My best friends Courtney and Maddie pick me up to go to the carnival. The annual Lions Club Carnival is the most exciting thing that happens in the town of Colmar.

I’m glad it’s a warm enough October evening to wear my new Burberry dress. I bought it last month, and haven’t had a chance to wear it yet.

Courtney looks perfect, as always. Not a single piece of her chestnut hair is out of place. Unlike Maddie’s wild red hair.

It’s Saturday evening. We’d planned to come last night too, but got distracted with a zombie movie marathon on tv and never made it.

Well, I distracted them with the zombies.

I didn’t feel like going last night, I was too busy stewing over the conversation with my father, right before my parents left for the airport on yet another of their vacations.

“Have fun at the carnival. It should be a good one, they’re a new carnival company this year,” my mom said, her overnight bag clenched in her hand.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” my father said, “I have a reputation to uphold. And as my daughter, your actions reflect on me.”

It was the same crap I hear all the time. I had to breathe deep, count to ten, and wish my father didn’t have the attitude of a man straight out of the fifties. I swear this entire town is stuck in the fifties.

I am twenty years old. An adult. What does my father’s reputation have to do with me?

Just because he’s president of the Lions Club, and has the largest car dealership network in North Carolina, doesn’t mean he has to have a daughter who never gets to have any fun.

As Courtney, Maddie and I near the gates, the noise of the rides and people screaming, as well as the incredible smell of funnel cakes make me regret the zombie movies. I can watch those anytime, we missed all the fun here.

The carnival is super busy. Half the young people in the town of Colmar are here, waiting in line to get in.

“What are we doing first?” Maddie asks.

“Let’s go on the rides before the lines get too long,” Courtney says.

“Ooo, good idea,” I say.

“Five bucks each admission,” the ticket man says. I recognize him as John from the Lions Club, this whole weekend is their biggest fundraising event. They keep the entrance price, the carnival takes everything else. My father helps organize it.

We pay our money and bustle each other into the park.

“Let’s go straight to the back and work our way forwards,” Maddie says.

“The Ferris wheel first?”

“Come on,” Courtney grabs our arms and we rush through the midway to get to the rides.

“Hey pretty girls, come win yourself a SpongeBob,” a guy at a game stall calls.

“First try is free,” another man at another stall says, spinning a basketball on his finger.

“Don’t look at them, just ignore them all and hurry up,” I say. I hate the games, I don’t see the fun of them. They’re all rigged or impossible to win.

“How is there already a crazy long line-up?” asks Maddie.

“Ferris wheels always take forever to get on, since they have to put someone on, move the wheel and put someone else on,” Courtney says.

“It’ll still be faster to get on now than it will later,” I say.

“Okay, let’s do it,” Maddie says.

We join the end of the line. There are dozens of people ahead of us.

Two guys with tattoos poking out from their yellow carnival worker t-shirts walk from the Ferris wheel and along the line.

“They’re cute,” Maddie says.

“Definitely yummy. Too bad they’re carnies,” Courtney says.

“All muscley hard coated-in-tattoos carnies,” Maddie says.

“Stop it, we’re staring at them,” I say, trying to drag my eyes away from the taller one.

Both their bodies are pure muscle, but his chest strains the seams of his shirt. He looks surprisingly clean, even though he’s covered in tattoos. Oh God, he even has a neck tattoo.   A scorpion crawls across the right side of his neck, as if it’s crawling from the back of his neck.   Its pincers reaching forward, and its tail curled and ready to strike.

His dark hair is cut short in a stylish way even my father would approve of. But most of all, his piercing blue eyes are looking straight at me, dazzling me.

“Why, you three are the cutest girls I’ve seen in weeks. Especially you, Goldilocks,” the blue-eyed guy says without slowing down or breaking his stride.

Courtney and Maddie laugh.

“Do you use that line in every town?” Courtney asks.

He chuckles, transforming his already attractive face into movie star quality. I try to look away, to let the lights of the moving Ferris wheel lure my gaze, but I can’t. Courtney’s right, of course, but I can’t help being flattered that he singled me out.

His blue eyes rake up and down my body. My cheeks heat in a blush, and I look away before Courtney notices.

“See you girls around,” he says, as the two of them walk by us.

I turn my head to watch them, but recoil in shame when I find him looking back at me. Swallowing hard, I shuffle forward to keep up with the long line.

My mind drifts back to the conversation with my father.

“Funny how you don’t care who your sons hang out with, aren’t you worried about them ruining your reputation?” I said, trying not to sound angry.

“My sons are both men now, their reputation is their own.” One of my brothers is eighteen, younger than me.

“But I’m a woman, so my reputation isn’t my own?” I said, widening my eyes but actually wanting to slap him.

“And my assistant business manager, who will one day be my full business manager.”

“So what? You’re letting Max run one of your dealerships, and no doubt you’ll give one to Cody too. It’ll probably be a high school graduation present.” My brothers get everything.

“That’s got nothing to do with you,” he snapped. Of course it has everything to do with me, he gives my brothers everything, and me nothing but a hard time.

“Why don’t you give me one of your dealerships?” I say this a lot.

“Because you’re better as an office manager.”

“Why? So you can keep an eye on me there?” It’s really because he doesn’t think women can sell.

“Emily,” my mother says, smoothing my hair, “Don’t get so upset, your father and I care about you very much.”

“If you cared about me so much, you’d let me grow up and live my own life.”

My father rolled his eyes, opened the front door and walked through it, as he said “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

After putting up with it all the way through high school, I’ve finally had enough of them holding me responsible for my father’s reputation. Right now, I’d really like to do something to ‘hurt his reputation’.

“You ladies still waiting?” the hot carny from before says, snapping me out of my thoughts.

Turning my head, I see the two guys returning to the Ferris wheel.

“Looks like,” I say.

He stops walking and offers me his hand.

“Come with me,” he says.

I look at Courtney and Maddie, and they raise their eyebrows and shrug.

“You going to throw your weight around and get us all out of the line?” I ask.

“For you, it’ll be VIP treatment all night long,” he says, flashing his killer smile.

I bite my lip, wondering what to do. Then my father’s voice, harping on about his reputation pops into my head, and I take the offered hand.

He leads the three of us past the line and straight onto the waiting car. It’s one of those ones that seats four, with the moulded plastic to look like an umbrella sticking up the center of it.

“Hey, no butting!” someone shouts.

Courtney and Maddie climb into one side of the Ferris wheel car, and I take a seat on the other side, looking back at them.

“Enjoy the ride,” the guy says, latching the door shut. He looks at me as he says it, and once again I feel flattered for being singled out. I immediately chastise myself for being flattered, it’s just a ploy, he does it in every town.

The wheel moves, stopping quickly again to load the next passengers. Courtney and Maddie chat animatedly, but I find myself unable to join in. I’m too busy thinking about what my father will say when he finds out his daughter let a carny take her hand and jump to the front of the line in front of everyone.

He’s going to freak when he finds out, and he will, this is a small town. He probably already knows.

When we get near the top, the wheel stops to load more passengers.

“Look, Emily, I can see your house,” Maddie says, pointing.

I move to turn my head to look for my house, when shouting and squealing floats up to me from below.

My attention is drawn to the ground but a movement on the wheel itself catches my eye. The next thing I know, the blue-eyed guy appears and hops into our car.

“Is this seat taken?” he says, sitting in the empty seat beside me.