A Fair to Remember
By: Tallulah
"I control the very fabric of time and space. With the speed and effort of a single thought I can travel the breadth of a country, a continent, the world. I have seen oceans and deserts, been on the beaches of exotic islands and into the darkest heart of the deepest jungles. For thousands of years I have explored the unimaginable variety and breathtaking beauty of your world and now I am offering to take you anywhere you desire, anywhere at all. And with the entire world laid out in front of you, you choose…this."
Sarah's laugh was lost quickly in the pervasive din that enveloped them. "You did say anywhere," she said cheerfully, raising her voice to be heard.
The heat of the day had risen and with it the pungent smells of popcorn, frying grease, hot sugar and the distinctive animal scent that emanated in waves from the livestock pavilion. Jareth scrutinized their crowded and chaotic surroundings with an expression of obvious distaste. "Not Hawaii, not Tahiti, not France or Greece or Italy…are you quite certain?"
"Yes," Sarah said firmly. "You just said yourself that it doesn't require any effort on your part to take us to those places. We can go there anytime. The state fair only happens one week out of the year."
"You do realize there are fifty of them, don't you? These little carnivals are going on constantly in some town or another." Jareth glowered down at the oblivious little boy that had just collided solidly with his legs. Rebounding unconcernedly the child trotted to catch up with his parents leaving a generous smear of chocolate across the leg of Jareth's immaculate fawn-colored trousers. He grimaced.
"Of course I know there are fifty states, but this is my state fair. I go every year and I will thank you to lose the attitude. You did say 'anywhere' you know."
"A mistake I will be quite sure never to repeat again, I assure you," he replied, surreptitiously cleaning the spot from his pants with a quick whisper of magic.
Sarah nudged him playfully with her shoulder. "Suck it up, Your Majesty. If you would stop being such a sour-puss for a few minutes you might surprise yourself and have a good time."
Jareth frowned at her. "I am not a 'sour-puss'."
"Then prove it!" she said, poking him in the chest.
He grabbed her hand before she could withdraw and held it pinned in place. She smiled up at him with dark eyes that sparkled in happy excitement; her cheeks flushed rosy by the heat of the day. His irritation eased ever so slightly. These stolen moments came far too infrequently as it was. He could at least relax and enjoy her company if not their malodorous surroundings. "It is a dangerous thing to provoke a king so recklessly," he replied finally, his voice low and seductive. He brought her captured hand to his mouth and kissed the base of her palm, enjoying the blush that spread across her delicate skin.
"Are we gonna eat soon?"
"Yeah, where's the food?"
"I heard they serve dog at these things."
Jareth felt his irritation ratchet back up a notch. He released Sarah's hand gently and saw as she tried, unsuccessfully, to suppress a smile. He gave her a quelling look and turned slowly to face the small group of goblin guards that had been assigned to protect their king and his lady on their 'date' in the mortal world.
Flip, Dingle, and Push had tried to disguise themselves; he had to give them credit for that. Unfortunately, the garish day-glow t-shirts they each wore over a pair of ill-fitting plaid Bermuda shorts did little to achieve their goal. Dark sunglasses, which in three out of four cases didn't even come close to their eyes, capped off the goblin guard's ridiculous aboveground 'uniforms'.
Jareth sighed and allowed himself to wonder one last time what he had been thinking when he agreed to this. "How many of you would like to go home with all of your limbs intact?" he began before Sarah interrupted by threading her arm through his.
"Let's eat," she said, "I'm starving."
"Can we get dog?" Push asked hopefully.
"There's a sign for dog over that way," Dingle said waving furiously in the direction of the midway. "I think they have chips made out of butterflies too!"
Push and Flip exchanged glances and then shrugged. "I'll try anything once," Flip said.
"Yeah, me too. Remember that time we tried cooking Klik's boots when he left them out to dry?"
"I still say they would have been okay with some ketchup or something…"
The trio of goblins ambled off in mid-conversation leaving Jareth and Sarah to stare bemusedly after them.
"I've never felt safer," Jareth said.
"What gets me," Sarah said as they started to follow their colorful guard through the press of bodies, "is that no-one else seems to have noticed them."
Jareth shrugged, "Humans see what they want to see. They don't expect goblins so they don't see goblins."
Sarah watched the diminutive creatures meander through the crowd ahead of them. Squat, spraddle-legged and gangly in turn, they otherwise looked very similar by goblin standards – leathery brown skin that didn't seem to be quite the right size for their bodies, features so grotesque as to be almost comical and an astonishing assortment of claws, horns, teeth and fur. Dingle was the only one of the three with a tail and he had cut an accommodating hole in the seat of his shorts that let the fluffy appendage wag lazily behind him. "Are you sure there isn't a spell on them?" she asked.
"Quite sure," Jareth assured her. "Humans are just that dull-witted."
Sarah stopped in her tracks and looked up at her companion incredulously.
"Present company excepted, of course," he added hurriedly.
"Of course," Sarah echoed dryly and shook her head. "You still need a lot of work, you know that?"
He was saved from attempting a response by their timely arrival at the hot dog stand. All three of the royal guard had pushed to the head of the line in front of the brightly colored stand, each clamoring to be first. The harried vendor was leaning over the edge of his counter and suggesting that they 'go and fetch mommy or daddy'.
Jareth rolled his eyes in disgust and Sarah completely failed to not laugh.
Fifteen minutes later, balancing five hot dogs, an assortment of drinks and a basket of butterfly chips, the incongruous group sought out a shady spot in the lee of a handy popcorn stall. The noise and confusion of the fair released them into a haven of relative peace and calm away from the crowded fairway and the incessant crush of people. Even the squawk of the 'guess your weight' agent's bullhorn faded to background noise and Jareth found that he was able to relax for the first time that day.
Sprawled in childlike abandon on the narrow swatch of patchy grass the goblins dove headfirst into their food, bickering and snatching and dropping more than they actually ate. They were enraptured by the butterfly chips and made short and very messy work of the hot ribbon-like potato chips before turning their voracious attentions to the hotdogs.
Jareth and Sarah settled side by side on a low stone wall, their legs brushing in comfortable intimacy. Ignoring the melee going on behind them, Sarah took a sip of her soda and smiled covertly into the wax paper cup as she watched Jareth hesitantly, but gamely, bite into his lunch.
He chewed for a moment looking thoughtful and then shrugged. "It's not the most elegant meal I have ever eaten, but I have been served far worse." At Sarah's surprised look he added, "Goblin cook, you see."
"Ah, yes," Sarah said in complete understanding.
"Heeeey," Dingle said, squinting suspiciously at the remaining stub of hotdog in his hand. "I think you should ask for your money back, Your Majesty. I don't think there's any dog in this at all!"
Despite the goblins assurances that it would be 'fun' to eat and then immediately go on the Tilt-a-Whirl, Jareth instead announced his intention to escort Sarah on a tour of the midway.
As he had expected, it was bright and loud and incredibly gaudy. The ceaseless ringing, whistling and whirring of the games grated on his hearing, but Sarah was in raptures. She smiled and rambled happily about past fairs with family and friends, laughing at her own memories as they winded their way through the throng and past the innumerable games.
At each booth an attendant hung across the counter, calling into a bullhorn, promising prizes to curious by-standers and sympathizing charmingly as the losers walked dejectedly away.
They passed another booth in the long line, its once-vibrant yellow paint faded ochre by countless years in the sun. Struck with a sudden impulse, Jareth stopped abruptly, pulling Sarah up short by their entwined hands. She looked back with curiosity that shifted quickly to surprise as he passed several crisply folded bills to the smiling carny in exchange for three scuffed baseballs.
Sarah lifted a curious eyebrow and crossed her arms with a smile.
Curling the three balls easily in one hand, Jareth returned both the smile and the quirked eyebrow and then very deliberately returned two of the balls to the puzzled attendant.
Sarah laughed, "Pretty sure of yourself aren't you?"
"What reason do I have not to be?" he countered, letting the worn leather ball roll fluidly through his fingers and across the back of his hand with effortless grace.
Across the counter the carny looked both impressed and disappointed. "Knock down all three and win a prize for the lady," he recited dutifully.
"Well," Sarah teased, gesturing towards the bottles stacked at the other end of the counter, "let's see it."
With his attention primarily focused on Sarah, and three noisy goblins cheering riotously around his legs, Jareth flipped the ball carelessly towards the three stacked bottles and sent all three crashing easily off the ledge. "You were saying?" he challenged with a playful smirk.
"Color me suitably impressed, Your Majesty," she said, adding her applause to the gleeful whooping of their goblin entourage.
The attendant reached up to the colorful assortment of stuffed animals and started to extricate a sad-eyed blue dog from the bunch.
"No," Jareth said and pointed towards a flash of tawny fluff hidden behind a pair of smiling white bears, "that one." He accepted the plush toy with a short bow of thanks then turned to present it to Sarah with a flourish.
It was an owl. She smiled softly as she brushed her hand across the velvety brown plush. "Oh, how sweet," she said. She reached up and kissed Jareth on his cheek and then added with a twinkle in her eyes, "I think I'll name him Hoggle."
"You shall do no such thing!"
She laughed, "Fine, fine, not Hoggle then, though I'm sure he would have been honored."
Jareth quirked a smile and leaned closer to her upturned face for a proper kiss.
"Your Majesty!" Dingle interrupted, tugged determinedly on Jareth's shirt tail, 'Your Majesty!"
Jareth turned his head slowly and looked down at the animated goblin, his eyes narrowed in irritation. "What is it, Dingle?" he asked, enunciating each word a little too carefully.
Oblivious to the personal danger he was placing himself in, Dingle continued to yank incessantly on the hem of Jareth's silk shirt. "Your Majesty, we found one!" He jabbed his finger across the trampled grass to the scene of a young mother in the middle of a very obvious toddler meltdown.
Frazzled and embarrassed the woman tried in vain to calm the fractious young boy who screamed and twisted in her arms. They were flanked on both sides by Push and Flip who were trying, quite unsuccessfully, to look casual as they nodded and gestured toward the flustered pair.
Startled, Jareth shot a guilty glance in Sarah's wide-eyed direction.
"You have got to be kidding me," she said, shaking her head in disbelief. "Are you seriously scoping out children at the state fair?"
"Of course not!" Jareth replied indignantly. "I would never…" he trailed off at Sarah's skeptical look, "well I wouldn't now at any rate." He made a dismissive gesture and the three goblins slumped in disappointment.
Flip cast one last longing glance at the red-faced youngster and then followed Push disconsolately back across the midway. He shuffled up to Jareth and looked up with a mournful expression, "Can't we have just one?" he asked plaintively.
"They're not collectibles, for heaven's sake!" Sarah said, throwing her hands up in exasperation.
"You can have cotton candy," Jareth offered.
All three goblins perked visibly and zipped off into the crowd clutching the bills Jareth handed out.
Turning back to Sarah, Jareth reached up and tucked a strand of dark hair behind her ear, "Where were we?" he murmured and once again bent his head down to kiss her.
"What about this one, Your Majesty?" Flip asked, suddenly reappearing and bumping between them. He held up a small, blanket-wrapped bundle that squirmed and whimpered in his grasp.
"Oh my God!" Sarah cried. "Are you out of your mind? Go put it back!"
"But it's just a little one," Flip wheedled, "they won't miss a little one will they?"
Jareth cut a scathing look at his pint-sized guard and merely pointed firmly back in the direction he had come from.
Flip wilted and sighed, "Fine/
," he said, tucking the bundle more firmly under his arm before turning back, muttering unhappily under his breath.
"You must admit, this would be an excellent place to find unwanted children…" Jareth began and then once again trailed off at the look on Sarah's face. "Right then, shall we visit the exhibits now?"
The afternoon passed into evening as the little group completed their circuit of the fairgrounds. They wandered through 4-H exhibits and farming demonstrations, exclaimed over the size of award-winning pumpkins and sampled a wide variety of local dishes and snacks as well as traditional fairground food. Dingle and Push exclaimed happily over deep fried Twinkies while Flick grumbled petulantly over the elephant ears, "Dough!" he complained loudly, "it's just dough! Whatever happened to truth in advertising?" Jareth and Sarah merely strolled along, enjoying the breeze that accompanied the setting sun as well as the satisfying proximity of the person by their side.
As the sun completed its descent, the fair became another world. The shabby structures darkened slowly in the fading light and then lit up suddenly, illuminating the midway with lights like multi-hued stars. The crowds began to thin perceptibly as young families carried drooping children towards the exits and then home to dream of carousels and balloons and teddy bears with stitched on smiles.
Push, Dingle and Flip began to droop a bit themselves. Sated on nearly every kind of edible delight the fair had to offer they lagged behind Jareth and Sarah, moaning piteously over sore feet and upset tummies.
When Sarah finally added her own yawn to the affected display of exhaustion being put on by the goblins, Jareth announced it was time to take Sarah home and return once more to the Underground.
"Not yet," Sarah said, stifling another yawn. "There's still one thing left we haven't done."
Jareth quirked a questioning eyebrow, unable to imagine what they could possibly have missed.
Sarah merely tilted her head back and looked…up.
Puzzled, Jareth followed her gaze and lit upon – the Ferris wheel. "Really?" he asked dubiously. "You really want to go on that…thing?"
"Well it wouldn't be a true day at the fair without at least one ride, would it?"
"Your standard for making such a determination may be up for debate," he said dryly, "but since I would by no means prevent any pleasure of yours…" He bowed low and held out an arm for her to precede him. "Not you," he said, straightening as the goblins attempted to follow. "You. Stay. Here."
The massive steel structure dominated the sky above the midway. With multi-colored lights that lined the steel struts in radiating spokes the Ferris wheel soared fifty feet in the air, overwhelming the fairgrounds below by its sheer presence. High above, riders laughed and called to one another in the darkness as the gondolas made their leisurely circuit around the axis of the giant wheel.
As they approached the boarding platform the gears changed pitch and the ride began to slow. Smiling families and cozy couples disembarked as each car rotated home, pausing only long enough for new occupants to board before they too were hoisted into the air, laughing nervously as the car swung drunkenly into the night sky.
Jareth followed Sarah onto the platform as the next car rotated into place and handed the bored carny a folded bill. "Tickets only sir," the tattooed youth began and then noticed the matching pair of zeros on the face of the proffered bill. He raised a pierced brow and affected nonchalance while slipping the money into an inner pocket and then, with a practiced yank, he wrenched open the door on the car, setting it to sway with a rusty creak.
Gingerly Jareth settled onto the chipped wooden seat and wrapped his arms around Sarah's waist. She relaxed into his embrace with a contented sigh and let her dark head fall back against his shoulder. Unable to resist the temptation, Jareth ducked his head and brushed his lips across the pale column of her throat. She turned her head to look up at him with a smile. "Is that the best you can do?"
"Far be it for me to decline such a challenge," he replied with a smile of his own. Turning her in his arms, he lowered his face and captured her upturned lips in a lingering kiss.
When they parted, their car hovered at the summit of the wheel, the countryside spread out below them, black against the lights of the fair. "Thank you," Sarah said softly into the darkness, "it was perfect."
Jareth tightened his grip in response and smiled into the dark curtain of her hair. It had been a far cry from the romantic day he had planned, but there was time. She had enjoyed herself and to his own surprise, so had he. Casually, he slipped a hand into his pocket, reassuring himself that the small square shape of the ring box was still there. There was a beautiful beach on the west coast of Thailand that he had visited once before. Next week he would take her there and let the gleaming white beaches and crystal water take her breath away and then, just as the sun began to set, then he would ask her.
The End.
A/N: Just a little bit of silliness written for the Labyrinth_ex fic exchange. My prompt was: "Jareth suffers a mortal date with Sarah at an amusement park. Snark, the ferris wheel and jibes about so many children running around to tempt him. If you squeeze in Hoggle and some inconspicuous goblins with shades on stalking duty, even better!" Fun to write though it does make me seriously crave a deep fried snickers bar:)