Page 70 of Family: Posy 4

I'm fine with all of that but the port-a-potty,I admitted.Surely there's somewhere more sanitary nearby—

Wyatt!they all bellowed and I rolled my eyes.

"Can we go on that?" Posy said suddenly, pointing at the teacups. "The little seats look so cute!"

Mase explained what it was and how the ride worked, and we decided Ash should be one of us to go on it with her. Since the cups didn't have a roof, his height wasn't a problem like it was on the tilt-a-whirl. Then we Rock-Paper-Scissored to see who else would go on, and I smiled smugly when I won.

So Ash and I seated Posy between us in a teacup and put our strength to work to make the cup spin as fast as we could. Mase, Cole, and Jay crammed into the cup right next to us, although they spent most of the ride watching her animated face rather than trying to make their cup spin. She giggled and giggled until tears leaked from her eyes and down her red cheeks, and Mase linked us to stop before she got dizzy and vomited.

She's fine, I assured him in a deadpan.Mr. Worrywart.

And she was, too. She got off the ride laughing so hard, she held her stomach, which made Mase fear she was about to puke, and it took her several minutes to convince him she was fine.

After that, we got on the carousel. As we all predicted she would, she selected the rabbit, and we settled for animals around her. Ash chose a black horse, I climbed on a tiger, Cole appropriately sat on a bear, Jay picked a white goat, and Mase took the giant seahorse.

She liked the carousel so much, we rode it three times. She didn't have a chance at catching the brass rings, so we all made a point to collect as many of them as we could. In the end, we handed her nearly two dozen iron rings and two brass ones.

After we explained what they meant, she gave the brass ones to some little kids in line, then made us throw the iron ones at the lion target next to the carousel. If you got the ring in the lion's mouth, he roared. When Ash hit it the first time, the noise startled Posy, but then she clapped and jumped up and down and praised him for his "skills."

Needless to say, none of us competitive bastards missed the lion's mouth after that.

We skipped the haunted mansion and went into the magic maze. She wasn't too keen on that until I held one of her hands and Jay the other. Strangely, the rolling checkerboard floor made her dizzy, but the tilt-a-whirl and teacups didn't.

As we walked by the obstacle course, Posy came to a dead halt, bringing Ash and Mase to a stop, too, since they held her hands.

"What's that?" she asked.

We explained how you had to dodge swinging sandbags while running across a balance beam, climb a cargo net, and cross a suspension bridge without falling into the water below before sliding down a long drop into an air pillow.

"The goal is to do it quickly," Mase added. "They keep a scoreboard and the fastest time at the end of the fair wins a prize."

"Well, then, youhaveto do it." Her pretty blue eyes twinkled up at us. "Although I think you'll all finish right around the same time since you're so fast and athletic."

"Oh, really?" I raised an eyebrow. "Hundred bucks says I'm the fastest."

"Hundred bucks says you fall in the moat," Jay challenged with a smile.

"Hundred bucks says you don't even finish," I shot back.

"Let's speed this up, boys," Cole smirked. "Whoever's fastest gets a hundred from each of us and everyone who falls in the water owes the others a hundred."

"It doesn't have to be a bet," Posy said hesitantly and started to twine her fingers together, a signal we all recognized as her getting nervous.

"Oh, baby, you know we can'tnotcompete," Mase told her with a broad grin. "The betting just adds another layer of fun. It's all good. I promise."

"If you're sure. I don't want anyone to get hurt because of a stupid bet."

"We'll keep an eye on them, luna," came a voice from our left, and we whirled to see Emerson and Angelo standing a few feet away.

"Em! Gelo!" Posy smiled and launched herself at Emerson for a hug. "Are you going to run the obstacle course, too?"

"Hell, yeah!" Angelo grinned.

"Now we got a contest!" I rubbed my hands together, also grinning.

"You leave your baby at home, Em?" Ash asked with wide eyes.

"Are you joking? Keep that kid away from something as colorful and busy as the fair?" Emerson rolled his eyes. "He's here with his besties. They've been here every night this week. You'd think they'd get bored of it."

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