by Rob Thurman
“I will call.”
Charlie’s stubborn voice interrupted my thoughts. Sticky-fingered thoughts but misdemeanors at best. Cane Lake was a mix of all kinds. Some kids were just victims—of parent-killing car wrecks, bad luck, or relatives who liked to touch too much—but some were a little rougher than that. I’d learned a lot here. Not much of it good, even less of it legal. I was getting an education, all right, just not the kind that got you into college.
“Don’t waste your money, Allgood.” It wasn’t the first time he’d said it. He’d been on this kick for the whole week. “Hair gel doesn’t come cheap.”
His hand automatically smoothed the bird nest on top of his head. “Funny,” he said sourly. “But I’m serious, Jack. I want to call. Just take them, all right? Don’t be such an obstinate ass.”
“I was thinking the same about you.” I leaned back against the wall, math book in my lap. The room wasn’t big enough for a desk. Wasn’t even big enough for two people to fart in at the same time without blowing the walls down. “Only with smaller words.”
“You never have a nice thing to say about anyone, not even yourself.” Charlie’s books were disappearing into the duffel bag, two at a time and cradled with the same care you’d show a baby. “You’re smart enough, Jack. Damn smart when you want to be.” He gave me a flash of white teeth. “Except in chemistry.”
“Yeah, yeah. Rub it in,” I growled.
The last book disappeared, and I was disappointed when I felt a pang at the sight. I was tougher than that. I stood apart, a lone wolf. If it took getting down on all fours and howling at the moon to prove it, then that’s what I would do. Just watch me. The rasp of the duffel bag’s zipper was unnaturally loud, but I did my best to ignore it. Charlie was harder to ignore. “Take the calls, Jack. Please?”
I gave in. Gave in and told him what he wanted to hear. It was a lie, yeah, but so what? I’d done worse. Much, much worse. “Okay. Jesus. I’ll take the calls. Damn, now give it a rest, already.”
“Good.” Charlie eased the bag to the floor. I would’ve tossed it. “You’ll meet my brother someday. You’ll like Hector.”
“Hell, Charlie, I don’t even like you,” I said impatiently, moving on to the next problem in the book. Another lie; this time, it was for both of us.
“Uh-huh.” The pale eyes were bright. “Want to wait downstairs with me for my cab?”
The math problem was harder than it should’ve been for some reason. I gave up on it and tossed the book aside to roll over onto my stomach on the bed. “A cab. Aren’t you rolling in the dough?”
He didn’t pay any attention to the swipe. “You don’t want to come?”
I shook my head, eyes on that goddamn pink wall. I didn’t particularly want to watch Charlie get into a beat-up yellow Ford and disappear down the street while I peered through the seven-foot-tall chain-link fence. Not my idea of a good time. “See ya, Allgood.”
I heard him heft the bag, heard the faint grunt of exhalation at the weight of it. It had my lips curling slightly. Such a little guy but such big ambitions. I hoped he held on to them. It’s always you against the world, and the world cheated like hell. But it might be that Charlie could fight it to a standstill. If anyone could …
“I’ll call,” he repeated, and I felt the faint knock of knuckles against my shoulder. “And if you don’t take them, I’ll call Mr. Sugarman instead and tell him you love the pink. Adore the pink. You want to volunteer to paint the outside of the building pink.”
“Go home, asshole.” I laughed. It came out a little thick, probably from those lingering paint fumes, but it was a laugh. My first since … since a long time.
He laughed, too. “Talk to you soon, Jack.” Then the door closed, and he was gone, leaving nothing but an overly clean bed and the feeling that the room had grown into an empty, echoing space. Hard to imagine in a room the size of a broom closet, but that’s what it felt like. I could’ve jumped up, shouted my name, and not been surprised to hear echoes for days. One smart-mouthed kid lost in a space the size of the Grand Canyon. I turned back over, pulled a corner of the blanket over me, and closed my eyes. There was nothing here I wanted to see right now.
I never saw Charlie alive again, but I did meet his brother, Hector. Charlie was wrong. I didn’t like him. I didn’t like him one damn bit.
3
I ended up in a carnival, a happy place for a happy kid.
Shit.
Although the place was a lot like me, really. There were the bright colors, the cheerful, tinny music pumped out by a mechanical calliope, all glossy surface to please the eye. Okay, none of that was like me. I was still everything I’d been two years ago at fourteen, red-haired country trash in T-shirt and jeans fished from a bin at Goodwill. Beat you like a redheaded stepchild, a good old-fashioned saying that Boyd had delighted in repeating to me over and over, snickering at his own “humor.” I had sullen dark eyes full of wary suspicion and chips on both shoulders with spares in my pockets. No, I didn’t have the external flash of the carnival, but I had the internal secretiveness and matter-of-fact larceny.
To live, you need money. There were things I wouldn’t do for cash, but not many. Practical to the very edge of ignoring my conscience altogether, I did what I had to do. I lifted a few wallets if the risk seemed low. The last thing I wanted was to be picked up and sent back to Cane Lake or someplace even worse. So while I lightened some pockets, my main source of income came from the con. There was no danger there. The rubes weren’t expecting anything but a little entertainment when they crossed my palm with silver.
I’d seen that in a movie once. “Cross my palm with silver,” a gypsy had said with dramatically arching eyebrows and hot breath fogging her crystal ball. I didn’t have a crystal ball. They were expensive, thirty bucks at least. I made do with a bowling ball. Laugh if you want. It worked. I’d found it in a garbage dump. It was chipped and cracked around the finger holes, but I simply turned that part down against the table and concealed it in the nest of threadbare velvet that cradled it. It wasn’t transparent, but the marbleized pattern was odd enough to catch the eye. Twilight blue with a glitter of silver swirling through it, it reminded me of the old days. Lying in a field of sweet-smelling clover and watching as a spray of comets crossed the night sky. I could hear the girls in the distance, laughing and squealing as they helped Mom bring in the laundry. Could feel the bread of my peanut butter sandwich give softly under my fingers as I raised it to my mouth for a bite. It was a good moment … yeah, good. And if I tried hard enough, I could live in that moment, just that one, for a while as I stared at the ball.
For two years in the carnival, years that passed more quickly than the ones in Cane Lake had, I dealt the cards and waved a hand over the makeshift crystal ball just like that movie gypsy. At first, I didn’t have a tent of my own or a trailer. I would pick a spot on the carnival outskirts, lay out my strip of velvet, ball, and cards, and wait for the ladies to come. And it was always ladies. They’d take a look at my hand-lettered sign that said a dollar a reading, my hair so very earnestly slicked back, my robe that had once been a Halloween Dracula cape, and my fake gold hoop earring that fit the lobe I’d pierced myself, and melt into a maternal puddle. At sixteen, I’d looked younger, an Opie who’d lost his way, and the women couldn’t wait to throw their money at me. I could’ve said you’ll meet a tall dark alien who will carry you off to his mothership to be his egg-laying hive queen, and they wouldn’t have batted an eye. It was all in fun … for them. For me, it was survival.
The carnival owner tried to run me off in those days, more times than I could count. He’d stomp after me, four hundred pounds of arm-waving fury. “Shoo, boy! Shoo!” he’d squeak in a voice oddly high and sweet for such a big man. “Shoo,” as if I were a stray tomcat spraying the place. It was safe to say that “Shoo” didn’t score too high on my list, damn sure not high enough to actually scare me off. A balled-up fist, a hard and heavy boot, that might’ve had me moving on. �
��Shoo”? Jesus. That was kiss-my-scrawny-ass territory. When I saw him coming, shaking the ground like a cranky elephant, I usually had plenty of time to gather my stuff and disappear. Half an hour later, I’d pop back up somewhere else, behind a hot-dog stand or next to the freak show. And that’s where I met Abigail.
“Why do you wear gloves all the time?”
I paused in the absent shuffling of my cards. They weren’t tarot, just a normal deck, slick and yellowed from a thousand fingers. It didn’t matter. I could’ve played at tarot until the end of time and not seen a goddamn thing. Not from a factory-fresh deck of cards, anyway. It had taken a while to learn to shuffle with the gloves on, but it was time well spent. I could’ve spent the two-fifty on a new deck and handled them with my bare hands, but it wasn’t worth it. I could’ve touched the cards, but I couldn’t have handled the money or the occasional brush of a customer’s hand. Gloves were just safer all the way around. Now I looked up at the girl who wanted to know why. I’d been lurking and working the carnival for two weeks, and she was the first person to actually talk to me … other than those unbelievably fascinating “shoo, shoo” conversations.
She was younger than me by four years at least. Eleven or twelve, probably. Dressed in a white unitard that was spangled from neck to ankle, she had a cascading mass of pale blond hair that reached her narrow hips. She also had a horn. Yeah, a horn. It was planted right on top of her head and protruding from the thick hair. Obviously papier-mâché and not fastened as tightly as it could’ve been, it wobbled precariously when she tilted her head to look at me. “Do you have warts? Huge disgusting warts all over your hands?”
There in the sweltering heat and stink of roasting mystery meat, sitting cross-legged on the ground, I looked up into round amber eyes and felt my heart stutter with a painful squeeze. It wasn’t love. Hell, she was a kid, barely past the Barbie stage. No, it wasn’t love but a surge of homesickness so strong that the card in my hand bent double before falling to the velvet. I’d seen the look in her eye before. Curiosity, impatience, troublemaking through and through, she would’ve skipped hand-in-hand with Tess and Glory … perfect synch. She was older but had the same spirit, the same “Look at me, world. Just look how amazing I am.” It would’ve been annoying if it hadn’t been true.
I let my eyes drop and swallowed against the strangling heat in my throat. God, I missed them. “No.” I cleared my throat, and the next words came out a little more smoothly. “It’s hair. All over my palm, just like Granny said would happen.”
She scowled, pale eyebrows pulling into a confused V. “Huh?”
“Never mind.” I picked up the card and tried to straighten it out. “I just like gloves, okay?”
A pink shoe and gloves. One led to the other.
The shoe had been the first time. I’d picked it up and known … just like that. I’d seen Tessie’s strawberry blond hair floating in a cloud, her blue eyes wide and empty, her mouth open just wide enough to show a flash of tiny white teeth. Tess was dead. Tossed into the old well as if she were garbage. Everything in her that made Tess Tess was gone. The fits of giggles, the smell of ninety-nine-cent honeysuckle shampoo, the absolute loathing of Brussels sprouts, and the forever love for her shiny pink shoes. All of it, gone forever. There was no more Tess, and it didn’t take any big jump of logic to know who was responsible for that. Chicken pox, Boyd playing babysitter, Boyd who would get bored easily, Boyd who drank until it was coming out of his pores, Boyd who’d thought Mom was a little too old when he married her at seventeen … so many thoughts in such a short moment of time as her shoe had tumbled from my hand.
So very many.
It had slowly gotten worse since that first time. In the beginning, I could touch something and see only a flash, a current slice of time. Hand me someone’s keys, and I could tell you where they were right then, but that was all. That changed. Little by little, I would see more of the past, until eventually I saw it all. I’d never much cared for history in school, and here I was condemned to relive it constantly. Wasn’t that a bitch? The past was all I saw, though, and I was glad of it. The future … who would want to see that? Unless you could change it, and it was safe to say with the way things worked, that wasn’t possible. Forget physics and math and all that geek crap, that wasn’t what would stop you. It was the universe, uncaring and oblivious, that was holding the cards on this one. It wasn’t about to let you change the shit coming your way.
“I want a pair of gloves,” the girl said imperiously. Quite the princess, this one was. She held out her hands in front of her, palms down, and looked them over seriously. “White, I think. With diamonds. Real ones,” she emphasized. “To match my costume.”
I gave a snort. “Sorry, kid. I’m all out of diamonds.” Picking up the stray card, I shuffled it back into the pack.
She gave an exaggerated sigh and flopped down opposite me, skinny legs folded beneath her. “That’s okay. They’d be too hot, anyway. My name’s Abigail.” Sticking out her nonexistent chest, she fluffed her long hair and preened. The horn wobbled so strenuously I was surprised she hadn’t put an eye out yet. “Abigail the Amazing Unicorn Girl.” The capitals were as clear as if they’d been letters of fire.
“Is that so?” I tried hard to stop the quirk of my lips. She was just a bored girl, bugging me for no good reason. She wasn’t Glory, and she wasn’t Tess. She was just a girl.
“Yep.” She touched a curious finger to the midnight-blue curve of my “crystal” ball. “First I was the One and Only. Then I was Unique. Like the Unique Unicorn Girl. But Daddy decided Amazing was better. ’Cause that’s what I am.” Actually, she was probably all three, and I was glad she had a daddy who knew it. “What are you?” she went on, eyes bright and curious.
“What am I?” I laid out a row of solitaire. Business tended to be slow this part of the day.
She shifted, pulling her knees up and resting her chin on them. “You know. Are you Stupendous or Super or Marvelous? You’re doing the whole psychic thing, you need something.” Hastily, she cautioned, “But Amazing is mine.”
My lips twitched again uncontrollably, and I agreed, “Amazing is yours.” Maybe she was right. Maybe I did need an Amazing of my own. Jack the Psychic didn’t quite get it for flash and flair.
“So?” she demanded impatiently. “What are you?”
I stared at the cards blankly for a moment, and then it came to me. “All Seeing.” Jackson Lee Eye, the All Seeing Eye. That was who I was. Blind as a bat in the past but all seeing now. Talk about your too little, too late … no one was better at that than me.
“All Seeing.” She didn’t seem too impressed, sighing and shaking her head. “Well, okay, but there’s no pizzazz.” The hands she threw out gave the word its own special effects. “That’s what Daddy says you need in an act, pizzazz.” She lingered lovingly over the word, emphasizing the z in a sizzle sound.
“I’m sure he’s right.” Giving my own sigh, I put the cards away and began to fold up the velvet. My stomach was growling loudly enough to scare any potential clients away. It was time to invest in a hot dog. “It was nice meeting you, Amazing Abigail. I’m going to grab some lunch. See you later.” Actually, I wasn’t quite sure that I wanted to see her again, but in the small confines of the carnival, there was probably no avoiding it. Not that she wasn’t a nice kid, but she reminded me of things I’d rather not be reminded of. Life was a helluva lot easier to bear when you could forget.
“Lunch?” She bounced up, surrounded by a cloud of hair. “You can have lunch with us. My mom loves company, and Daddy can help you think of a better name.”
I was happy with the name I’d come up with, but somehow I ended up being pulled in her wake. Not caring could work against you sometimes. When you didn’t care, it was hard to muster up the energy to stand in the face of Hurricane Abby. Not giving a shit: as philosophies went, it had its flaws. Two years later, I was still going to lunches and dinners at Abby’s trailer.
I stuck with t
he name, though.
Then I was eighteen and had a small tent that was my home. I didn’t buy a trailer. I was saving my money for bigger and better things. Abby’s parents had smoothed over things with Mr. Toadvine, the carnival’s owner, and I’d been allowed to eke out a little corner of the place for myself. When I wanted to shower or clean up, I went to Lilly and Johan’s place and locked the door. Abby had dumped enough cold water over the shower curtain to do a good imitation of Niagara Falls. Following me like a puppy, she’d adopted me wholeheartedly as her older brother. Every time I had that thought, my chest ached fiercely. Two years with Abby was still four years without Glory and Tess. That truth was inescapable.
But now I would be leaving soon, and that led to another inescapable truth. I’d be losing another sister, no matter how hard I’d tried to make sure she didn’t creep her way into my heart. She was fourteen now, the same age I was when it had happened. When it had all happened. I buried the thought and carefully covered the table in imitation silk. The velvet had long since raveled away. Abby … I’d been thinking about Abby, fourteen and thought she was all grown up, although she was still stuck in a training bra to her mortification. A sound of the tent flap being raised had my head coming up. Speak of the devil … if the devil were a flat-chested teenage girl in sequins. “Hey, Amazing, what brings you around?” I drawled as I polished the tried-and-true bowling ball of the future.
“I’m bored.” She flounced into a folding chair, then grimaced and pulled her tail from beneath her. Johan had decided the horn wasn’t enough and had added a full fall of white polyester hair in a cascading tail. Abby had swished it with enthusiasm for a day or two before getting tired of it. Twisting the end of one blond strand, she said with a hesitancy that was completely un-Abigail-like, “Somebody said you were leaving.”
