that operates this thing?” I shouted over the music at Emily, who was directly behind me.

She didn’t answer me.

“Em?” I called, turning in the saddle to glance at her.

I started as I saw her eyes, which glowed eerily, and it wasn’t from the lights. It was as if they glowed from the inside. She was staring off into space. Her lips were moving, though she was making no sound as far as I could tell, and I panicked a little.

“Emily?” I shouted, taken back.

She didn’t respond, just kept murmuring silently.

I climbed off my horse and grabbed a hold of the gold bar that it slid up and down on for balance. “Emily?” I shouted again, desperation tingeing my voice, waving my free hand franticly to get her attention as I tried to keep my balance.

She turned those now-unnatural eyes on me. “Yes?”

She wasn’t shouting, and yet I heard her as clearly as if she’d spoken directly into my ear. Was I dizzy? Getting sick? There had to be a reasonable explanation for it.

I took a few steps closer, trying to keep my balance as the carousel seemed to move faster. “What’s wrong?”

She cocked her head at me in a very cat-like manner. “Nothing,” she replied. And then she grinned ominously at me, showing off long, pointed canines. Canines that hadn’t been there before.

I heard myself shriek. “What’s going on? When did you put those things in? It’s not funny!”

“They’ve always been there,” she purred. Then Emily threw her head back and laughed darkly before she swung one leg over the zebra and slid to her feet gracefully, eerily like a cat. Her eyes were no longer bright blue, but instead pale blue flecked generously with gold, and they reflected the light with mirror intensity much like a feline’s would. “No, its really not funny, is it?”

I heard the cracking of wood over the cacophonous music, and I dared a peep to the left of Emily to see the leopard pulling one of its front paws from the deck.

With every breath it took, it became more life-like, its smoothly painted coat becoming glossy fur that bristled, its muzzle pulling back into a deadly snarl, honed muscles rippling as it began to struggle for freedom. And when it was free, which only took a few rapid beats of my heart, it shook itself, glanced at me, and crouched low as it started to stalk forward slowly, gold-tinted ivory claws out and ready for use.

What was happening to me? Had I been drugged? Or was I hallucinating?

“Say hello to my great-grandmother, the one I was telling you about,” Emily replied, standing perfectly still, almost like a statue, even as I swayed back and forth with the fast rotation of the carousel. “You’ll have to excuse her, as she hasn’t fed in over five decades. But I think you can take care of that.”

I was rooted to the spot as I stared in horror at the leopard, who stalked even closer, it’s amber eyes glittering like ice in the carousel’s lights. That bizarre carousel music played on and on, seeming to reach a roar in my ears, and it only made my head spin faster as I tried to focus on the creeping leopard.

And when it pounced, I wanted to scream, to run, to do anything. Fear kept me planted where I was.

My last clear image was razor-sharp claws extended, lunging for my throat.

My last coherent thought was that my time on the wheel was up for good.

I tried to scream as the leopard grabbed me, the lights and colors and faces spinning faster than the speed of sound in front of me, but instead of shredding away like any normal leopard, it grasped my shoulders firmly and shook me violently.

“Laurell!” it cried, and it sounded awfully similar to Emily. “Laurell!”

I rolled my head as a pounding took up in my temples, and I frowned as the leopard’s golden eyes melted into piercing blue eyes.

Familiar blue eyes.

“Em?” I asked.

The leopard’s face swirled and slowed, fading into Emily’s concerned features, surrounded by several other worried faces. I recognized the coffee shop’s buttery-colored ceiling.

“Are you alright?” Emily asked, her hazy voice growing clearer with each syllable.

I stared at her, confused. “What happened to the leopard?” I asked.

She arched a brow at me as she felt my forehead carefully. “You must have hit your head harder than I thought,” she mumbled. “Are you okay?”

I shook my head. “I have a bad headache, but, the leopard . . . What happened?”

Emily gave me a gentle smile. “You stood up to throw away your cookie, tripped over your book bag, fell and hit your head on the corner of the table.”

I frowned even though I was greatly relieved. “So, it was all just a crazy dream?”

She arched a brow even as she grinned like I was nuts. “Yeah. Whatever happened, it was all just a crazy dream.”

I sighed in respite, disbelief.

I caught sight of Emily’s necklace, hanging free of her shirt.

On a delicate gold chain hung a golden carousel horse, one I swore I had never seen before.

Or had I?

Which begged the question, just where was my wheel headed?