[October 7th]
October 7th, 205 SD
7:44 PM
Jun shuddered and pulled her jacket closer. “How much farther are we going?” she asked, picking her way carefully around the uneven ground.
I waved my hand behind me to dismiss her question. “Almost there don’t worry! I told you it wasn’t going to be that far of a walk.”
She gave me an exasperated sigh, making it loud enough so I could hear. “You said that when I asked twenty minutes ago.”
I stopped, turning around to look at her. “I mean it this time-trust me on this one, will ya?”
Jun returned my stare, then closed her eyes and shrugged. “Alright,” she said, holding out her hand towards me.
With a smile, I grabbed onto her hand and pulled her up after me onto the ledge of concrete.
She held out her free hand to steady herself. “Shouldn't we like... I dunno, tell Lysander or something?”
“Oh, c'mon, this has nothing to do with Lacryma.” I picked my way down the other side, careful to keep my footing despite the loose gravel and the slight incline.
Jun waited until I was steady before sliding down after me.
I caught her in my arms and said, “Besides, we don't have to let him know everything that we do. We're allowed to go on little adventures, right?”
“I guess.” She hopped down the last few feet, arms pinwheeling to keep her balance. When she reached the bottom, she let out a breath of success and stepped aside. “Where are we going, anyways? It's not in the dead zone, is it?”
“Naw, nothing like that, I said don't worry, right?” I hopped down after, a lot less graceful despite all my pinwheeling. “Just something I found when I was bored one day. I think you'll like it!”
Side by side, we continued on in silence for another few minutes. Jun kept her hands in her pockets and her eyes trained to the ground, her feet having to take a few extra steps just to keep pace with me.
I could see the top of it just over the crumbling wall. “Okay! We're here, just close your eyes.”
Jun was short enough that, from this point, she couldn't see to the same point that I could. All she could see was uneven ground and a giant wall. “Are you sure...?” she asked, her voice riddled with hesitation.
I waved a hand to dismiss her concern. “I'll guide you the rest of the way. You trusted me this far; I promise you won't get hurt.”
She made a soft sound in the back of her throat-but if it was a whine or a noise in agreement, I couldn't tell. Still, she closed her eyes and once again held her hand out towards me.
“We'll just take this slowly and you'll be fine.” I took her hand in one of mine, the other going to support her elbow as I led her towards the wall. “Alright, now I'm going to lift you up-”
Her eyes snapped open and her head swiveled around with a look of shock. “What? Oh, no no no-you didn't say anything about lifting me!”
I hurried to cover her eyes with my hand. “I said keep your eyes closed! And it's just easier this way. Lot easier than walking around the wall. I'll hold on, don't worry!”
This time, the whine was clear as I felt her eyelashes flutter against the my palm. “This had better be worth it,” she said, and her eyelids stayed still.
“It will, it will!” After a moment's hesitation, making sure that she didn't try to open her eyes again (even though I realised that she could see even less from this vantage point than she could before, it was the principal of the matter).
“'Scuse the reach,” I said, slipping my hands under her arms and, with a small grunt, lifting her up towards a ledge that was partway up. “Kick your feet out a bit and you'll feel it.”
She obeyed, her boots scraping just below the lip of the ledge twice before finding proper purchase. With an ease and flexibility I hadn't even thought possible, Jun wriggled her way up onto the ledge without further instructions from me.
“You sure your eyes are closed?” I asked, straining a little to grasp the top of the wall above my head and fitting my foot into one of the larger cracks.
Jun grinned, a rather odd look with her eyes still scrunched shut.
“Ooookay you secret kung-fu master, I get it.” I let out my breath and hoisted myself up, scrambling for footholds as I did so. “The top of the wall is pretty wide so I'll help you up here and then you can open your eyes.”
She nodded, once again holding out her hand towards me, only this time a little more half-hearted.
I leaned over to take her under the arms once again. “Hold on,” I told her, and she complied by gripping onto my shoulders.
Once I started to lift her, she folded her legs in against her chest, easily clearing the top of the wall. “You can put your feet down.”
She did, and I held on for a moment until I was certain she had her footing.
“Open your eyes.”
Her eyes opened, and she blinked a few times before her gaze focused on what lay in the clearing before us. “What is that?” she asked, tilting her head to the side.
“It's one of those... er... things that goes round and round and has animals and cheesy music.”
“A carousel?” Jun asked, a little surprised but with a faint hint of delight.
I hit my fist into the palm of my other hand. “Yes, those. I know it's hard to tell because it's all run-down like, but when you get closer you'll see.” I waved my hand in the direction of a pile of rubble that had formed behind what was left of a bench. “Ladies first,” I said and sketched a bow.
Jun was grinning now, tossing an appreciative look my way before clambering down onto the bench, and jumping off. She didn't wait for me, heading straight for the slightly lopsided carousel.
I was halfway there by the time she pulled herself up, using the muzzle of what might have been a bear frozen in mid-roar. Most of the paint had been warn down, the metal starting to twist and dull from years of abuse from the weather. I draped my arms over two of the figurines that had since shifted into something unidentifiable and watched Jun as she disappeared behind three horses and a swan-pulled cart.
“How did you find this?” she called, her voice coming from the direction of a mangy-looking lion.
“Exploring. I found it earlier this week.” Truth be told, I had actually gotten lost on my way back from a final pizza delivery on the other side of town. Luckily, my shift was over with that delivery, so I didn't have to worry about never making it back to work.
Jun appeared on the other side of the carousel between a row of mostly intact horses. “Aren't you afraid of others finding this place?”
I glanced from her to the slanted roof, giving it careful consideration. “Well, it's not like I looked really hard for this place. I mean, it's near the dead zone, so not a lot of people wander out this way anyways. So other people could find it, but we can always pretend that we're the only ones who know, right?” I gave her a grin, using the rear end of one of the shapes I was leaning against to pull me up onto the platform. “That means you can't tell anyone.”
“Not even Lysander?” she asked, tilting her head to the side.
“No! 'Cause then he'd his friends and from what I can tell Kaito likes to talk so who else knows would find out about it.” I crossed my arms over my chest in a stubborn 'this is final' sort of way. Or, at least, what I hoped look like that.
She looked mildly amused, but didn't say anything to the point, other than a soft, “Alright.” Her gaze shifted to the roof as well, eyes squinting in concentration. Probably trying to make out what the broken displays used to depict. “It's too bad it doesn't work any more. I've always wanted to ride on one.”
My mouth flattened out into a frown. “Yeah, well... we can pretend like it works!” An idea suddenly forming in my head, I scrambled over the uneven floor towards one of the horses. “Get on a horse! We'll have a race, okay?”
Jun's face had a surprised expression on it, which quickly shifted into confusion. “W-what? How does that work?”
I gave a disapproving click of my tongue, slipping one foot into the metal stirrup before swinging myself up and onto the horse. “Just do it, yeah? Use a little imagination!”
A crooked smile pulled at the corners of her lips, despite how confused she still managed to look. “Alright,” she repeated. She had to shuffle past me to find a horse that was a bit lower to mount. “Now what?”
“Now? We race! Look, I'm in the lead!” I let out a victorious laugh, kicking at the horse I was riding on like a jockey.
“Hey, wait!” Jun protested. “That's not fair-if that's how you were going to do it, you should have told me!”
I laughed again. “But then it wouldn't be a race, right?”
“Then how do you know I'm just not an entire lap ahead of you? And about to pass you up again?”
I hesitated, twisting around in the saddle to look at her over my shoulders. “Oh, er, I didn't think about it that way.”
She had a victorious grin on her face. “Then I guess it's a tie, huh?”
“I guess so...” I twisted all the way around, sitting backwards on the horse to face her.
Jun leaned forward, resting her crossed arms over the head of the horse. She arched an eyebrow, as if waiting for me to say something first. There was still the faint trace of a grin on her lips.
“So you like it?” I waved my hand to indicate the carousel as a whole.
Her smile brightened and she nodded. “I do! Thank you for showing it to me.”
“It can be like... our own personal getaway, yeah? If we're feeling stressed out about something or just don't want to hang around people from Lacryma. We can just come here and have horse races or... ostrich versus bear races or something.” I put my hands on my knees, swinging my legs idly just for something to do with them. “Sound good?”
She laughed. “Sounds good.”