{Will}

The next morning, it's more effort than usual to haul my legs out of bed into my chair. My head throbs quietly and I'm sure Ethan would say I had too much sun and sugar yesterday. I need to make a plan immediately to shake off how crap I feel. I roll into the kitchen and pull my phone off its charge cord, barely acknowledging Spices cheerful, "Good morning, chintu." I slide into the hallway so her talking won't mess with my text to speech ap.

Lauren recently renamed our group chat to 'Ravenclaw Common Room' which is completely lame. No idea why Jaz thought it was a good idea to give his little sister admin privileges. Or maybe she just used his computer to do it while he was absorbed in the new Fortnite season drop. Jaz has a few obsessions--Fortnite is one of them.

I speak into my phone without bothering with punctuation:

Fast & Furious: Guys guys guys

We should go to the fair today

TheUltimateCrafter: cant rn, sorry

playung fortnite with jaz and guru

✨JazzleDazzle✨^^

I roll my eyes. I should advertise and charge for my psychic predictions.

Fast & Furious: boring

I don't even bother waiting for a response from Lauren. Jaz probably dragged her into Fortnite to round out their team. Megs is offline--she doesn't have data so I assume she's outside somewhere she doesn't have wifi to get her Discord notifs.

I text her directly.

<Legs>

<you in town today>

<save me from utter boredom>

Spices calls, "Do you want scrambled eggs and toast?"

I roll back into the kitchen. "Is there bacon?"

Her brown face wrinkles in distaste. "No bacon. But I make my special spicy eggs for you."

"Sure, whatever." I call her Spices for a reason: days when she's shift lead we smell like curry and chilli right to our skin. I don't usually mind, but nothing feels fun right now.

"Your mentor is coming to see you this afternoon--"

I tune into her chatter, perking up. "Bear?" I say.

"It is the one you saw yesterday—I forget what his name is called--"

"Bear," I say. "You can just 'call his name' Bear."

"He is taking you swimming, so eat up or you will be hungry at the pool."

My mind is whirring as I shovel in my breakfast. Bear is not actually taking me swimming: my clenched up body sinks like a rock. What I want to do at the pool is go down the slide a hundred times. What my physiotherapist wants me to do is wade up and down the kiddy pool until I'm so bored I just want someone to hold my head under water and make it stop. I don't know if you noticed, but my legs do not walk fast or well. Demonstrating how crap they are in a public place is my least favorite thing. The question is if my physiotherapist got to Bear first, or if I can.

My phone buzzes.

Megs: <here for the 4H show>

This is a standard part of the fair in our little prairie city: cotton candy and cows apparently are the ideal combo.

Megs: <Did you try drop of doom already?>

Me: <YES> <25 times>

Megs: <lucky. i'm stuck with cows. i keep hearing the screams>

My lips curl in a smile, as I say into my phone:

<what if we pick you up do some rides. I have mentor time today>

I am sure I can make this work.

Spices gives me Bear's number from the office. The area code is weird and I don't know if it's a cell, so I just call it, rolling back and forth in a semi-circle while I listen to it ring. The voice mail clicks and I hang up and call again immediately. Three times.

Finally, a muffled, growly voice says, "'Lo?"

"Bear, is that you? Dude, we need to make plans for today!"

He groans. "Will? What the hell time is it?"

"Time to get up!" I say. "Look, my bestie is stuck with cows right now and if we meet her I can take her on Drop of Doom and she'll be indebted to me forever. We can go swimming any old day, Bear, it's the last day of Hometown Fair!"

"Slow down," he says. "Gimme a sec." There's a 'thunk' and a rustle and I think maybe he's still in bed, hibernating. Distantly I hear cursing and shuffling noises. I'm laughing, imagining him in old-man pyjamas, his salt-and-pepper hair standing on end.

"Ugh-fuck." His voice is suddenly right in my ear and he's out of breath. "What did you want to do today?"

So I repeat it all, more slowly, vibrating with how much I need this guy to pull up in his truck like five minutes ago.

He exhales. "Can't. Body won't do the thing. Sorry Will."

I blink. "Whaddaya mean won't do the thing. You got legs that walk, don't you?"

He makes a huffing noise, maybe a laugh. "My hip is stuck in upright and locked position. Can't pick you up and carry you without both of us falling on our asses."

My mind immediately gets busy trying to solve this. "Has this happened before? What do you usually do?"

There's a pause. "I usually take a bunch of drugs and see my physio lady. She's eight hours away. Haven't found a person since I moved."

I sigh. "Look, it's Sunday so no one's going to be open, but you can see my person tomorrow. They keep a couple emergency spots open. Can you at least—drive? Can you take something to just do the thing today?"

He's quiet, but I think he's really considering it. I press just a little more. "We'll totally go easy on you. Spices can get me in your truck and when we pick up my friend, Meg, she can get me on and off the rides. And then we'll go to the pool and sit in the hot tub, Bear--"

"Hot tuuuub," he groans.

"Yeah, the hot tub will feel so good. So—can we do this?" The question hangs. "Please?"

"'Kay I'll be there," he says. "Gimme forty minutes to get my pants on."

I'm laughing when I hang up because, boy, do I know that feeling.

*

I guess I should take a second to tell you about Meghan Fehr. For Meg to make sense, you need to know that our city is barely big enough to use the word: five minutes drive in any direction gets you to fields, wheat and canola or cattle ranches. Meg's family live in the middle of fields, in a big sprawling house with no wheelchair ramp, so even though I'm allowed to visit now, I don't go over very often. She keeps saying her dad means to build one, but they have, like, five-hundred cows and fences and barns to maintain and he never gets around to it.

Meg has three rowdy brothers who bump into me in the school hallway sometimes—not because they're mean, just because they're big dumb teenagers who don't look where they're going. I don't know anything about siblings, but I think they're why Meg is the way she is: just the coolest girl in our grade, no offense to Lauren. Meg doesn't mess around with her hair or her clothes, and she doesn't mess around with stupid over-dramatic feelings. She's direct and straightforward as I am, but less hyper. Which, even I'll admit, is probably needed.

And she's good at knowing when to say nothing.

It's rare to get to see her on the weekend, and I'm buzzing with excitement to have all day together—no classes to cut things short.

Bear's just about on time, not like I was checking the clock every five minutes between shots on the hoop. His truck rumbles into our driveway, and I back up into the shadow of the house to check how Bear moves and what we're dealing with today, without making it totally obvious I'm watching.

He kind of picks his left leg up, setting it onto the running board, then wraps his arms over the truck roof and lifts himself out, dropping onto his right leg and hopping a little for balance. He swipes his arm over his face and resettles his cap on his head, before limping to the base of the ramp. He notices me and stops. "Ready to go?" he says gruffly.

I grin. "You bet." I whirl back into the house. "Spices, he's here—I need a lift!"

She bustles out of the bathroom, peeling off the gloves she was using for cleaning. She's smiling—probably glad to get rid of me for the day. She's not much taller than me (standing), so it's trickier for her to get me up into the seat and I have to help pull myself in with my arms. Whatever, arms are good today as usual.

Bear carefully takes the wheels off my chair and tucks the pieces behind my seat with one hand, the other steadying himself on the truck.

"Now chintu be good and call us if you need anything," Spices says.

"Okay bye, we'll be fine." I pull the door shut and return her wave.

Bear hauls himself into the driver's seat with a heavy 'oof,' and needs a minute to catch his breath.

"You all right there bro?" I ask.

He grunts an affirmative, starting the truck.

"You need grab handles on your doors," I say. "To haul your ass in and out."

"Probably," he says.

"You ever think of getting a cane?"

He snorts. "No. Want my hands free."

"Well I want legs that walk," I shoot back. "But I got wheels instead. You need to a little mental flexibility when your body won't do the thing."

"Yeah yeah," he says grumpily. "Can you shut up while I get a coffee in me?"

I turn my face to the window, laughing behind my hand. "You are the worst mentor ever. Like—the worst. You're not supposed to say 'fuck', okay? I'm twelve. You're not supposed to punch shit—and you're definitely not supposed to tell me to shut up."

He's ignoring me, pulled up to a drive through speaker and leaning out the window to ask for an extra-large coffee, double-double and then as an after thought, a plain donut which he hands to me like that might shut me up. He doesn't even respond until he's nursed that coffee for, like, five minutes, glaring at the road as he drives with one hand. "You're just gonna have to be 'mentally flexible'," he growls. "I'm what you got."

I smack his bicep—not the one holding the cup, obviously, I don't have a death wish. The man clearly needs his coffee. "I'm kidding, Bear. Lighten the fuck up." I really like the feel of that word in my mouth, crackly and powerful.

He takes a breath, turning his glare on me, then exhales. "Whatever. You're not my kid. Say what you want."

I laugh, delighted. "Cool thanks. I fucking will."

He raises a single finger off the wheel. "However. You get three uses of that word per visit. And that was your last one. Use it more wisely next time."

I slump back in my seat. "Damn." A smile is still playing on my lips.

I asked Meg to meet up at the ticket booth, which made sense to me until we pull up in the field-turned-parking-lot and I realize I still need to get out of the truck to get to her. My exit is basically me falling out of the truck into my chair, with Bear kinda keeping me from face-planting in the grass instead. Whatever works—I'm too stoked about today to care.

When we roll up, Megs is standing next to the booth, tanned and hatless, her hands stuck in her jeans pockets and her boots spread wide while she waits. She looks exactly like every man in her family when she stands like that, except shorter and recently her jeans are sitting on her hips in a way her brothers' totally don't.

Seeing her there makes my body prickle like I just want to get up out of this chair and walk over to take her hand. I don't know what the heck this feeling is and lately I've been trying to just keep my eyes on her face and stay cool when I'm with her. Unfortunately, her hips are level with my bicep when I'm rolling next to her in the school hallway and she brushes me sometimes without realizing. I don't even know what to do with myself for a second before I recover. Hopefully it's just a weird phase that I'll get over soon, like indigestion or something.

Meg narrows her eyes at Bear, sizing him up, the full, pink bow of her mouth pulled flat and neutral. She's seen a lot of these mentor-guys come and go.

"Meg, this is Bear. He's cool for an old man, don't worry."

Bear snorts. "Twenty-seven is not old."

"Bear, this is Meg."

She doesn't say anything, arms folded over her flannel shirt, her eyebrows raised, looking him over like he's one of her dad's dairy cows. She usually resents the mentors for the first couple weeks because they get paid to act nice to me. She's a bit of a purist that way.

"Nice to meet you," Bear says, touching his cap like it's the 1800s. I roll my eyes.

"'Kay, Bear is malfunctioning today, but he can still drive and walk, like, super slowly. Actually, nothing is different about Bear today."

Her mouth unfurls a little and she drops a hand on my shoulders, leaning towards me as we roll onto the fairgrounds. "Where'd you find this one?" she asks.

"The zoo," I say. "The agency's really getting desperate."

"I'm right here," Bear grumbles.

"Pretty sure that's as insulting to me as to you," I say breezily over my shoulder. "No one wants me."

"Please. Everyone loves you Will," Meg wrinkles her nose at me.

"They just love me for my fancy wheels," I say.

She shrugs. "True."

"Ha!" I poke her arm. "You agreed with me."

She shoves me back. "The non-wheel part of you is an asshole fifty-percent of the time. That's on you, bro."

I laugh. "So I'm fifty-percent non-asshole, awesome. That's a passing grade."

The fair is one hundred times more fun with Meg because I know she doesn't have to be here. There's a half-dozen rides that are pretty easy to get my legs into--no ledge, no gap, no swinging ride cars--and we ride them a million times. When we whizz by, Bear just waves at us from a bench, his leg stuck stiffly in front of him. He hands over his credit card like he's made of money, and that definitely helps the fun factor. I wonder if they gave him a bigger budget than the other dudes from the agency.

Honestly, my friends have been my other legs forever, so even though it's harder work for both of us to get off and on the rides than it was for Bear, who could pretty much lift me with one arm, I'm not stressed about it. Except for the part where Meg smells way better than Jasper, like under the dust and cow smell there's a hint of vanilla.

She's got her arm under mine and we're laughing, our bodies bumping as we haul my legs out of the Drop of Doom car for the twelfth time, when I turn my head and her neck's right there, tiny hairs frizzing behind her ear, and I think I want to put my lips on her skin to see if she tastes like she smells, like chocolate chip cookies and sweat.

I'm so flustered when I drop my butt into my chair that I almost go over sideways. Meg catches the back of my chair casually, releasing me when I've recovered. I buckle up, hoping she doesn't notice how hard I'm blushing. What the hell is up with my body anymore.

Beams from the lowering sun are cutting straight across the fairground, making the shadows stretch long and purple over the ground before we notice we're tired. Bear's standing up when we head back to his bench, leaning with his hands on the back. He smiles, watching us come, shifting his weight. "Good day Will?" he asks.

"The best," I say.

"Hot tub now?" he says.

I sigh. "I did promise you a hot tub." Truthfully, I can't wait to sink my body into the steaming bubbles and put those jets on my back. "Legs, want to come with?"

Her fingers are already flying over her phone screen, asking her dad. "You got trunks I can borrow?"

"Sure, at my house." Are we still the same size? (Stop. Wait. Do NOT look at her butt to check!) "If you run in and grab them."

Her phone chimes and she puffs out her breath. "Dad says we gotta go."

"Aw." A little bit of the sparkle goes out of the day.

She ducks and puts her arms around my shoulders in a hug so quick I only get one arm around her in return. "See you tomorrow, Wheels." Her voice buzzes in my ear.

I watch her jog across the fairground until she's lost in the crowd. Beside me, Bear's straightened up, his arms folded against his chest. "She seems nice," he says, and I feel like there's a hundred other things implied, like, for starters, why's she friends with you?

"Yup," I say. "We 'stan' Meg."

"We do," Bear agrees thoughtfully.

We're back at his truck in the field full of vehicles before I realize the flaw in my plan—our best pair of legs went running back to the 4H show and Bear's truck is, like, ten feet tall.

"Huh," Bear says, rubbing his fist into his hip as he surveys the situation.

Not gonna lie, I'm pissed for a second that I can't just climb into the cab like every single one of Meg's brothers. "Look, it's fine, we can do this," I say. "It just won't be pretty. Get the door open."

He does and I roll up beside the opening, and set my brakes, eyeing up the height of the running board and the seat a couple feet above that. (legs you fuckers let's go) "Spot me—I'm going for the running board and then the seat."

"Uh huh," Bear says, but he limps up close, his hands open and ready.

I push my hands on my chair arms and shove my feet against the foot rest, popping my butt up onto the running board. Bear's quick, he's got my chair out of the way and a hand on my back to steady me. I can just reach far enough to wrap an arm around the far side of the seat and I use my other arm to push against the doorframe. I'm hollering swears and laughing hysterically, kicking up inch by inch with my face smooshed against the upholstery and Bear shoving on my ass. When my butt finally makes it into the seat I can't stop laughing. Tears are running down my face and I hear Bear laughing too as he limps around the truck.

He opens the driver's side door, his eyes almost disappearing in their smile crinkles. "Damn Will, you should be in The Light Circus with stunts like that," he says. The truck rocks as he awkwardly hauls himself up and drops into his seat with a grunt and a long exhale. Pushing his shoulders against the seat, he finds the pill bottle in front of the gear shift without opening his eyes. He dumps more pills in his palm than even I would take and swallows them dry, like a pro.

I swipe tears off my face. "I know, imagine me on the trapeze."

He chuckles low in his chest. "Imagine me on the high wire."

"Imagine us both in sequins!"

We're both still laughing as he pulls out of the parking lot.

*There's no doubt this scene is inspired by this hilarious video by Zach Anner about how to get in your car when someone parks in the access aisle. This guy is sharp and funny and heartfelt and I regret none of the hours I spent on YouTube watching him for insight into Will's life.*

https://youtu.be/4OdtFyA-irc

I am slowly but surely slogging through school and I'm sorry reader-friends for posting so infrequently. These characters have a vibrant life in my imagination--I will eventually have the time I want to write more often and more prolifically to finish their stories!

Thanks for reading, voting and commenting, and hanging in with my super-slow-at-the-moment creative process. Be well lovelies, we're getting through. Rae.*

>3319 words.