Page 24 of Freak Show

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ARI

The need to run away from the circus and never look back was an all-encompassing feeling with me.

Peopling was not my thing. In fact, it was so much not my thing that at times I was awkward and uncomfortable to be around because I was just that hard to talk to.

It wasn’t that I didn’t like talking or listening, per se, it was because I just took a really long time to warm up to people.

But I could count on one hand the number of people that I’d clicked with, allowing me to talk openly and without any awkwardness.

Even Simi’s husband, Coffey, still made me uncomfortable.

But there was just something about Slone and his daughter, Briley, that made me feel so…relaxed.

That was why being in the middle of their tight-knit gang didn’t set me on edge.

There I was, hanging out with four people and a baby that I barely knew—the older kids had gone to bed over an hour ago—and loving it.

Oh, and I’d already had two episodes from laughing.

I was tired as hell but less stressed out than I had been yesterday.

Luckily I’d been sitting down for these episodes, and they couldn’t see that my legs had gone completely limp there for a few seconds. Oh, and the other good thing was I was plastered on the most comfortable couch I’d ever sat on in my life, in the biggest mansion I’d ever been in.

“Was that one?” Slone asked from my side.

He was sitting in the sectional on the seat closest to my corner seat, but he wasn’t actually touching me.

“Yeah,” I murmured. “Cataplexy. Muscle weakness. Only last for about two to five seconds and then I’m good to go.”

Mostly.

There were the rare times when it started right before I fell asleep and kept happening even when I woke up.

“What are the plans for tomorrow?” Perry, Banner’s wife, asked.

She looked great for just having a child. As in, “didn’t even look like she’d had a baby a few months ago” great.

“I guess we’ll leave when everyone wakes up and is ready to go.” Slone shrugged, making his large shoulder bob. “Why? Plans to kick us out soon?”

Perry rolled her eyes. “You could straight up move into my house with me, and I wouldn’t hate it. Actually, it’d be kind of nice to have a live-in babysitter.”

Banner snorted. “Just because our kid can fall asleep instantly on his soft stomach doesn’t mean that he’d make a good permanent houseguest.”

“Hey,” Slone called out, barely jostling the baby that was once again in his arms. “Just because I have a bit of padding doesn’t mean I’m soft.”

“He can beat you in a forty-yard dash right now,” Titus countered.

“No he couldn’t,” Banner instantly disagreed.

Slone raised his eyebrows. “Want to bet?”

“I can’t afford to make bets with you,” Banner said. “I don’t have a couple hundred mil contracts in my back pocket.”

My eyebrows raised at that statement. “Couple mil? As in a couple hundred million? Plural?”

Slone shrugged. “I have a few shoe contracts, a contract with the Big and Tall Store, and my football contract on the table right now. There are more smaller ones, but those are the big hitters.”

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