Page 60 of You Found Me (The Meadow Springs #1)

Spencer

Never did I think I’d be dressed like a pathetic Christmas tree, signing kids in to see Santa—who just so happens to be my best friend—while staring at my perfect girlfriend in a silly elf costume.

But here we are, and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I didn’t even hesitate when Colette asked if I could help. I accepted without even thinking of Emmy being here. I only wanted to help out a very stressed-out friend.

Seeing her here, in that cute little outfit, was just the cherry on top.

If I hadn’t shown up to help, I would’ve missed her running around looking like she escaped a holiday movie and what a shame that would’ve been.

It’s like she was made to be an elf. Which is perfect seeing as how much she loves Christmas.

The fair has been going for about four hours now. Paulie delivered the pizzas himself, along with his grandson, both wearing reindeer headbands and red noses. The kids laughed and cheered once Colette announced it was time for a lunch break.

Before I can grab a couple of slices, Emmy pulls me away and towards the photo booth. “Everyone is eating so now is the perfect time to hog this bad boy.”

I laugh at her excitement. “Smart thinking, Shortstack.”

Rolling her eyes at the nickname, she continues guiding me over to the booth.

Once we reach it, she starts nervously rambling.

“Have you ever used one of these? I have so many strips of me with my parents, or the girls. It’s something I never pass up doing.

And not all booths are made equal. Some give the pictures in a grid instead of the traditional strip—which is my favorite—and some are only black and white. ”

She’s barely stopped to breathe as we sit inside.

“This one though, is one of the best. It’s in color, has the option to put the event and date at the bottom, and doesn’t rush the countdown so you have more time to change your pose.

What do you want to do? Obviously we smile in one, maybe a silly one? ”

I wait to see if she’s done before I respond, “Emmy, what’s going on? You’re doing that nervous rambling thing you do. If it’s about what we talked about earlier, we don’t have to discuss it further anytime soon.”

Rather than answering my question, she pushes the start button, and the screen begins to count down from fifteen.

“Okay, I say the first one we smile. Real smiles. Which means I wanna see that dimple pop out.”

I laugh, despite worrying that something is wrong. She looks so happy to be doing this, so I shake it off. “Works for me. Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

The screen shows three seconds left. I turn away from her smiling profile and smile into the camera as she places her hand up to cup my face.

There’s not a flash like from a camera or phone, the screen just brightens, signaling the photo was taken.

We look at the screen and it shows five seconds, letting us look over the photo.

Seeing how happy we look makes me smile wider. I expect Emmy to look the same, except she’s nervous. “Spence?” she says, phrasing my name like a question.

I peek at the screen, seeing the countdown has started. “What is it? You seem off.”

“I need to tell you something . . . and I’m nervous because of my own issues, nothing to do with you.”

“Buttercup, whatever it is, you can tell me. ”

“I love you, Spencer.”

I wait a beat, making sure I heard her right. “You love me?”

She smiles, nodding. “Yeah, I do. I love you.”

The screen brightens, indicating a picture was taken and my smile grows wider. It caught the moment she said those words to me.

Emmaline, the girl that got away, my Shortstack, my Buttercup, loves me.

I grip her around the waist, bringing her closer in this already tight booth. Her hand that’s cupping my face, moves to the back of my head, as her other takes its place.

“I would have waited forever to hear you say those words, but I can’t lie—not having to wait more than a week to hear them is incredible. Say it again, please.”

She laughs, “I love you, Daredevil. You’re it for me.”

“I love you, too.” I close my eyes, overcome with emotion, still unable to wipe the smile off of my face. When I open them, she’s still smiling, brighter than before.

“That was photo number three. Now what should we do?”

“Well, since we’re in a building full of children, that limits our options.” I shake my head, making her laugh. “How about this?” I lean in, catching her lips with mine.

She drops her hands down, one reaching around to hold my shoulders and the other on my thigh, kissing me back. When she opens her lips the tiniest bit, I move in, teasing her tongue with mine. Treating this moment as a prelude to all the things I’m going to do to her later.

I slow down, not wanting to get too indecent. I place my hand on her face, pulling back a little before giving her soft pecks. There’s another bright light and I know that we’ve finished. She pulls back first, turning to the screen to approve the photos or to change them.

“They’re perfect. Don’t you think?”

I huff out a laugh. “Perfect is selling them short, but seeing as I can’t think of another word for them right now, perfect is what we’ll go with.”

Emmy taps the screen to approve the photos and then hits the amount needed as four. I feel my eyebrow raise up and she notices and shrugs. “One for you and one for me. And then extra just in case I want to get crafty.”

She’s something else and all I can do is shake my head and laugh.

“Alright,” she claps her hands together. “They’ll print shortly. Go ahead and grab your lunch before the boss lady has us get back to work.”

“I’ll grab you a plate and drink and meet you out there.”

“You’re the best.”

“I know, that’s why you love me,” I smugly say.

“Don’t make me take it back, Spencer Hale.”

I gasp, then mime zipping my lips before leaving the booth.

***

A few hours later, all of the families have left, and we’ve cleaned everything up.

Looking around at everyone, the one thing we have in common right now is exhaustion. Even through Colette’s content smile, you can see it’s going to hit her hard very soon. Cori jokingly told her that she’d have to pay her to do something like this ever again.

“Thank you guys for helping out. I know it was a lot to ask, but you made this run so smoothly—even with the hiccups leading up to today.” There’s a chorus of “you’re welcome” and “no problem.”

“And an even bigger thank you to Theodore,” she says, looking at him like she’d rather be at the dentist having teeth pulled, “for stepping up and playing Santa Claus.”

Theo shakes his head at the use of his full name. “You’re welcome, Sta—”

Whatever he was going to call her, he stops when she pins him with a glare. Clearing his throat, he tries again, “You’re welcome, Colette.”

“I don’t know about everyone else, but I’m ready for a nice peppermint cocoa and a ride on the Ferris wheel. Thanks again everyone. Go enjoy the rest of your Saturday. ”

The crew starts filing out, Piper, Callum, and Cori are among the first out the door.

I’m not sure what the first two are doing, but I heard Cori saying she had a date and needed to “wash the stench of joyous children” off of her.

I couldn’t help but laugh out loud, which gave away that I was listening to her conversation with Piper. Cori smirked and shrugged, not caring.

Caressing Emmy’s arm, I place my hand in hers, intertwining our fingers. “You want to change and then we can leave?”

“You didn’t bring anything to change into. So, I won’t change in solidarity.”

“Shortstack, that’s sweet of you. But you brought clothes so that you could change out of your alter ego,” I laugh out.

She shrugs. “It’s actually pretty comfortable. Come on, let’s put our stuff in our cars and go play some games. Think you can win me a prize at one of the booths?”

“Buttercup, I can win you as many prizes as you want. I’ve never met a carnival game I couldn’t win.”

“Let’s go test that bold claim.”

***

Sooo . . . I’ve apparently lost all skill I had as a kid when it comes to fairground games—that or they got harder.

Emmy hasn’t said anything, but I can see her stifling her laughter as I hang my head in shame. We’ve been to three different booths and are heading to another one right now. It’s a reindeer themed ring toss. It’s literally throwing rings onto giant reindeer antlers.

I hand the booth attendant two tickets, and he gives me five rings.

Surely that’s enough to at least get her a small prize from the bottom row since you only need to hit three to win.

The first two completely miss, the third one barely makes it, and the last two miss.

Rather than call it quits, I set down more tickets.

This time, I make the first two then miss the next two.

There’s a small boy—maybe five—who comes up during my third throw and immediately hits two in a row.

I watch in abject horror as this child proceeds to make all five rings.

Before picking his prize, he pays for another turn.

Once again, he makes all five as I sit here, embarrassed that my last one sails past the reindeer antlers.

Emmaline’s laughter comes out as a surprise, even to her. I’ve been schooled by someone who’s barely tall enough to see over the booth. He claims his prizes then looks between Emmy and my prizeless hands before waving at me to come down to his level.

“Do you want to win you a stuffy for your girlfriend?” he whisper shouts, causing a snort to come from Emmy.

“Luca, let the nice couple be,” his mom says to him before looking at me. “I’m so sorry. He has a game like this at home and plays it a lot .”

“Mama, I have two stuffies and they have none. I only wanted to share,” Luca pouts.

“Luca, my name is Spencer. It’s really kind of you to offer to give my girlfriend, Emmy, one of your stuffed animals. But we can’t take it. You won it fair and square.”

He shrugs. “Okay. She might dump you if you don’t give her something nice. My friend lost his girlfriend because he didn’t share his prize cart toy at school yesterday.”

His mom sighs while Emmaline and I chuckle. Emmy bends down to meet his eyes. “I’m not going to dump him. Promise.”

“Okay, bye!” and with that, he grabs his mom’s hand, pulling her away.

Emmy looks at me, with pity in those big, brown eyes. “It was really sweet of him to offer. Even if it was a blow to your pride.”

I belt out a laugh. “Yeah, I don’t know how I’ll ever recover. Especially since I still haven’t won you anything.”

“It’s okay, Spence. I don’t need anything. How about I win you something from that booth over there?”

I follow where she’s pointing and notice the target gallery balloons. “You know they dull the darts and under-inflate the balloons, right? There’s no way you can win.”

“Oh ye of little faith. Wanna bet on it?” she asks with a smirk.

“What are we betting?”

“Do you want to try your hand at it with me?

“I feel like I’ve already embarrassed myself to the point of no return, so why not.”

“Aww, poor wittle Spencer,” she jokes.

“You’re going to be in the same boat in a few minutes once we do this.”

Shrugging, Emmaline grins. “I guess we’ll see.”

“How about this, whoever gets the most balloons popped, wins. They give you three darts per ticket, so we can do two tickets to have six tries. Sound good?”

“Works for me,” I agree. “What are the stakes?”

She pauses, thinking, before saying, “I’m not sure. Maybe something to be cashed in at a later date? But if it’s something the other isn’t sure about or uncomfortable with, we talk and decide whether to go through with it.”

I stick my hand out to shake hers and when she does, I pull her closer, kissing her. “Deal.”

Ten minutes later I realize I’ve been hustled.

I popped one measly balloon while she hit the balloons every single time.

She doesn’t gloat about the fact that she won the bet.

Not even as she picks her prizes out. Emmy points toward a stuffed polar bear wearing a light blue scarf and matching hat and then to a penguin in a winter coat. Both are incredibly cute.

“Here,” she says while handing me the bear, “this one’s for you. That way you never forget this night.”

“Gee, thanks.”

She winks. “You’re welcome. Do you wanna go on a little drive around town before heading home? There’s a couple of things I want to show you.”

“I’d love to.”