Thank you Carol, Beth, and Kelly!!
See links at end for pics of the kites mentioned…
From Chapter 15We moved back towards the dance floor and Chad and I tried to keep up with the moving feet around us. The truth was neither of us had line-danced since our first date and that was eleven years ago. After a few minutes of tripping over our own feet, though, Clark and Rachel showed us some steps and we did pick it up quickly, if I do say so myself.
By the time Rachel had to go to help with the fireworks, Chad and I were old pros at it, and we were all beaming from a combination of sweat and happiness.
Chapter 16Clark helped us set up to watch the fireworks in what he claimed was the best place to see them, and then he went to go find Rachel. She needed to be near the fire department and other emergency services, but being sheriff had some advantages. He said generally no one said anything if he went to watch them with her.
Martha and Jonathan found us a few minutes later and sat down on the grass next to us. “How'd you do?” Chad asked.
“Oh, I think we made a couple hundred dollars,” Jonathan said “but tomorrow is usually a bigger day since lots of people come in late today to watch the fireworks and stay through the kite flying tomorrow. Plus, you know, we just do it for fun. Our main goal is just to recoup our expenses.”
“Have you done that?” I asked.
“Probably not for the buck-eye balls,” Chad mumbled and I smacked him.
Martha laughed. “I don't know for each individual thing, but I think we spent about $400 on groceries for everything – the meat Jonathan grilled, the chocolate, peanut butter, and butter for the buck-eye balls, and the fruit and flour for the pies. So, we're about half way there. Not too bad.”
“Does everyone do that?” I asked. “Just look to break-even?” I had noticed that things were cheaper here than normal, but I had thought that was just because we were in Kansas rather than New Troy.
“Pretty much,” Jonathan answered. “I think most people see this as sort of like a block party would be in the city. It's more a chance to get to hang out with your neighbors than a way to make money.”
I nodded. There was no doubt that this was different than the way this type of event would be in Metropolis, but it was kind of nice.
Right then the music from the bandstand got louder as the first firework lit across the sky. Although I didn't see them, I assumed Lana and Pete were nearby as I had seen Emma toddle by once or twice, but soon she must have gotten caught up in the explosions of color above us as well and aside from the music and the explosions from the fireworks themselves, things got fairly quiet.
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I woke up to Chad nuzzling his head against my neck. “Morning,” I yawned.
“Good morning, sleepyhead!” he said.
The fireworks had surprised me last night. Despite the talk earlier, I hadn't really expected to be impressed by them, but I was. Clark was right – they were far more creative and better choreographed than any I had seen before. A quiet sense pervaded after they were over though, and people started packing up to go home.
We had come back here and talked with Rachel for a few minutes, but Clark had come over after he had dropped his parents off at home so he could borrow the car. Shortly after he got here, Chad and I had gone upstairs to leave Clark and Rachel some more time alone and I had fallen asleep still hearing their soft voices speaking from the floor below us.
On Friday night I had had some trouble falling asleep because it was so quiet here compared to the noise I was used to in Metropolis, but that hadn't been a problem last night. Now I was realizing that while I had wanted to think this weekend was boring, it couldn't have been as I was disappointed to realize that it was Sunday all ready and we were going to be leaving this evening.
“We should get up and clean up after ourselves before it's time to head to the kite thing,” I mumbled. I felt Chad nod next to me and realized that despite his teasing earlier, he wasn't any more awake than I was.
“Are you having fun?” I asked him.
“Yeah. It's great here, isn't it?” he asked sleepily. “Aren't you having fun?”
I nodded. “I am actually. I don't think I could stand how quiet it is here all the time, but I can see why Clark still enjoys coming back here. It's a nice change from Metropolis.”
Chad chuckled into my hair. “I don't think that's the only reason Clark likes to come back here.”
“Probably not,” I admitted.
I lay still another minute, before I swung my legs out of bed. “I'm going to brush my teeth,” I told Chad as I left him in bed.
Exiting the bathroom a few minutes later, I passed Rachel. I had already pegged her for a morning person and yesterday she had certainly lived up to that expectation, but this morning she seemed a bit more subdued. I wondered if the firework thing really took a lot out of her. “Hi,” I said softly.
“Hi, Lois,” she said, smiling at me. “I'm about to head out to start to organize things. The kites start to go up in an hour and I need to make sure no one is crowding anyone else.” She rolled her eyes and I could already tell that this is why she seemed less cheerful this morning – what a boring job! “Clark and his folks will be by in about 45 minutes to pick you up and bring you over.”
“Okay. We'll see you there?” I asked.
Rachel gave a small laugh. “Well, you'll probably see me, but whether I'll see you is another thing. Trying to view all the kites takes longer than you would think.”
Chad was out of bed when I got back into the guest room and I told him that we had forty-five minutes to get ready. We jumped right into the shower so we could try to do a load of laundry with our sheets and towels and put things into the dryer before we left. This way Rachel wouldn't suffer too much with having to clean up after us.
The washing machine stopped right as Clark came in the front door. “Hey,” he said, and it was clear that he, too, was not as cheerful as normal this morning. Then again, if Rachel was going to be busy all day, he probably wouldn't get to see her much more before we left.
“You okay?” Chad asked him.
Clark nodded. “There were some Superman emergencies last night, so I didn't get much sleep,” he explained.
“Can we run the dryer while Rach is out?” I asked.
Clark shrugged. “I think so. I don't think she worries too much about that kind of thing.”
I ran into her small laundry room to throw our towels and sheets into the dryer before we moved out to the car. It was a tight fit with the Kents in the car as well, and I had to sit in the middle seat, but it wasn't that far a drive either.
We passed by the place we'd parked before this time. “The kites are done a little bit further from town than the events yesterday,” Martha explained. “Just the other side of the food stands, but it's up on a plateau that tends to get more wind.”
Jonathan parked a minute later and we climbed out of the car.
“I'm going to man the stand for a few minutes,” Clark told us. “Mom and Dad will show you around the kites.”
He walked off towards the stand and Chad turned to Martha. “Was he up all night?” he asked referring to the fact that Clark still seemed rather subdued.
Martha shook her head. “I don't know. That's what he told us, too.”
“There were several rescues on the news this morning,” I said. “Although not all of them seemed like the type of thing I thought he would go to when he was taking the weekend off.”
Jonathan nodded. “Sometimes Clark forgets how not to help. I can see him getting up for something big and then coming across smaller things and not being able to pass right by.”
I nodded in agreement. I could definitely see that.
By that point we had walked to the bottom of a hill, but I could already see several kites in the sky from here. As we walked up the hill towards the plateau, I could see that the kite flyers ranged from a couple of small children, no more than six or seven, to several adults. The kites seemed to come in as many varieties as the people. There were several plain kites that Martha said were out there for the fun of it, since everyone knew they didn't stand a chance of winning, but some of the serious contenders were really interesting.
“Wow,” I said looking around. “Who knew they even made this many types of kites?”
Jonathan put a hand on my back to turn me to face the other way. “These are just the traditional ones. The trick kites are over there.”
“Trick kites?” Chad asked.
“Oh, wow, look at them!” I exclaimed. It was immediately clear why they were called trick kites. None of them had the standard kite shape and as I moved closer I could tell most of them had two strings, while some even had four. The fliers were keeping a bigger distance from one another and moving both their hands around, but the impact on the kites was amazing. These kites were flying across the sky, some were doing loop-de-loops, I saw one take a sharp dive towards the ground. The flier yanked both his arms backwards hard, the kite flipped skyward again, and the speed seemed to flip on a dime from the fast dive down to what was now a slow progress upwards.
“Do you know how to fly those?” I asked Jonathan. “Is it hard?”
Jonathan shrugged. “I've never tried, but they are fun to watch, aren't they?”
I nodded my head and turned to look at Chad who was looking at them in the same wonder I was.
“Hi, honey,” Martha said as Rachel came by. “How's it going?”
Rachel rolled her eyes. “Oh, it's fine. I've already confiscated a dozen pairs of scissors.”
“Scissors?” Chad asked.
“Remember Clark said that people sometimes cut down other kites?” she asked him. “Officially that's allowed, but you need to use your kite to do it – honestly, I think the only reason it's allowed is that it makes it more interesting to watch the kite fighting. But sometimes some of the teenagers think it will be faster to just walk along and cut the strings of competitors.”
“And that's not allowed,” I smiled.
“No, it's not,” Rachel. “Which doesn't seem to stop it happening every year.”
“What happens if someone does it?” Chad asked.
Rachel lowered her voice slightly, “Honestly, most of the time, nothing. There are two other local officials here doing this with me, but aside from us, no one cares, so unless you're stupid and do it right in front of us, you're unlikely to get caught. But officially, you get disqualified for this year and next.”
“Is there a prize for winning?” Chad asked. “Would they care?”
Martha laughed. “I doubt it. Third prize is a $10 gift certificate for the soda shop, second is a $25 dollar gift certificate, and first is a $50 gift certificate plus your picture in the Smallville Press.”
Chad laughed. “Yeah, I don't see too many teenagers thinking those are worth giving up the fun of doing something wrong.”
“Anyway, I should get back,” Rachel said and Martha reached out to give her a hug.
“Hey,” Chad said in confusion as Rachel walked away. “You know, I never asked, but where are her parents?”
“Oh, they're on vacation,” Jonathan answered. “They wanted to go next week so they wouldn't miss this, but got some sort of incredible deal by going now.”
“Are you friends?” I asked.
Martha nodded. “Well, we didn't really meet until the kids got older. Since Rachel's father was sheriff, they lived in town. But now that Clark and Rachel have been together so long, we've become friends. You know, you see someone multiple times, it just sort of happens. It doesn't hurt that, like Rachel, her parents are lovely people.”
“Particularly with them living so far apart,” Jonathan said. “We hate the idea of Clark coming home for Thanksgiving or something and not seeing Rachel as he's tied up with family stuff. So we'll invite the Harrises over.”
“What about the rest of their family?” I asked.
“Rachel has a brother, but he moved to California a few years ago, and they don't really have too many other family members in town, so it's not usually a problem. And we don't have a lot of family members either, so when Evan is in town and the Harrises are having a big family meal, they'll invite us,” Martha said.
“Not that we're together for every holiday or something,” Jonathan said. “But we try to often so it's not too hard on the kids.”
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Martha and Jonathan went to relieve Clark from his duties, and he came and joined us later in the afternoon. He pointed out some of the kite fliers to us. Unfortunately, knowing how to fly a trick kite was not one of the pieces of useless information Clark knew.
Around three o'clock, several kites had been cut down (although we didn't have a good idea of how many were by legal methods) and Rachel and two other people I didn't recognize got up on the small stage.
The trick kite flying award went to the kite I had been watching all afternoon. Even just watching, it was hard to keep up with it. For the traditional kites, third place went to a little girl flying a butterfly kite. Second place went to an adult who was flying a dolphin shaped kite and first to another adult flying a kite I couldn't describe – sort of like a psychedelic tube.
Shortly after the awards were given, Rachel came over and joined us. “I'm done,” she said, but with less enthusiasm than I was expecting.
“We should probably start heading back to Metropolis. Can you come home?” Clark asked her.
“Yeah,” Rachel said. “I just need to grab my stuff. Can I meet you by the car?”
“Sure,” Clark said. “I want to say goodbye to Mom and Dad first anyway.”
We followed Clark back over to his parents who were doing a good business now that the kite flying was over.
“Heading home?” Martha asked when she saw us.
“Yeah,” Clark said, giving her a big hug.
“Make sure Clark brings you back sometime soon,” she said as she gave a hug to Chad.
I hugged Jonathan and then Martha. As I pulled away, she said, “Don't go anywhere. Just one second.”
She finished taking care of the customer that had approached and then reached into the box next to her. “I made these for you last night,” she said. She handed Chad a peach pie and me a bag of buck-eye balls.
“Oh, you didn't have to do that,” I gushed.
“This is really nice of you!” Chad said over me.
“Don't be ridiculous. Like Jonathan said, you're family now. I knew you'd enjoy it, and it was no trouble at all.”
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The car ride back to Rachel's was quiet and the sadness Clark and Rachel were feeling at their weekend being over was palpable. I checked the dryer when we got back and everything was dry, so I folded things quickly while Chad did the last minute packing up. By the time I made it back to the living room, Clark had left to take our stuff home.
“You didn't have to do that, Lois,” Rachel said.
“I wanted to,” I smiled. “You didn't have to have us.”
“It was my pleasure,” she said and I could tell that she meant it.
Clark came back in and so Chad and I said our goodbyes to Rachel.
“When are you coming for your next visit?” I asked her as I pulled away.
“I'm not sure,” she said, her voice quiet and I noticed her eyes fill with tears as Clark came over to give her a hug. I turned to give them some privacy. I couldn't imagine doing the long distance thing.
“I'll come back after I drop them off and we can talk some more,” I heard Clark say softly before he came back over to us.
The four of us walked outside and Clark turned to give Rachel another tight hug and tell her again that he'd be right back. I was surprised to realize that his eyes, too, were covered with tears when he came back over and wrapped an arm around each of our waists. Dating long distance must be even harder than I thought – I wouldn't have expected Clark to get emotional over the weekend being over.
We lifted off a moment later and waved at Rachel before Clark shot us up over the clouds.
*********
First trick kite Lois sees:
Beetle I picked this as it's my kite. Not that I've been able to fly it in years, but I miss it, so I wanted to include it.
Trick kite winner:
Benson Airbow Third place traditional kite:
Butterfly Second place:
Dolphin First place:
Kichi Tako
