Free Horseflies by Bonnie Bryant Page A

SLID contentedly into their usual booth at TD’s. The ice cream shop was deliciously cool. “I can’t believe you guys aren’t hot. I’ve been roasting all day.”
    “Poor Stevie,” Carole sympathized. “Some ice cream should cool you off fast.”
    Stevie sat back in the booth and gazed at the ceiling, pondering her choices. “Let’s see … What sounds good today?”
    “I’m sure you’ll come up with something,” Lisa said, giggling.
    The girls studied the menu, though they knew it by heart. Finally the waitress came over to take their order.
    “Let me guess,” she said, pulling out her pad. She looked at Lisa. “You’ll have a scoop of chocolate with marshmallowsauce. Your one friend there will have a double cone with pistachio and strawberry. What your other friend who’s fanning herself with the menu will have, I hesitate to even ask.”
    Everyone looked at Stevie, who had a reputation for strange and exotic ice cream creations. The waitress waited, her pencil poised.
    “Ummmm, I think I’ll have one scoop of double Dutch chocolate and one scoop of banana raspberry with pineapple sauce on top.”
    The waitress shook her head and scribbled down Stevie’s order.
    “And since I’m feeling a little under the weather, could you put a couple of green cherries on top, too?” Stevie looked up pitifully. “Please?”
    “Coming up,” the waitress said as she walked back behind the counter.
    “Well, that should certainly make you feel better, Stevie.” Carole crossed her eyes at the thought of Stevie’s latest dessert.
    “I think it would put me under the table,” Lisa said with a laugh. “Almost like having chicken pox.”
    “Do you remember having chicken pox?” Carole asked.
    “Sure,” said Lisa. “I was in the first grade. My teacher discovered a rash on my neck and called my mother. She came rushing to the school like I had diphtheria or something.” She shuddered at the memory. “I was so embarrassed.”
    “I had them in the first grade, too,” recalled Carole. “My dad was stationed at Beaufort, South Carolina, and we lived in Marine Corps housing. I remember my mother would come into my room every afternoon with a milk shake for me, and we’d play on the bed. She’d read to me or make these really neat origami animals.” She smiled. Her mother had died several months before the girls had formed The Saddle Club. For a long time Carole had been very sad, but now she mostly remembered the good times she and her mother had enjoyed together. “I remember itching some, but mostly I remember how much fun it was to be with her.”
    Stevie frowned. “All I remember is Alex looking speckled and griping all the time. My mother had to bathe him with some kind of oatmeal soap, so our whole bathroom smelled like a giant cookie. It made me hungry.”
    “Didn’t you have to take the oatmeal bath, too?” Lisa asked.
    Stevie shrugged. “I guess not. If I did, I don’t remember it. I think Alex had a much worse case than I did.”
    Just then the waitress arrived with their orders. Along with three small glasses of water, she set a dish of chocolate ice cream in front of Lisa, handed Carole a double-scoop cone, and then placed a huge brown, yellow, and magenta concoction in front of Stevie, complete with two green cherries on top. “There you are.” She gave Stevie a pained look. “Enjoy.”
    “Yum!” said Stevie, digging in.
    Carole and Lisa watched as she took her first bite.
    “Well?” Carole asked. “Do you think this dish will restore you to health?”
    Stevie nodded with a grin. “I’m beginning to feel better already.”
    Lisa swirled a spoonful of her chocolate ice cream in the marshmallow sauce. “You know, I’ve been thinking about Jamie and the fair. It’s too bad he had such an awful time. He’s really such a sweet little kid. And his mother said he’d really been looking forward to going with us.”
    “That’s true,” agreed Carole. “What’s bad is that