Tiger's Circus

Chapter 12: Birthday Party

It was really quite amazing how time passed so slowly when you were in the kitchen. I felt like I'd been here for months, but I had barely been here for a couple of weeks. I was about to finish my first campaign at the circus since coming here which meant we'd be moving soon.

Sunday was our last show in town and it came like any other day. I was frying bacon on the stovetop. I hate cooking on the stove in general, but frying stuff was especially bad. The oil always seemed to attack me. Today was no different. Except maybe there was more oil than usual. A glob of it got me in the arm and I went to the sink really quickly to wash it. But in those precious seconds, the stupid bacon began to burn and the whole kitchen could smell it.

"Kelsey Hayes!" Ruth exclaimed, "The bacon is burning. Get back to your position."

I hurried back but Ruth was already there flipping the bacon. "A girl who can't cook bacon, can't cook breakfast!" She shouted in my ear. Chris, who was serving food, snickered.

"I'm sorry, Ruth," I said quickly, hoping that she wasn't going to give me a long lecture on the importance of bacon again.

"Like hell, you are," snapped Ruth. "Go fix some more eggs. We're running low. Remember, today we're doing scrambled." I could feel Chris laughing at me.

I nodded and went to cook eggs. I was fairly good at eggs. They cooked fast and people liked to season their own eggs. But I had fixed the wrong style once, scrambled instead of an omelet and Ruth had never let me forget it.

The rest of breakfast went okay. After that, I went about my normal routine almost on autopilot. I tried to be more excited to see Lisa, but it was such a short time that it was depressing in a way and I was so tired from trying to focus on cooking so much. And no matter what I did, I always seemed to make some mistake that Ruth would hang over my head.

Later, during the afternoon show intermission, some customer started to complain that I hadn't given their kid enough cotton candy. Honesty, I hardly remember making the stick, but I really doubt I had gotten it wrong. My cooking wasn't great, but even I could spin cotton candy.

It didn't stop Ruth from forcing me to apologize and chastising me again. Needless to say, today was not a good day. And then as Ruth and I were packing up after the show, I heard a familiar voice.

"Kelsey! There you are!" someone cried out. I turned with a feeling of dread. Suddenly, I was enveloped in Sarah's arms. I stifled a groan. Sarah released me but kept her hands on my shoulders to look me up and down. As if I could have changed that much in the last couple of weeks. But Sarah's eyebrows came together. "You look awfully tired for a birthday girl."

I stared at her bleary-eyed. With all the drama in the kitchen, I was too busy to make a fuss about my birthday. No one at the circus seemed to remember, not even Cathleen. That didn't bother me too much, though. What did bother me was Sarah calling me on Friday to say the family wanted to take me out to dinner. I had to refuse and was forced to explain why. That had turned into a painful discussion about how I worked all my meals so, no, I could not go out and no, she shouldn't come with cupcakes, ice cream, and presents either. I did not think Ruth would approve and I honestly didn't want to see Sarah either. I was doing my best to start my new life. I did not want her butting in and critiquing every little thing I was doing like I couldn't make my own decisions. Despite Sarah's protests, I had eventually gotten her to hang up and had foolishly thought that had been the end of it.

Apparently, it wasn't, because standing in front of me was a triumphant Sarah, an amused Mike, and an apologetic Mr. Maurizio. Sammy and Rebecca were there too. Rebecca's face was painted and Sammy had tiger paws. They both were playing with Dhiren plushies.