The Funhouse

kissing her hard, pushing his tongue into her mouth, and then he tugged her T-shirt out of her shorts and got one hand under it and squeezed her bare breasts, thumbed her nipples, and she moaned softly, concerned that someone might walk around behind the trucks and see them, but unable to express her concern, responding even to Buzz's crude caresses.
        Suddenly Liz said, “Enough, you guys. Save it for later. I'm sure as hell not going to lie down right here, in broad daylight, and take it in the dirt.”
        “The dirt is the best place,” Richie said.
        “Yeah,” Buzz said. “Let's do it in the dirt.”
        “It's the natural thing,” Richie said.
        “Yeah,” Buzz said.
        “All the animals do it in the dirt,” Richie said.
        “Yeah,” Buzz said. “Let's be natural, just hang loose and be real natural.”
        “Stifle yourselves,” Liz said. “There's a lot more carnival to see. Come on. Let's go.”
        Amy tucked in her T-shirt, and Buzz gave her one more wet kiss.
        Back on the midway, Amy thought the rides seemed to be spinning faster than before. All the colors were more vivid, too. The dozens of different sources of music seemed louder than they had been ten minutes ago, and each song possessed a subtleness of melody of which she hadn't been previously aware.
        I'm not totally in control of myself, Amy thought worriedly, dizzily. I'm not out of control yet, but I'm liable to wind up that way. I've got to be careful. Sensible. Watch out for that dope. That damned, spiced-up dope. If I don't watch myself, I'm going to end up in a bedroom at Liz's house, with Buzz on top of me, whether that's what I really want or not. And I don't think that's what I want. I don't want to be the kind of person Liz and Mama say I am. I don't. Do I?
        They rode the Loop-de-Loop again.
        Amy clung to Buzz.
        
        * * *
        
        After spending Monday morning and part of the afternoon at the fairgrounds, watching the carnies set up their equipment, Joey hadn't intended to return to the carnival until Saturday night, when he would run away forever. But Monday evening he changed his mind.
        Actually, his mother changed it for him.
        He was sitting in the family room, watching television, drinking Pepsi, when he accidentally knocked over his glass. The soda splashed on his chair and spilled all over the carpet. He got a bunch of paper towels from the kitchen and cleaned up the mess as best he could, and he was sure that he hadn't permanently stained either the carpet or the chair's upholstery.
        In spite of the fact that the damage wasn't serious, Mama was furious when she walked in and saw him with handfuls of Pepsi-soaked paper towels. Although it was only seven-thirty, she was half drunk already. She grabbed him and shook him and told him that he behaved like a little animal, and she sent him to bed more than two hours early.
        He felt miserable. He couldn't even turn to Amy for sympathy because she was out somewhere, on another date with Buzz. Joey didn't know where she and Buzz had gone, and even if he did he v couldn't run after her, whimpering about how Mama had shaken and scared him.
        In his room Joey sprawled on the bed for a while, crying, utterly disconsolate, angered by the injustice of it all-and then he thought of the two pink passes that the carny had given him earlier in the day. Two passes. He would use one to get into the fairgrounds on Saturday evening, when he would try to join up with the carnies by telling them that he was an orphan and had nowhere else to go. But that left one pass, and if he didn't use it between now and Saturday, it would only go to waste.
        He sat up on the edge of the bed and thought about it for a few minutes, and he decided that he could sneak off to the carnival, have a lot of fun, and sneak back into the house without his mother knowing that he'd been gone. He got up and pulled the drapes shut, so that hardly any of the fading, summer-evening sunlight reached into the room. He took a spare blanket and an extra pillow from his closet and used those to form a dummy under the covers. He switched on his dim night-light, stepped back from the bed, and studied his handiwork critically. Even with the splinters of light showing at the edges of the drapes, he thought the dummy would pass Mama's inspection. Usually she didn't come to his room until eleven