Set Fire to the Rain

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I asked barely above a whisper as I slowly slid off the smooth leather seat and out of the car and moved to Shannon’s side.

He chuckled at that response, and said, “I take it you’re surprised then?”

“Ha! Yeah, I would say that’s a fucking understatement. Not to sound unappreciative or anything, but I read they closed this place down like 8 years ago or something.”

“It was more like 15 years ago, and I made a few phone calls to see if it was possible to have the owner come out and let us in and walk around for a while and maybe ride one of the rides.” He said looking down at me as we walked towards the entrance of the very old, very closed down, amusement park.

I stopped dead in my tracks when he said that we were actually going to get onto one of these things! Seriously, they closed the place down for a reason right! The man is clearly out of his mind! Crazy muddafugga wasn’t anywhere near being close enough to a description for Shannon now. Insane is more like it! Holy shit! “Shannon, you just said yourself the place has been closed down for 15 years! And you want me to ride on one of the park rides! Are you fucking insane?” I threw my hands in the air visibly upset with the idea.

“Eliza, do you honestly think I would ever willingly put you in danger?” He asked stepping in front of me, and looking deep into my eyes.

“Umm, well, no, you have never given me any reason to think that you would. You have been nothing but great to me.”

“Alright, so do you think that I would take you to a place and then purposely put you onto an old amusement ride that would send you and I both plummeting to our deaths?”

“When you put it like that, it sounds really fucking stupid. I’m sorry.” I laughed.

“Ok, no need to apologize babe. By the way you are far from stupid. I have it all planned out, so you aren’t getting any information out of me, other than this was one of my favorite places to visit as kid a when I lived not too far away.” We began walking towards the entry gates and Shannon took out his iPhone and texted to a phone number and we waited.

I remember reading somewhere that Shannon had gone to a music program of some sort as a young teen up in the Philly area, but I wasn’t positive. This having been one of the largest amusement parks in the area long ago, I am not surprised that he came here while attending.

We didn’t have to wait very long before a short thin, elderly man, with thinning hair came from one of the building closest to the gates with a set of keys and asked to see Shannon’s ID. Once that was settled, the man, Calvin, whom I guessed to be the owner said that his sons were waiting at the places that Shannon had specified. Calvin handed Shannon a very old folded pamphlet that I took to be a map of the park, bid us farewell, and Shannon glanced down at it, and he led the way as I followed.

The first stop we made was to a ring toss game. I loved these games as a kid. I hadn’t been to an amusement park for as long as I remember and here I was with Shannon and he was kicking ass at the ring toss. He won me a huge ass purple elephant, and I loved it. So when he finished, Shannon asked if I wanted a turn and I immediately said yes. I failed miserably, but had a great time doing so. We laughed so hard at my failures, it was amazing. After the ring toss, I carried my elephant to the next game, and the next. I think in all we played 4 games, and when we were done Shannon started walking us down a long wide cobblestone pathway that looked like it belonged to a street out of the 1920’s or something, but I had a feeling it led to something huge around the corner. I could hear the hint of music playing but it wasn’t loud enough to quite make out. I was looking around trying to figure out where it was coming from and coming up empty. All of the rides that surrounded us were shut down, and or boarded up, so music playing from somewhere didn’t make any sense to me at all. Apparently, it made total sense to Shannon, because he had the most beautiful smile on his face when he looked at me. He was always up to something.

It was then that Shannon stopped walking and asked me the most bizarre question “So do you like ducks, giraffes, horses, or llamas?”

“I’m sorry, what?” Shifting slightly with my giant purple elephant under my arm, I was totally confused.

“You heard me, what’s your answer? Before we take a step closer, I need to know.” Stepping in front of me, he looked at me with total seriousness.

“Hmmm. I would have to say, horses.” Tapping my chin with my left pointer finger as I answered him with a smirk, I had to pretend to at least think hard about it, of course I didn’t, because horses were indeed my favorite.

“Horses huh” Then moving out of my way, and taking the elephant from under my right arm and taking my right hand in his, entwining our fingers as one we began to walk forward down the old cobblestone path towards the music playing through the air as it became louder.

What I saw when we rounded the corner put the biggest smile on my face, and I completely understood his question now. What I saw was a carousel, a very old fashioned one at that moving around in its circular motion playing an old song from when it would have been in use years before. It was beautiful, maybe even more so now, than years ago. There were black wrought iron benches that sat along the outside edges of the grassy area bordering the carousel giving onlookers a place to sit and watch as it went around, and that was where Shannon placed the prize he had won for me. Though we didn’t pause for long and then continued on to the carousel, he stopped before getting on and looked at me. “Would you like to join me on the carousel sweetheart?” Gently raising my hand to his soft lips he placed a kiss to the top of my hand. God help me!

“I would love to” I said looking up at him from under the hair that had slowly fallen in front of my eyes.

“Let’s find ourselves someplace to sit then” and he helped me step up, before climbing up directly behind me himself.

We walked around the carousel looking at all the different types of animals, noting that a lot of them were very worn down and some were broken from non-use or overuse over the years, and some of them were missing altogether. Shannon happened upon one horse that seemed to be just fine for us. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t anywhere near perfect, but it was one of the few animals that were still in mostly one piece, and though there wasn’t anything around it for him to sit on; he said that he honestly didn’t care, that he was fine standing next to me. I went to sit on the horse in front of me, when Shannon held me back and told me to wait. He wiped his hand over the top of the horse’s saddle trying to rid the top of any debris or dust that had collected there before I climbed on. When he was satisfied with the outcome, Shannon stepped back and helped me climb on the horse. I sat, and he stood close to me with his hand placed solidly on my back, he said it was in case something happened. Maybe it was that he had explained why he was holding on to me, or maybe not so much. Either way, I didn’t flinch when he touched me and that’s saying a lot.

The carousel was the end of our time at the park, but it was the perfect ending if you ask me. We walked slowly to the gate of the park where Shannon then talked to Calvin and his family also taking the time to sign a few autographs. We walked out of the gates and back towards Shannon’s car just as the sun was going down over the park and Shannon got all excited.

“Stand right there! Don’t go anywhere ok!” and he took off running to his car opening the back door. He was rummaging around in a big black bag, then placed something over his shoulder, took a step back and shut the door. He turned around taking the lens cap off of a camera, putting it up to one of his beautiful tawny eyes, and began to snap away. “Gorgeous, just gorgeous.” I just barely heard him say.

“Umm, excuse me? What do you think you are doing?” Now mind you Shannon and I had been taking pictures with our cell phones with each other all afternoon while we played games in the park, but this was an actual camera. You can’t hide the flaws with what he’s using. They only stand out more. You also have to take into account that we had just gotten off a carousel ride, had been playing outdoor amusement rides, and I was carrying an enormous purple elephant in my arms and he is talking about gorgeous. He must be nuts. I am sure I look like shit, and I am nothing much to look at to begin with.

”Sorry about that.” Dropping the camera from his face and looking at me, he said, “I needed to have a few pictures of you with the sun setting over the park. It’s just a stunning shot. I want one of the two of us too. Come here!” And he slightly jogged over to where I was with a smile and his left arm open to me.

I walked into his waiting arm, as it slid over my shoulder and my own wrapped around his back. He held his camera up expertly, and he did his thing clicking away pictures of the 2 of us as we smiled and we made goofy faces. The last one surprised me, as I was starting to look down, and he turned in and kissed me on the cheek. I heard the click. I could feel the blush rising on my face.

The man really is insane. He put the lens back on his camera and back into the bag in the rear seat along with my purple elephant because it was way too big for me to hold onto in the front seat, then he walked me around to the passenger side of the car and helped me inside. Before I knew it we were back on the Turnpike heading towards Shannon’s home in NYC. His iPod was playing in the car, and we found that we enjoyed almost all of the same music, and were actually having a great time singing along to what would come on. Shannon didn’t seem to mind my horrible singing voice either, he said it was great. Liar! I noticed that with every mile that went by, my stomach would flip-flop more and more, and my heart would beat so hard and fast that it felt like it would jump out of my chest. This was driving me crazy. He was leaving in a few weeks and we are only friends. Friendship was what was best for all involved. Right?