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“Does anyone know where Venice is?” asked Deb, once we were on our way back. It was taking us a long time to get home since our limo driver had taken us on a detour to buy ice cream for Alanna.
“It’s in Italy,” said Vanessa.
“Like Italy, Europe? Gosh. I have never been there. Do we need to have a passport?” asked Deb.
“Of course,” said Vanessa.
“Oh. I hope the show worked that out for me. I don’t think I have one, but I imagine the producers will have it all figured out.”
“It was one of the requirements for coming on here,” said Tamika. “I don’t think you could be here if you don’t have one.?
?
“I don’t know,” said Deb. “My mom filled out most of the paperwork for me, so she probably handled it. Is a passport a little book with my picture in it?”
“Yes,” said Alanna. She sighed. Her patience with all of us was wearing thin.
“Hmm. Yeah, I think I have seen passports before, like, in movies and you know, just in general, but I am not sure if I ever got one. Well, it will work itself out, right?” asked Deb.
“No. If you don’t have one it will not work itself out,” said Alanna. “If you don’t have a passport, your time here is over.”
I could tell what the other girls were thinking: Another one bites the dust. I, however, had confidence in the producers and believed that none of us would be contestants if we did not have valid passports.
“I’ll bet I’m going home,” said Deb. “I screwed this up. I screw everything up! Once I had a job at a popcorn stand at a carnival and I blew it. Can you imagine getting fired from a popcorn stand? By a carnie? Who ran the ducky game? Who never even wore a shirt? Who was my uncle? Well, it happened to me.”
“For real?” asked Tamika.
“I wouldn’t make up something like this! It was pretty much the worst night of my life. The popcorn machine started on fire. I tried to put out the fire with Sno-Cone ice and syrup, but it didn’t work.”
“Is there something illegal in Sno-Cone syrup?” asked Klassie. “It’s so yummy.”
“I feel the same way,” said Vanessa.
“Especially cherry,” said Klassie.
“See, I would have said especially blue raspberry,” said Vanessa.
“I think just lots of sugar,” said Deb. “Anyhow, it was about a hundred degrees out and maybe one fifty in my popcorn shack. Livin’ On a Prayer was playing. I was wearing cut off shorts and a pink tie dyed t-shirt, and some blue sandals with beads on them. I can picture it all like it was yesterday. My hair was in braids. God, it’s like rushing back at me. I can remember everything! My nails were painted dark pink! It’s like I’m right back there.”
“It’s okay, relax,” said Tamika.
“I’m okay. Thanks,” said Deb, nodding and taking a sip of her champagne to calm herself a bit. “Have you ever seen the way fire can leap across a fairground? It’s something about all that dry, crunchy grass and oily, sweaty people. It’s like a perfect storm. Excuse me,” she said, lowering the window long enough to let a gnat fly out. “I love gnats. I thought that little guy was going to end up in my champagne. He would have drowned. I had some gnats as pets when I was a kid,” she added, a hazy smile of remembrance on her face.
“I can’t imagine they made good pets,” said Alanna.
“They have personalities like anything,” said Deb. It was right then and there that I decided she should be Bellamy’s wife.
“Then what happened? I mean with the firestorm, not the gnats,” said Vanessa, leaning forward, tucking her hair behind her ears so she wouldn’t miss a word.
“A ball of fire shot from my popcorn stand straight over to the Bulldozers, and started a stuffed purple panda on fire,” said Deb.
“How did you end up working at a carnival?” asked Alanna. “Do you come from one of those carnival families?”
Deb ignored her and continued with her story: “The panda fell on the ground and a line of fire starting burning, heading straight over to the Tilt-a-Whirl. I almost started the Tilt-a-Whirl on fire. With kids on it! Geez, it was really bad.”
“It sounds awful. Super scary,” said Vanessa.
“So, I guess this means I don’t have a passport, since that’s the way things always go for me,” said Deb.
