With tight lips, her head nods, almost imperceptibly. I release her hand and get out of the car. I go around to her side to coax her out, but to my surprise she gets out on her own and is standing waiting for me by the time I get there.
“Holy shit, you made it,” Papa Smurf says, walking towards us.
“The promise of my own trailer? You’re damn straight we made it,” I say.
“And this is her, the one you drove us all nuts about over the winter?” he says, eyeing Emily.
“Papa Smurf, this is Goldie.”
“Goldie, huh. Nice to have you with us. I still can’t believe Steel convinced you to come.”
The comment makes her smile, and with a soft voice she says, “I was the one who had to convince him to bring me.”
“I’ll be damned. Ain’t never heard that one before,” he says.
“Enough of the Steel bashing, where’s our trailer?”
“How you going to pull it?” he asks, laughing.
“With this.” I point to the Corolla.
“You’ve gotta be shitting me. That little thing?”
“You’ll see.”
“I’d sure like to. Trailer’s over there, the little blue one.”
I grab Emily’s hand and say, “Come on, Goldie, let’s go check out our new home.”
“We’re leaving in half an hour,” Papa Smurf calls after us.
Pulling her across the field, various carnies I’ve known for years yell and whistle at me.
“Fuck you all,” I shout at none of them in particular.
“Fuck you too, asshole,” someone yells. I think it was Razor. Doesn’t matter anyway, they’d all say the same thing. So would I.
“This is it,” I say, pulling my hand on the trailer door latch.
It’s small, not much bigger than a bunkie room, but I don’t care. It’s all ours.
I open the door and Emily climbs in, looking around. I enter and shut the door behind me.
“It’s nice,” she says, her voice a bit deflated.
“It’s great, look at this, our own table and chairs.”
“That’s a bed?”
“Now it is, but it turns into a table.”
“Oh.”
“That means we can sit in here when it rains, and don’t have to sit on the bed.”
“I thought you’d prefer the bed in the rain.”
“Don’t you worry about that. Bed, table. Hell, I’ll even bend you over this little stove.”
Emily laughs, “Is that a promise?”
“Don’t you worry, Goldie, I wouldn’t be surprised if we bust this trailer’s axle.”
I grab her hips and grind into her. My mouth smashes against hers, my woman in our trailer, and I know where this is going to end.
“Get the fuck out of there, we got to get ready to go,” Razor says, pounding his fist on the door.
“Give us five minutes.”
“That’s no way to please a woman. Goldie, he ever lets you down, you can come running to my bunkhouse any night.”
Enraged, I let go of Emily and fly out the door. I don’t care if he is like a brother to me, these fuckers need to know she’s off limits, and I need to make that loud and clear now.
“What did you say, asshole?”
“I wasn’t talking to you,” Razor says, not looking behind him as he walks away.
“I said, what did you say?”
“You heard me, that pretty woman ever gets tired of your disappointing fucks, she needs to know where she can come get a good one.”
Covering the ground between us as fast as I can, I lunge at Razor from behind and we go crashing to the ground. I’m on top of him, and push myself up by pushing his back down into the ground.
Everyone in the lot has stopped what they were doing and is rushing towards us.
“Let me make this clear now,” I yell, “Goldie is mine, and if anyone does anything to upset or disrespect her, they’re going to have to deal with me. I don’t care who you are or how long I’ve known your fucking cocksucking ass.”
“Easy, buddy, I was just messing around,” Razor says.
“And that includes messing around,” I bark, and shove his back to emphasis my point.
“Fine,” Razor mutters.
Standing, I look around at everyone and continue yelling, “And so help me God, if anyone lays a hand on her, I’ll beat your fucking head in until you don’t have a face left. Is that fucking clear?”
I glare at various nodding faces. Some people murmur things before turning away and going back to their business.
Good. I think I got the message across.
At that moment, I look up and notice Emily peeking out the door, looking whiter than she did when we first got here.