Summer of the Bumper Car (under 500 word story)

“There’s pink and blue fairy-floss in Melbourne, Lonnie.”

“So what? I don’t care.” I felt a burning envy sink into my chest. Keith got everything. His sister May, small and brown haired, said quickly, “Don’t worry ’bout it, Lonnie, wasn’t that good.”

“I got it in a bucket for a prize,” he ignored her.

“Made my tongue sting,” she insisted, giving me a shy smile. Keith turned back to me. “Just like a girl,” he muttered. “Anyway, there’s bumper cars, too.”

I could hardly resist asking what bumper cars were. “So what?” I repeated.

“Reckon you dunno what I’m talking about.”

I scoffed.

“What’re they, then?”

“Cars with bumpers, ’course.”

Keith laughed and laughed. They’re something you only see in the city, if you’re lucky enough to go there, he said airily. Then he laughed a bit more. May shrugged and said I didn’t miss anything; she was trying to soften the blow, and I admitted to myself girls weren’t always bad.

“C’n I have a bumper car, Dad?” I asked at dinner. Mother and Dad looked at me and I wriggled. “Keith Allen rode one in Melbourne. I thought if we got just one it wouldn’t cost much. We could even rent it out.”

“I bet it’ll be too expensive,” said my sister wisely. I could tell she didn’t know what a bumper car was.

“My impossible boy,” Mother smiled fondly. “You can’t just buy one, love.”

I stopped and swallowed. “Didn’t ax you, Julie,” I said to my sister, giving Mother a sideways glance to indicate that I didn’t ask her, either. “I axed Dad.”

Dad yawned. “Alright,” he said.

“Thanks, Dad,” I said, giving the females a spiteful look.

“You know what a bumper car is?” asked Mother sceptically.

“Well enough,” answered Dad.

Dad and I built our bumper car out in the shed when school got out. I’d never seen one but I trusted Dad. It was a comfortable wooden platform with rope to pull and pedals to push, big solid wheels and a black horn, and on the back and front it had bumpers to prevent accidents. Mother and Julie disapproved, but Julie made me blue and pink sugar mice because Keith wouldn’t stop going on about fairy-floss. I didn’t believe in spun sugar anyway.

“That ain’t a bumper car, you idiot,” laughed Keith, when he saw it. He liked to laugh that way. It’d come from deep in his belly and when he let it out he’d slap his knee to accompany it - he’d seen men do that. “It’s a go-kart with bumpers and gizmos.”

“Maybe,” I shrugged. “But it’s mine.”

I milked the money out of Keith and the neighbourhood with my car that year. They all laughed until they saw me speeding down the hill with the wind in my hair. May just smiled. She said she’d marry me if I let her ride it ten times. I said okay.

And that was the summer of the bumper car.