I was there by 1:45.

Fifteen minutes early, which I told myself was just being responsible and which was absolutely not because I was nervous. I did a lap around the entrance area, found the ticketing booth for the roller coaster, bought two tickets for the 5 PM ride and slipped them into my jacket pocket.

Then I stood at the main entrance with my hands in my pockets and watched the gate.

Wheeler’s Park on a Saturday afternoon was exactly what it was supposed to be. Colour everywhere. The smell of fried food and sugar drifting from the stalls lining the main path. Families with kids. Couples. Groups of friends moving between attractions with no particular urgency. The distant mechanical screech of the roller coaster running its track somewhere behind the tree line.

I checked my phone.

2:00 PM.

I looked up.

2:02 PM.

And there she was.

For some reason, everything slowed down the moment I saw her.

She came through the main gate in a pale pink sundress that fell just above the knee, fitted at the waist, the kind of simple that took effort to pull off. Her hair was down, soft waves sitting against her shoulders, catching the afternoon light in that way her hair always did. She had small white trainers on and was holding a pair of sunglasses in one hand.

She was glowing.

I am not a person who uses that word. But there is genuinely no other word for what she was doing in that moment. She moved through the crowd and the crowd seemed to adjust for her without knowing it was doing it and she was completely unaware of any of it.

She reached me and smiled.

"Hi," she said.

"Hi." I exhaled slightly. "You look nice."

"Thank you." She looked me over briefly. "You too."

"Let’s go," I said, because I needed to start moving before I said something embarrassing.

We walked side by side into the park, the main path opening up in front of us into a wide stretch of stalls and attractions on both sides.

I had no plan beyond the roller coaster tickets and the vague intention of winning something for her.

I scanned the stalls.

A ring toss. A duck pond for the younger kids. A strength tester with a hammer. And then a shooting gallery near the middle of the row, a long counter with a line of spinning target discs and rows of bottle caps set up on a tiered display.

That looked manageable.

"Over there," I said, nodding toward it.

We walked up to the counter. The gallery operator, a heavyset man in a red and white striped shirt with the particular unimpressed energy of someone who had watched thousands of people fail at this exact thing, looked up.

"Welcome welcome! Step right up." He spread his arms wide. "Six shots, hit five targets and you pick anything on the top shelf. What do you say?"

"We’re in," I said.

He grinned. "Fantastic. Who’s going first? Ladies first, gentleman’s code."

I turned to Raina. "Ladies first."

"Oh no." She shook her head immediately, holding her hands up. "I’m genuinely terrible at this. I’ll embarrass us both. You go."

"You sure?"

"Please. Go first. I’ll watch and learn from the master."

I turned back to the counter, picked up the lightweight air rifle the operator slid across and settled into position.

Okay. Five out of six. I could do this.

I lined up the first shot. Squeezed.

Crack.

The bottle cap spun off the stand.

"Ohhh!" The operator slapped the counter. "We’ve got a natural! Ladies and gentlemen we have got ourselves a natural!"

I stood up slightly straighter.

Okay. I’ve got this.

Second shot.

Miss.

"Ooooh!" The operator winced theatrically. "So close! You’ve got five left, keep going!"

I looked back at Raina. She was covering her mouth with one hand, trying not to smile.

"You’ve got this," she said. "I believe in you."

I turned back and shot again.

Miss.

Shit.

Two more shots. Both misses.

Final shot.

Hit.

Three out of six. I set the rifle down on the counter and stood there for a moment.

"Three out of six!" the operator announced to nobody in particular. "A valiant effort! Would the lady like to try?"

I was sulking. I will admit that freely. I am a sore loser and those bottle caps had been mocking me.

"Sure," Raina said beside me.

She handed me her purse and stepped up to the counter.

The operator slid a fresh set of bottle caps into position and handed her the rifle.

She took it, held it up, adjusted her grip.

And shot.

Hit.

Shot again.

Hit.

I stared.

Shot three and four. Both hits.

I was standing there with her purse in my hand completely unable to process what I was watching. She had told me she was terrible at this. Those were her exact words. She was going to embarrass us both.

Two bottles left. She needed one more for the prize.

She shifted her stance slightly, brought the rifle up close to her cheek, closed her left eye and looked down the sight the way a sniper lines up a shot. Still. Focused. Completely unbothered by the small crowd that had gathered at the counter.

I was holding my breath.

She squeezed.

Bang.

The bottle cap flew off the stand.

I lost my mind.

"YES!" I grabbed her by the shoulder without thinking. "That’s it! That’s five! You got it!"

Raina lowered the rifle and laughed, properly laughed, as I jumped once beside her like I had personally accomplished something.

She knocked out the last one just for the fun of it.

The operator did not look pleased. He had the expression of a man doing rapid mental calculations about his profit margin.

"Well," he said. "Congratulations. Top shelf. Take your pick."

Raina scanned the prizes. Then pointed.

"The Hello Kitty one please."

He reached up and pulled down a Hello Kitty plush almost as big as my torso and set it on the counter in front of her. She picked it up with both arms and held it against her chest.

"Thank you," she said to the operator with complete sincerity.

He managed a strained smile.

We walked away from the stall and I shook my head slowly.

"You told me you were terrible."

"I said I was going to suck," she said. "I was wrong."

"That was sniper level accuracy Raina."

"It was beginner’s luck," she said.

"Four out of four is not beginner’s luck."

She looked at me over the top of the Hello Kitty head. "Are you annoyed that I won?"

"No," I said. "I’m annoyed that I missed."

She laughed again.

"I’m winning the next one," I said. "I’m telling you right now."

"I believe you."

"You’re being sarcastic."

"I absolutely am."

We stopped at the cotton candy stall on the way down the path.

A girl was already at the counter ahead of us, waiting on her order. The vendor, a young guy with a paper hat and the particular cheerful efficiency of someone who genuinely enjoyed their job, glanced up when we approached, looked at Raina for half a second longer than necessary, then held up a hand to the girl.

"One second sweetheart, let me just—"

"Oh no please," Raina said immediately. "She was here first."

The girl looked relieved.

"You sure?" the vendor asked.

"Completely," Raina said.

We waited. The girl got her order, thanked us and moved on. The vendor turned back to us.

"What can I get you?"

"Two please," I said. "Whatever colour she wants."

Raina pointed at the pink.

Of course.

I got blue.

We walked and ate cotton candy and I felt approximately fourteen years old and had absolutely no complaints about it.

The next stall stopped Raina mid-step.

She grabbed my arm.

"Wait."

I followed her gaze.

The horseshoe pitching stall had a display case mounted on the side wall behind the counter with a single item inside it. A small boxed doll, Lumi♡Live themed, the avatar rendered in miniature with white hair and full pastel colour set, the bow, the sparkling eyes, the whole thing. A small printed card beneath it read:

Limited Collector’s Edition — Lumi♡Live Miniature Character Doll

Worldwide Production: 5 Units

Authentication Certificate Included

Raina was staring at it.

"Oh my God," she said quietly. "A Lumi♡Live limited collector’s doll."

She looked at me. Then back at the case.

"There were only five of these made," she said. "Five in the entire world. I didn’t even manage to keep one for myself."

She turned to me with an expression I had never seen on her before. The composure was completely gone. She looked like a kid who had just spotted something they wanted more than anything and had not yet decided whether they were allowed to ask for it.

"I want it," she said.

I looked at the stall.

Horseshoe pitching. Hook four out of four horseshoes over a metal stake and win the limited display item.

Four out of four.

Beer pong had four cups per side and I had spent the better part of my sophomore year developing what I considered a genuinely respectable arc throw. This was essentially the same principle. Curved trajectory, fixed target, consistent release point.

I got this.

"Stand back," I said.

The game attendant at the counter, a tall man with forearms like he had been running this stall for twenty years, set out four horseshoes on the counter in front of me and explained the rules with the bored efficiency of someone who had given this speech several hundred times.

"Four throws. All four must land clean on the stake. No leaners. Prize goes to a full house only."

"Understood," I said.

I picked up the first horseshoe. Felt the weight of it.

Lined up.

Threw.

Clang.

It dropped clean over the stake.

Raina made a sound beside me.

Second horseshoe.

Clang.

"Oh he’s doing it," the attendant said, sitting up slightly from where he had been leaning.

Third one.

I took a breath. Adjusted my release point by a fraction. Threw.

Clang.

Raina grabbed my arm.

One left.

I picked it up. Looked at the stake. Looked at the horseshoe. Found the arc in my head the way I had found it a hundred times across a dorm common room table.

Released.

Clang.

Raina jumped and threw both arms around me so fast that the Hello Kitty plush hit me in the face.

"You got it!" she said. "You actually got it!"

The attendant stood up fully, walked to the display case, unlocked it and carefully removed the boxed doll. He set it on the counter with both hands.

"Full house," he said. "Congratulations."

Raina took the box and held it in both hands and looked at it the way people look at things they did not expect to get back. Something personal in it that I probably was not supposed to notice.

"I’m going to keep this forever," she said.

"Forever is a big commitment for a doll."

"I’m serious." She looked at me. "Thank you Ethan."

"That’s what I’m here for," I said.

She shook her head, smiling, and tucked the box carefully under her arm alongside the Hello Kitty plush.

We did popcorn next. Then the scream house.

The scream house was a serious operation. Three floors, genuine darkness, actors in full costume who appeared from doors and corners with enough commitment to their craft that I walked into a wall at one point trying to back away from something that jumped out from the left.

Raina grabbed my arm every time something appeared and then immediately pretended she had not.

I said nothing about it.

We came out into the late afternoon light slightly breathless and both trying to look like we had not been scared at all.

"That was fine," Raina said.

"Completely fine," I agreed.

"The third floor was a bit much."

"A little bit."

"The clown."

"Yeah," I said. "The clown was a lot."

We looked at each other and laughed.

Five o’clock.

I pulled the two tickets from my jacket pocket and handed them to the attendant at the roller coaster entrance.

"Row three okay?" the attendant asked.

"Perfect," I said.

We strapped in side by side. Raina set the doll box carefully between her feet and held the Hello Kitty plush on her lap.

I glanced over my shoulder as the last few riders settled in behind us.

And did a small double take.

The guy from the cotton candy stall was three rows back, getting strapped in alone. Paper hat gone now but the same face. The same guy who had almost served us before the girl ahead of us.

I turned back around.

Probably nothing. Parks were not that big. People crossed paths.

The safety bar came down.

The coaster lurched forward on the track, slow at first, clicking upward on the lift hill with the particular mechanical patience that made the anticipation worse. The park spread out below us as we climbed. The stalls. The paths. The late afternoon sun sitting low and gold over everything.

Raina looked out over it.

"It’s beautiful from up here," she said.

"Don’t get too comfortable," I said.

She looked at me. "Why—"

The coaster crested the hill.

And dropped.

The first drop hit us like a wall of pure speed. Raina’s hair flew back and she screamed, the Hello Kitty plush held to her chest with both arms, and I gripped the bar and felt my stomach leave my body somewhere at the top of the hill and spend the next three seconds trying to catch up.

The first loop came immediately after. Zero gravity for half a second, the world flipping, the track above us and the sky below, then slamming back into direction with a force that pressed us both into our seats.

"ETHAN—" Raina started.

The second drop cut her off.

Then the corkscrew. Then a long sweeping turn that pressed us sideways hard enough that she went into my shoulder and stayed there because there was nowhere else to go.

I was laughing at some point. I could not hear it over the wind and the screaming from the rows behind us but I could feel it in my chest.

The final stretch was a straight run at speed, the track blurring on both sides, the brake run coming up fast, and then the deceleration, steady and firm, bringing us back to the station.

Silence.

Or relative silence. The sound of people catching their breath around us.

Raina was still pressed against my shoulder. She sat up slowly.

Her hair was everywhere.

She looked at me.

"Again," she said.

I laughed properly. "We’d have to buy more tickets."

She considered this seriously for a moment.

"Worth it," she said.

We walked out of the park at seven on the dot, hands finding each other somewhere between the exit gate and the pavement without either of us acknowledging it. The city had shifted into its evening mode around us, softer light, the first streetlamps flickering on along the road.

Raina had the Hello Kitty under one arm and the collector’s doll box under the other and was still faintly glowing from the roller coaster. I had not stopped smiling since the horseshoe clang.

"Okay," she said. "Today was genuinely the most fun I’ve had in a long time."

"High praise," I said.

"I mean it." She looked at me. "Thank you for planning this."

Across the road I spotted a vendor with a cart, a row of corn dogs rotating slowly under a heat lamp, golden brown and perfectly identical.

"Hold on," I said. "You want one?"

She looked over. "Yes please."

"Wait here."

I stepped off the curb and crossed over.

The vendor was already reaching for the tongs when I got there.

"Two please," I said.

He nodded and pulled them out of the rack.

I reached for my wallet and glanced back across the road to where Raina was standing.

And that was when I saw him.

The guy from the cotton candy stall. Not at a stall. Not on a ride. Just standing near the park entrance, hands in his jacket pockets, not looking at anything in particular.

Or looking at everything.

I stood at the vendor’s cart with two corn dogs in my hand and stared at him. 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

He was not moving. Not waiting for anyone as far as I could tell. Just present in the space in a way that did not have a clean explanation.

The cotton candy stall.

The roller coaster.

And now here.

Am I crazy or is this guy following us.

The thought landed fully and sat there.

I paid the vendor, took the corn dogs and walked back across the road.

Raina looked up when I reached her.

"Everything okay?" she asked.

I looked back over my shoulder.

The man was gone.

I turned back to her.

"Yeah," I said, handing her the corn dog. "Everything’s fine."

But I looked back one more time as we started walking.

The space where he had been standing was empty.