Page 70 of Plus Size Player

I nodded again, slowly. “Yeah,” I whispered as his lips came closer to mine.

Our mouths connected lightly. It was a sweet, chaste, quick kiss. And it put a smile on my face. But when I opened my eyes and saw the way he was staring at me, the breath left my lungs.

“You’re holding up the line!” the Ferris wheel attendant called out.

Breaking apart and looking around, we realized he was talking to us.

I covered my mouth to stifle my laugh.

“My bad,” Russ apologized to the man before ushering me forward.

Snickering, we made our way to the rusty blue-and-white Ferris wheel car with glass windows all around. Classical music pumped through the small speaker as we climbed aboard.

Locking the door with a firm click, the attendant’s thin lips were pulled into a tight line.

He was not amused.

“You know he’s cussing you out in his head,” I told Russ as soon as we started moving.

“As long as he gets us off this thing when it’s over, that’s fine,” he replied with a laugh.

“Oh, look,” I gasped, pointing to the way the sun was peeking over a thick stretch of clouds.

He draped his arm around my shoulders. “Yeah, that’s sick.”

We were both quiet, staring at the sky as we slowly ascended.

“Today has been so much fun,” I murmured.

“It really has. I didn’t know what to expect, but I knew it was going to be a good time with you.” His fingers danced over my shoulder. “Thank you for being here with me.”

“Thank you for planning this.”

“I planned it for you, but I enjoyed every minute of it.”

“I’m glad you enjoyed your first Magic World experience. Would you come back?”

“I would.” He ran his free hand over his short beard and chuckled to himself. “But I don’t think this place would’ve been half as much fun without you.”

My lips spread into a smile. “I was just thinking that I don’t know if I’ve ever had as much fun here as I have with you.”

Pulling me into him, he flashed a self-satisfied smile. “Oh, really?”

“Yeah. Before today, my favorite memory at this place was with my childhood best friend Leah, my cousin Ashlyn, and Ashlyn’s best friend Stephanie.”

“Why was that your favorite?”

“We were sixteen, maybe fifteen, and my uncle, Ashlyn’s dad, dropped us off. It was a random, hot summer day. We were here from like ten o’clock in the morning to seven o’clock at night. It was my first time being here without my parents, or any parents supervising. We rode all the rides, flirted with all the boys, and spent all of the little cash we were given for the day.” I giggled at the memory. “We all had a change of clothes with us, and I changed into this cute little outfit I’d put together. I got so many compliments on my style. It was one thing to hear it in school or at the mall, but it felt bigger here. That’s when I knew fashion was my passion.”

That was the moment I knew fashion was my life.

“So that’s why you look so good all the time,” he observed.

I grinned. “Yeah, pretty much.” I sighed. “Like I said, it was a great day. But then it started pouring down raining and we had to wait in the rain for an hour to be picked up. We danced in it and laughed about it, but I think three of us ended up sick. It was a mess. But it’s still one of my favorite memories.”

“Sounds like it.”

I looked out at the vast sky. We were so high up on the Ferris wheel that it felt like we were in arm’s reach of the clouds. “It was agood day, but this day… this day has been perfect,” I murmured, still mesmerized by the sky.

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