It was the hypnotic rhythm of the two boys in the flying cage
swinging up-and-over, up-and-over, again and again that caught the man's
attention as he drove past the small carnival. The faded banners and rickety
miniature roller coaster, along with a multitude of other fun-challenged
equipment - all having seen better days - magically appeared overnight in the
open field outside of town - much like an unforeseen rising of mushrooms
following a summer storm.
"Damn!" the man whispered aloud, "That's a Swingin' Gym ... I haven't seen one of these in fifty years!"
Without giving it a second thought, he made a hasty U-turn and pulled alongside the ditch separating him and the two caged boys dizzily circling round and round, arms and legs gracefully extended, hands tightly gripping opposing metal bars, leaning in tandem, in perfect harmony, as they propelled their flying machine, shouting out the count at the top of their lungs as the squeaky, rusty, rotating contraption rose and fell, rose and fell: "Ninety-nine, one hundred ... one hundred-and one!"
And still they flew, two lads lost and gleefully locked in seemingly perpetual motion as a crowd gathered close, joining in the count.
The carnie ride operator grinned and winked at the man behind the wheel of the car and stayed his hand, which a second before had been flirting with the ride's ancient braking mechanism.
So the boys joyfully continued on with their loop-de-loops, laughing and counting higher all the while.
The man in the car also smiled as he turned around and pulled away, recalling fondly a forgotten evening at a carnival much like this - a night when he and his best friend gathered a similar crowd around a rickety flying metal cage, as they too chanted the count and moved in perfect harmony: "Ninety-nine, one hundred ... one hundred-and one!"
When he glanced in the rearview mirror for one last look down memory lane, all he saw was an empty field.
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