That Time I Joined the Circus

by J. J. Howard

  I glared back at him. “Cookie batter, maybe, but potato’s disgusting. I’m sure they’ll be awesome when they’re cooked, though!” I hurried to add when I saw his face.

  But Dad grinned again. “Yes, when they have been cooked properly.”

  I jumped down from the stool, and one of my ears fell off, which only made him laugh harder at me.

  “How your mother and I ever had such a good kid, I will never know,” he observed, not for the first time.

  “I’m sorry to be such a disappointment to you.” I lowered my gray head.

  I felt Dad’s hand under my chin; he was gentle, so as not to smudge me. “I’ve never been disappointed in you,” he said, suddenly serious. “I thought you knew that.”

  I smiled at him, words failing me, and blinking hard so no tears would damage my face.

  “Now, when’s Eli picking you up?”

  “Like, an hour.”

  “Good. Go get me whatever you use to take off makeup. Get me all of it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Dad put his hands on my shoulders and looked right at me, his light silver eyes serious once more. “Lex, child of mine, I love you. And I applaud your creativity. But, sweetheart, you look ridiculous in that getup. I think it’s time for the emergency costume closet.”

  I blinked for a second, saw he was serious, and tried to swallow my pride. One hour!

  I ended up going out in some of his and my mom’s old punk stuff. My feelings were pretty hurt at the time, but now I was thinking he probably saved me from a lot more embarrassment.

  I noticed then that the lady next to me on the bus was staring at me, like she was trying to figure out whether or not to ask me if I was okay. So much for stuff I can remember without crying.

  Somewhere in the Carolinas, I don’t know which one, I started to think of less-happy memories. I only had two pocket-pack tissues left to last me all the way to Florida.

  For one thing, there’s singing, or more precisely, not singing. I actually have a pretty decent voice — no surprise, since my mother used to sing professionally, mostly in clubs and at events. She made an album when I was a toddler, but she never got a recording deal or anything. And my dad can — could — sing, too. He had a band when I was little, Vinyl Parade, and although he wasn’t the lead singer, he sang harmony and background and stuff.

  My mom used to sing around the house all the time, and I used to, too. After she left it was quiet, so quiet it hurt to breathe, and it was hard to speak; when I wanted to say something to my dad, I planned it all out in my head, and then for some reason the words still felt stuck, like when I was learning to dive and I would get ready and stand on the end of the board and then freeze, waiting, not sure I was ready to take the plunge. After weeks and weeks like this, I remember one day just bursting out into song, like I was a Disney cartoon or something. I was washing the dishes and I’d thought Gavin was in his room, but then he appeared in the kitchen doorway, and he gave me this look — I’ll never forget it — angry and sad and just, like, lost.

  “Lexi, stop.” That’s all he said.

  And so I did; I stopped. I never sang another note, not ever again.

  Thanks, Mom and Dad.

  Somewhere in the Middle of Florida — Friday, October 8

  I ended up in an empty field, standing in a sponge.

  That’s what it felt like: standing down in one of the little holes of a kitchen sponge. The air was actually wet.

  I sat down on top of the suitcase that contained my worldly goods. I don’t know how long I sat there before two big trucks pulled up and parked in the field. A couple of minutes later, a door on the side of one of the trucks clanged open. I saw hands lowering a set of metal stairs, and then probably the owner of those hands tumbled down the stairs a few seconds later.

  The man was maybe a little shorter than me, with dark black hair slicked back and tied into a short, neat ponytail at the base of his neck. He wore a red button-down shirt that looked a bit worse for wear with the sleeves rolled up and black pants. As he came close to me, I stood up, knocking over my suitcase in the process.

  “Who are you?” he demanded. He had a strong Eastern Europe–flavored accent. “Suitcases! Of course! Always they are showing up here with suitcases. And hard-luck stories. Have you brought one of those as well?”

  Well, welcome to the freaking circus.

  “You could say that,” I said, trying to get my bag to sit upright on the sandy ground. “But actually I’m here looking for my mother, I guess.”

  “You guess? Is this some kind of game?”

  “No. I mean, it’s not a game. I am looking for her. I wish I weren’t, but that’s not your problem.” He sort of snorted at that, but it wasn’t an entirely unfriendly sound. Maybe he was glad I wasn’t trying to lay my baggage — literal and figurative — on him.

  “My name is Xandra,” I continued. “My mom was supposed to be here. Her name is Callie Ryan. Or maybe Thompson.” The guy gave me a look, but I didn’t blink. It wasn’t my fault my mother was a rotten liar whose own kid didn’t actually know for sure what her name was these days.

  “I think I had a Callie on board for a time … or a Connie — no, it was definitely Callie.” The man regarded me thoughtfully. “But it’s been six months at least since she left. People come and they go around here.” He shrugged, then abruptly started walking past me.

  “Hold on a second!” I raced to catch up with him. If this rude guy left, I would have zero in the way of leads on finding my mom. And no money to, like, live.

  The man turned. “I told you Callie’s moved on.” He sounded genuinely puzzled about why I was still talking to him.

  “I know, but … isn’t there anything else you can tell me? I mean, I really, really need to find her. I don’t really have another option here. I wish I did, but I just don’t. Did she leave anything behind, like an address? Or is there somebody else here who worked with her maybe?”

  He shook his head. “I haven’t the time to question my people about a woman who worked here for less than one season. Sorry.” He turned to go again.

  “Wait! Seriously, dude. I mean … sir. What you said about the hard luck. I mean, I’m sure you’ve heard about hard luck. But mine is really … hard. We’re talking granite, or like a diamond or something. Wait, that sounds kind of positive.” He sighed, and I knew I was losing my audience. “I can work! I mean, can I work? Here? For you here? I could do anything. I just need to sort of … eat at some point. And I could maybe find out some more about where my momster might have gone.”

  “I knew it!” He slapped his leg for emphasis. “As soon as I saw the bags, I knew. All right … but you must promise to stay until the end of the season. Even if you find a lead on this mother of yours. Until December. You make solemn vow — yes?”

  I nodded. “Yes! I mean, thank you, yes.”

  “You may wish you hadn’t thanked me when I give you your first job. I am Louie Vrana,” he said, extending his hand and shaking mine once, very forcefully. “The animals arrive tonight,” he told me over his shoulder as he resumed walking. “Put your things in that truck with the stairs. You can rest on the couch in there. You will need it.”

  Turns out I was more bus-tired than I thought, because I curled up on Louie’s couch and drifted off.

  I fell asleep in an empty field, but I woke up at the circus.

  I stumbled down the little metal stairs and almost walked into a tiger. Yes, a bright-orange-and-black striped, majestic tiger. Thankfully, he had a rope around his neck and was being led by an old man in grubby corduroy overalls. The man glared at me and it sounded like he cursed, though not in English or even a language I recognized. I mumbled an apology. I could walk through the subway station at Forty-second Street at rush hour without running into anyone, but here in the middle of nowhere, I almost trip over a tiger.

  The animal appeared to pay me no mind and kept striding ahead, its muscles rippling.

  I looked
around. In addition to the tiger guy, I saw two women leading horses in a circle. I’d never seen — or smelled — so many animals up close before. I’d seen them on television, at zoos, in movies, but this was different. I felt very tiny and crushable.

  The two big trucks had become five. I saw a bunch of people leading an elephant slowly down one of the ramps. The elephant looked sort of grumpy and grubby, kind of like the tiger man. It was a muddy brown-gray color, and even from across the field I could smell a distinct odor that must be elephant specific, sort of a mix of grass and wet dog.

  I sat down on the stairs. Between the sleep deprivation and being about ten feet from an elephant, I felt really weird. I was also starting to understand that my life was getting very surreal very fast. Here I was, over a thousand miles from home, at the circus, sitting here gaping at an elephant, two horses, and a tiger.

  And holding a shovel. A boy who looked like he was maybe in middle school walked up to me and handed it to me without a word. I stood up, but he was already walking away.

  “Wait up!” I yelled after the boy. He stopped, but still didn’t speak. “I guess I’m supposed to help you?” I asked him.

  He grunted. I guessed that was a yes.

  “What’s your name?” He stopped and spun around. Close up, I thought maybe he was older than I’d originally thought, but I couldn’t really tell because he was covered in dirt.

  “Costi,” he said, then turned and resumed walking.

  “So what are we doing?” I asked him. When he didn’t answer, I just kept following him. He led me up the ramp of the elephant truck and into an open cage.

  It turned out Costi wasn’t covered in dirt.

  He demonstrated briefly what to do. It wasn’t exactly a complicated procedure. Then he left me to it, going back down the ramp and presumably into one of the other trucks.

  I started shoveling, trying not to smell — or breathe. My shoulders and hands hurt after only a few minutes. I kept waiting for the temperature to drop now that the sun had gone down, but it was still hot and humid, which wasn’t helping with the smell situation. I wished I had a scarf or something to wipe the sweat from my hairline, but I had to make do with the hem of my T-shirt.

  Costi came back to check my work and silently helped me finish off the rest of the elephant cage. Then we went on to the truck the tigers had arrived in. We kept working, and I found creative ways to hold my breath. Around us, small trailers and cars kept pulling in. When the cages were finally clean, about nine thousand smelly shovelfuls later, I followed Costi back toward the center of the field. I rubbed my poor right shoulder and tried to remember if I’d packed Tylenol.

  A whole circus city was being built right before my eyes. A lighted path led to a round section of the field that had been cleared. Some of the smaller trucks were already parked in their places, ready to open as concession stands or ticket booths. Someone had set up a pair of huge speakers, and “Hotel California” was playing as Costi and I walked by.

  We landed at a line of horse trailers. It seemed that the girl who usually took care of the horses hadn’t shown up, if I interpreted Costi’s grunts correctly, so he brushed and fed them while grunting orders at me. I filled buckets and buckets of water from the hose someone had hooked up, carried feed bags, and tried to lift with my legs.

  The people who came to claim each animal seemed to share Costi’s tendency to go about their work without speaking. But as more of the crew — “the ring crew,” I heard someone say — began to show up, I found out that silence was not everyone’s way here. I counted twelve guys and one girl — everyone introduced themselves — and their names were almost all common American names, so I promptly got confused as to who was who. One particularly boisterous guy, Doug, was memorable. Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” started playing, and he kept singing along (off-key) and trying to do the zombie dance. Everyone laughed at him, me included.

  The one crew girl, Heather, told me they were setting up the rows of seats around the center ring. She wasn’t quite as dirty as me, but her Orlando Magic T-shirt was ripped and stained, and her blond hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun. I sat down in the grass while the seats were set up. It seemed pretty clear that we weren’t done, though I was almost afraid to ask what came next. I didn’t have to, though; Heather told me.

  “Don’t fall asleep, new girl. The real work’s the tent. Everybody helps with that part.”

  Indeed, everyone who wasn’t attached to a tiger or a horse turned up to help lay out the gigantic red canvas. All around the circle we held the edges of the material as the crew set the poles and finally tied the tent in place.

  I lifted my arms in the air, holding up my little corner of the tent. When I could finally let go and look at my watch, I saw it had been just an hour, but it had felt like a hundred. My arms felt numb, and I would have given anything for a shower.

  “Who’s that guy?” I asked Heather. The tent was up, but one guy kept on circling it, tightening and adjusting the ropes, and barking orders at people.

  “That’s Carl — the tent master.” Heather didn’t seem inclined to explain, but another one of the guys came up behind me.

  “The tent is kinda the heart of the operation,” the older man told me. “We’ve gotta get it right. Especially here — gets pretty windy in Florida. This your first time on a show, huh?” he asked. “I’m Joe, by the way.”

  I nodded. “Hi, Joe,” I said. “It’s that obvious, huh?”

  He smiled. “You’re doing fine,” he said. “Everybody’s gotta start somewhere.”

  I thanked him and he walked away. Most of the crew I’d been working with had begun to wander off, but I didn’t know if I was free yet, so I sat back down and looked around. Beyond the tent, rows and rows of carefully parked trailers were lit from within. The nicest trailers were closest to the tent — some were big, probably bigger than our old apartment. I saw a dark-haired girl glide down the steps of one of the nicer ones. From her posture and the grace of her walk I immediately pegged her for a dancer — live in New York long enough and you get to know what dancers look like.

  Heather flopped down beside me. “Who is that?” I asked her.

  “That’s Lina. Her dad’s Louie — the guy who hired you. He’s the boss.”

  Lina walked toward us and I smiled at her. She didn’t smile back.

  “She’s probably some kind of dancer?” I said to Heather as she sailed past us.

  “Close,” she said, lighting a cigarette. “Flying trapeze.”

  “I was gonna guess that next,” I told her.

  Eventually, everyone started to clear out. “Bunk’s this way,” Heather told me. “Unless you have your own trailer?”

  “I came here on a Greyhound,” I told her.

  “Me too,” Heather said. “The rest of the crew trailer’s all guys, but they’re okay. As long as you don’t mind snoring.” I watched Heather stamp out her cigarette under her booted heel. She didn’t seem to think there was anything weird about rooming with twelve guys. I looked around at them. They all looked pretty exhausted and harmless, but the idea still freaked me out. I followed her to the very back of the lot, then up the steps into a huge trailer. Once inside, I saw there were rows of beds stacked two high on both sides. Most of them had sheets or scraps of fabric hung up as privacy curtains.

  “Welcome home, new girl. This bunk’s up for grabs.” Heather gestured to one that didn’t have a curtain, then climbed into one a little farther down and unceremoniously yanked her curtain shut.

  There was nothing else left to do. I climbed onto the tiny, creaky bed. I curled away from the center aisle. My clothes were filthy, and I smelled like elephants and tigers and oh, my … But my bag was back in Louie’s trailer, and it seemed like I’d need to wait until morning to get it back.

  I tried not to think of home, or of hot showers or clean pajamas, or of someone who cared if I ever had those things again. I lay there as guys trickled in and started to settle down
. It got quiet pretty fast. But soon the chorus of snoring started. I got up and crept back outside.

  The night was dark and not any cooler. The strange little circus town I’d helped to build blurred in my vision, and through the tears I imagined for a moment that the lights I could see were the lights of New York City. I shivered and imagined it was from the cold. If only wishing could make any of it so. But when I wiped my eyes, the air was still warm: I was still at the circus. I had to stop wishing — I had nowhere else to go.

  I sat on the steps of the trailer for a long time. Alone.

  13 Broome Street — Friday, May 14

  Bailey almost tripped over me, then she leaned down, ponytail bouncing. “Hey, girl! What’s shaking?”

  Sitting on the floor watching everyone stream past me, or step over me, without even noticing I was there was only mildly depressing at this point. I’d been fading into the antique woodwork at the Sheldon Upper School since freshman year. Bailey, though, always got noticed. There had been a couple of freshman guys sitting opposite me for the past twenty minutes — I think one was copying the other’s algebra homework. They stopped “working” and stared at Bailey.

  “Nothing’s shaking; just glad last period’s finally over. How was bio?” I asked.

  “Well, it smells like evil in there, as always. But we did group work, and I got to sit with Dana Marsters — you know, the senior? She’s retaking bio. Anyway, it was awesome! She invited me to lunch this weekend and everything.”

  “Swell.” I tried to smile. As far as I was concerned, if there was an aroma of evil in the bio lab, it was coming from Dana Marsters. But Bailey sees the good in everybody, and she is almost always in a good mood. It takes some getting used to. Eli and I used to be more dark-cloudy, but with Bailey the sun is always shining.

  “And now we get to go shopping!” Bailey did a little hopping dance and sang the word shopping.