Hooter looked up at her and yipped.

“Hungry, are you?” She shook dog food from the big bag into Hooter’s dish and opened a can of cat food for Blister.

The cat bailed off the cabinet, smelled the food, and rubbed around Liz’s legs. Hooter ate one bite before he sat down in front of the microwave and looked up. Liz reached down to rub Blister’s ears, and the cat licked her fingers.

“What happens to you two if I go home to the carnival after Christmas? This is your home. I couldn’t take you with me,” she said.

The smell of baking bread and cinnamon filled the kitchen, reminding her of all the times when her mother heated up leftover sweet rolls in the microwave. When she and her mother had put away a pot of coffee and all the rolls were gone, then they’d go outside and begin tearing down the carnival.

That morning she took the rolls out of the oven and found a fork in the drawer and ate two of them right out of the pan.

I miss you, Mama. She sighed.

***

When Liz reached the carnival, Blaze was sitting on his trailer doorstep with a blanket wrapped around him. He had a cup of coffee in one hand and a toaster pastry in the other.

“Sit down and tell me your week has been better than mine. Want some breakfast?” he asked.

She scrunched in beside him. “I had hot cinnamon rolls and bacon. What are you whining about? My feller got called away to help find a runaway horse this morning while the bacon was still cookin’.”

“I’m whinin’ because Colleen just breezed in and out of my life, and I want to know her better, and life is not fair,” Blaze whined.

Liz laughed. “Aunt Tressa didn’t sign a contract that life would be fair when she took you to raise. I believe the one she made you sign was pretty much like the one Mama made me sign that year. It talked about lots of work, good pay, and you didn’t have to go to public school. And besides, you’ve still got a few days to woo her into going with you, or else staying here. You can always move into my spare bedroom.”

“I found my soul mate and I didn’t even get to sleep with her,” Blaze said between bites of the leftover pastry.

“Colleen will be right next door until you leave. Did the warranty run out on the charm and you forgot to renew it? Come on, Blaze, if she’s your soul mate, it will work. If she’s not, there’s lots of fish in the sea,” Liz said.

Blaze finished the pastry and licked his fingers. “I don’t want to fish anymore. I want a soul mate like you got in Raylen.”

“How do you know that?” Liz asked.

“It’s in the eyes and the way you look at each other,” he answered.

“That’s a load of romantic crap. I’ve seen women look at you the same way since you were fourteen,” she told him.