Lipstick On A Pig

Chapter 2

Three hours later we had all the animals ready to go in the petting zoo. Emily, from the animal shelter, had shown up with a half dozen dogs who were all much better behaved than the farm animals. Bee fell asleep and then promptly began to ignore everyone who came to the petting zoo, much to my relief. Even the cries of “look at the kitty!” from little kids couldn’t make her stir.

Around eleven, my boyfriend Jason showed up with a vanilla latte from Betty’s café, the best coffee shop in town.

“You’re amazing!” I told him as I grabbed the cup with gusto. It had been that kind of morning. I left Sophie in charge of collecting donations and letting people into the petting zoo, and walked along the side with Jason.

“Are you talking to me, or the cup of coffee?” he asked, his face breaking into a giant grin. Jason had dark hair and eyes, and a smile that made my legs—as well as other parts of me—melt completely. He a shad over six feet tall, it was obvious he worked out, and I couldn’t help but notice the roaming eyes of a number of the women in the park were on him. Well, it was too bad for them. Jason was mine. We’d started dating a couple of months ago, and while I had initially found Jason to be incredibly infuriating to be around—it hadn’t helped that I’d suspected him of murder for a while—it turned out he was actually a pretty good guy. And funny, too. Who would have guessed?

“Why can’t it be both?” I replied, happily taking the drink from him and closing my eyes while I enjoyed my first sip of the soothing drink. “You have no idea what kind of morning I’ve had.”

“It was probably worse than mine, I spent the morning watching surfers on the beach and listening to tourists tell me how much they love Willow Bay for the articles I’m writing.” Jason worked for the local paper, the Willow Bay Whistler.

“Show off. I spent the morning trying to convince my cat that she has to lie there and not claw people, then I had to split up some piglets and goats that really do not like each other. I’ve had two people complain they stepped in animal droppings and one kid who peed himself in the middle of the enclosure. And we’re not even halfway through the first day.”

Jason laughed. “I hope all that’s on the record, I want to include it in my article.”

“That is absolutely not on the record,” I replied, punching him lightly on the arm, “and you know it. Reporters. You’re all the same—always out for the story.”

“You caught me,” he replied with a shrug, then wrapped his arm around my shoulder. I saw at least three women glaring at me. “Seriously though, do you want me to bring you anything? It’s not like interviewing people for a bunch of personal interest stories for the Whistler is exactly a taxing job. I could even help Sophie out for a little bit if you want a break.”

“Thanks, I think we’ve got it covered, though. Hey, just out of curiosity, how many of the people that you interviewed this morning were women?”

“I dunno, probably most of them? Why, am I not allowed talking to the opposite sex anymore?” he joked.

“No, but seeing as how four women just glared at me when you put your arm around me, I was curious.”

“Ah, well, that’s part and parcel of dating such a dashing specimen as myself. I generally have to fend women off with a stick.”

I giggled as I took another sip of my coffee. “Well, I’m glad you decided to put your stick away when you saw me.”

“How could I not? A woman who thinks I’m a murderer straight away? That’s a keeper!”

“You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

Jason laughed. “If by ‘let that go’ you mean ‘let you live that down’ then no, I’m not going to.”

I stuck my tongue out at him before resting my head against his shoulder. He was so comfortable. His firm, muscular body just felt so safe and comforting when I rested against it; I closed my eyes and let the warm summer breeze brush my face. This was absolutely perfect.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t take the whole afternoon off. A few minutes later I told Jason I had to get back. He promised to come back again later when we closed off the petting zoo, around five.

“Thanks for coming,” I told him with a smile.

“No problem,” he replied with a wink as he headed back out to find himself the big scoop of the festival. I made my way back to Sophie and plonked myself back down on the chair next to her. In the petting zoo behind us I could hear two of the piglets behind us arguing about who had the biggest snout. I knew I wasn’t going to make it to the end of the day without getting a migraine.

“Excuse me,” I heard a voice in front of me say. I looked up to see a young woman, probably around my age, holding a little girl’s hand. They both had exactly the same shade of blonde hair, the girl was dressed in pink from head to toe. The woman was carrying a Louis Vuitton purse, with Gucci sunglasses on her head, and a Hermes scarf around her neck. She was so not dressed for a petting zoo. The woman was frowning.

“Yes, how can I help you?” I asked, plastering a smile on my face.

“My niece came here expecting to see cows. There aren’t any cows.”

“That’s right, every year we have a local farmer who generously creates the petting zoo out of his animals, he chooses what animals to send every year, and this year he doesn’t have any calves.”

“Well we came here to see cows.”

“I’m afraid there aren’t any calves at the petting zoo this year. But we do have goats, sheep, chickens—”

“I want a refund. There are no cows.”

“The petting zoo is by donation. I’m afraid we can’t give money back, as we don’t know how much you put in to begin with.”

“Well I’ll tell you how much I put in; I gave twenty-five cents. A quarter for my niece, since she was the only one who was going to pet an animal. And she didn’t even get to see a cow.”

I sighed. Twenty-five cents. Of course. I didn’t begrudge people not giving a lot of money. In fact, I knew that some people couldn’t pay anything at all, and that was fine. But the clothes this woman was wearing easily cost more than what I made in a month, so I knew that wasn’t her problem. And quite frankly, while twenty-five cents wasn’t much in the grand scheme of things, she was being rude and abrasive, and this was just not the day for that.

“I’m sorry, there’s nothing we can do. We cannot refund donations, and the money goes to the local animal shelter, so it’s for a good cause.”

“No! I didn’t get to see a cow, so I want my money back!”

“Ma’am, you could see all the animals before you paid.”

“I don’t care!” She was starting to make a scene. And the more she fought, the less I wanted to refund her quarter. I looked over at Sophie, who was watching with interest. Sophie was a bit of a firecracker, I knew that if I needed backup, she was there. Still, the last time Sophie decided to step in when someone was abusing me, Sophie ended up with handcuffs around her wrists after punching a woman in the face at a funeral. I definitely didn’t want a repeat of that experience, so I locked eyes with her and shook my head. I could handle this.

“I’m going to have to ask you to leave, please,” I asked the woman politely. “I’ve told you we’re not refunding your money.”

“No! I will not go! You’re a frigging thief, you know that! A damned thief!”

“Hey, watch your language around my kid!” someone else called out. Ok, this had gone on far enough. I took out my phone to call the security company that had been hired to take care of the festival. I was on the phone with them, the woman still screaming at me, when the noise evidently woke up Bee.

She looked up at the woman and began to hiss. Uh oh. This was not good.

“What are you looking at, you dumb cat?” the woman spat at Bee.

“Get them here quickly!” I practically shouted into the phone, then dropped it as I tried to get my cat. Too late. Bee jumped up on the woman’s shoulder, claws out. The woman began to howl.

“Get that cat off me! What is it doing? Ugh, get it off!” she screeched, but Bee hung on tight. Then, she did something I had never, ever seen a cat do before.

She peed. All over the woman’s outfit. Dribbles of cat pee rolled down the woman and onto her purse. She began to screech and holler as she ran around, realizing what was happening.

“DUMB CAT! GET OFF! GET OFF YOU WORTHLESS CRETIN, GET OFF ME!”

As I stared incredulously, Sophie completely lost it. She burst into laughter so hard that tears began to stream down her face. Her total lack of control spurred on a chain reaction as everyone who’d seen the woman’s meltdown over a quarter began to laugh. Eventually, Bee, having finished her role, jumped back off the woman and onto the table like nothing had happened, curled herself back into a little ball, and went back to sleep.

“YOU GIVE ME THAT CAT, I’M GOING TO STRANGLE IT,” cried the woman as she hurled herself toward Bee, but I quickly stepped in front of the table to block her. There was no way this lady was going to get near my cat. Not that I especially thought Bee needed my protection; her claws would do more than that woman ever could, but after that show, Bee certainly deserved it.

The woman looked like she was going to throttle me as well. “You stupid bitch! You give me back my money, and you let me at that cat!”

Just then, however, two men from the security company showed up. It was obvious who they were here to escort off the grounds, and they grabbed the woman gently but firmly and began to escort her away, her niece following silently behind her as the woman continued screaming, cursing me, Bee, and everyone else involved with the festival.

“Ugh, what’s that smell?” I heard one of the security guys ask the other one, and I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I began to giggle as well.

“You know Bee, I might give you a hard time sometimes, but you’re a good cat,” I told her, stroking her fur gently as people began to mill around once more, everything slowly going back to normal.

“I know,” Bee replied smugly.