Suze flexes her arms like a weight lifter, showing off some impressive muscles. “This is my third summer serving. I can win nearly every arm wrestling competition in the world at this point.”
Suze shows me her trick for picking up large trays of food. She has me set the tray on a table, bend at the knees, place my shoulder under one side of it, and then slowly stand so that I’m supporting the whole thing. Still, even with this method, I feel exhausted after just a few practice runs in and out of the kitchen, and all I want to do is sit down and rest.
But before Suze lets me have a break, she also lets me in on the wench’s number one moneymaking secret: flirting.
“Toss your hair, bat your eyelashes, laugh loudly at their jokes,” she instructs, and then leans in so she can whisper conspiratorially. “And don’t be afraid to show a little skin. I used to get only a handful of singles at the end of my shift. After I started wearing this corset? Some men just flat out hand me a ten.”
I feel myself blush. The thought is as horrifying as it is intriguing, and as soon as the doors open for lunch, I see it in action.
“Watch and learn,” Suze instructs, and that’s what I do. I shadow Suze for the first hour, learning the routine. She winks at her customers, leans over the table close to talk to them, plays with her hair, and her speech is filled with flirtatious barbs and innuendos.
By the end of my shadowing time, I’m amazed at her. Not because she’s collected so much cash in tips, but because of how at ease she is with it all. Everything comes so naturally—the flirting, the language, the whole Renaissance act—that I almost forget there’s a whole modern world outside. And Suze is just resplendent, dazzling everyone she comes across, including me. She’s pretty in an old-fashioned kind of way, with a strong chin and wide-set eyes and high cheekbones, like she walked straight off an old black-and-white film reel, but her looks are only a small part of her beauty; the rest is all attitude.
I try to mimic her when I’m set free and have a few tables on my own. The heaviness of the food and ale, doled out in Viking-size portions and served in pewter steins, fatigues me even faster than I thought it would. Although I manage to keep it all upright, it’s so tiring that there’s not much room for small talk with the customers, let alone a good round of flirting. Plus, I am really not used to serving in a long skirt and tight bodice. I feel like I might trip, or that at any point the lacing on my dress could snap and my dress could fall off.
It’s busy, too. Suze claimed the lunch rush wouldn’t seem that long, but it feels like a decade. I look over at Suze while I’m dashing to and from the kitchen, and she’s barely broken a sweat, whereas I’m drenched, I have ale all over my billowy sleeves, and I’m almost positive that the white stuff in my hair is mashed potatoes. She also has a wad of bills in her hands from tips, and I’ve got a measly fifteen dollars.
As soon as we have some time to breathe, I tell her I’m in awe of her. She laughs and waves me away. “It’s all in the tight bodice.”
“It’s not. At least I hope not.” I look woefully down at my own chest. “No matter how tight you pull the strings, I don’t think I have a prayer.”
Suze laughs again. “We can’t all be blessed with the inability to see our own feet, I guess. But you’ve got that hair. I’m totally jealous of your hair. It’s perfect.”
I pull a few tendrils out in front of my face to inspect. My hair has always been the bane of my existence. Dark and curly, with a coarseness to it that makes me feel completely unsexy whenever anyone touches it, it’s also thick to the point of being ridiculous. It falls around my head like a lion’s mane, and no matter what I do to tame it, it always disobeys me and goes wild.
“My hair is awful,” I tell Suze. “It’s too big and I think it got in someone’s beer. And worse, their mashed potatoes.”
Suze inspects me with an amused smile. “You really are a mess. Come here. Let me try something.”
She leads me back into the kitchen, which is a flurry of cooks preparing food for hundreds of faire patrons. There’s a small mountain of potatoes on one counter, and deep pans of raw, pink and fatty turkey legs. It seems like everything inside the kitchen is coated with a fine layer of grease. Some of the cooks give us a curious glance, but mostly they’re too busy to bother even looking as Suze leads me to a stool and starts to work some sort of voodoo on my hair. She rolls the sides of it back and then tucks it underneath itself, making it look not only Renaissance-esque, but neat and tidy as well. The best thing? No chance of getting it in mashed potatoes this way.
“Thanks,” I tell her, and she shrugs like it’s no big deal.
“Get out!”
I turn, startled. Ramón is brandishing a potato peeler at us, nostrils flaring, but Suze merely chuckles at him. “We had a hair emergency, Ramón. We’ll go back out in a second.”
“You’ll get hair in the food,” Ramón complains. He crosses his arms over his scrawny chest and gives us a stare that’s meant to be threatening. My ears burn at the scolding and I worry about the impression I’m making. He’s not Jeff, but he’s definitely a boss in a way.
Suze doesn’t seem at all fussed, waving him away. “We’re going, we’re going . . .”
“Yes, now. Before—”
“Before you get angry, I know,” Suze says, and as we walk through the swinging doors and back into the main part of the tavern, she looks back and blows him a kiss. Ramón’s face screws itself up, and I can’t tell if he’s annoyed or completely uncomfortable or both.
“Don’t worry too much about him. Mostly empty threats. And, Ro, I should have mentioned . . . don’t forget the children,” Suze says. We pause to look out over the tavern’s patrons who are, blissfully, all fed and happy at the moment. “Even if you don’t have the flirting down, children and parents are big tippers too. Tell them their baby’s the cutest, don’t make a fuss when the kids make a mess, and be playful with them. Parents love it.”
I smile at her, grateful for more advice. There’s something about Suze that reminds me of Kara. Something in the way she’s really caring without making a big deal about it, like it comes so naturally to her that she doesn’t even realize she’s doing it.
It’s the first time I’ve thought of Kara since this morning, and regret and guilt seep deep into me, fitting alongside my tired muscles.
I finish my shift, exhausted, and although I’m getting the hang of it, I have a long way to go. Especially with the flirting. I probably should start lifting weights so I’m more comfortable with the heavy trays, and maybe do some cardio so I’m used to running around the tavern in long laps, but the flirting is where I need the most work. With Kyle, flirting was always easy. But this fake variety while balancing turkey legs and mugs? Not so much.
“Wenches have to be good flirts, Ro. It’s part of the atmosphere,” Suze says as she walks me to my next shift: face painting. Suze is trying to be gentle, but as my wench mentor, it’s her duty to dish out some criticism. She hesitates before saying, “I’d give you a rating of Fine in serving, but a Fail in flirting.”
“I’m no good at it in real life, either, so that’s no surprise,” I say, and sigh at my ineptitude.
Suze giggles at me and squeezes my arm. “You’re going to be fine, Ro,” she tells me. Then she leaves me outside the face painting tent. I watch her walk away, missing her reassuring presence already.
She thinks I’m going to be fine. I have no idea if she was talking about the flirting or the Renaissance Faire in general. All I can do is hope she’s right.
6
WEEK 1—TUESDAY
The face painting tent, I decide, looks happy. It sits back on a small hill in the kids’ section of King Geoffrey’s Faire. A winding path climbs up the hill to the opening in the front of the tent, and when the kids are done here, there are games, toy shops, and a petting zoo to explore just down the way. I make a vow to go down to the petting zoo soon and make a few furry friends, but for now, this tent is going to be my workplace, a
nd just looking at it makes me smile. Unlike the more adult sections of the faire, everything in this section is brightly colored, and our tent is striped in purple, orange, and yellow, making it look more like something out of a carnival than the 1400s.
The sign over the opening says FACE PAINTING in calligraphy, and a face painted with stars is displayed right next to the G. I duck inside and a girl is sitting there on a wooden chair, looking bored.
“I’m Ro,” I say to her. “I’m the new face painter and server. I guess you and I are going to be trading shifts between here and the tavern?”
She looks at me blankly before reaching into the pocket of her long skirt and withdrawing a tube of lip balm. She applies it generously to her full lips, which seem to be her best feature. Although she’s cute, she’s definitely not up there with Suze looks-wise. And Suze slays her on warmth and friendliness as well. She takes her time, all the while looking me over. As she inspects me, I take note of the brand name on the lip balm tube. It’s good stuff from a great place in the mall; it would have cost me a day’s tips at TK’s.
I wonder if her parents are rich or if she just manages that much in tips from the tavern.
“Cassie,” she says by way of introduction, but doesn’t offer me her hand to shake. Instead she turns, removes what looks to be a photo album from a small wooden stand by the entrance of the tent, and holds it out to me. I take the heavy book in my arms.
“The face painter’s bible,” she says when I look at her in question.
“It’s huge.”
“Uh-huh. Stick to it and you can’t go wrong.”
I glance down again at the big-ass book and decide the name has a certain ring to it. The B.A.B., we can call it, and have a good laugh. I’m about to say so to Cassie, but then I realize she’s already seated herself back at the table and is doing a great job of pretending I’m not there.
I sit down in the unoccupied chair on the other side of a desk that is covered, literally covered, in paints. There are probably more than thirty small, round metal tins of face paints, in colors ranging from neutrals and browns to neons of pink and green. The spaces between have drips of paint, water, or stained cloths where brushes have been wiped. At the end of the table there are jars upon jars of brushes in all sizes and shapes for all of their different purposes. There are jugs of water, too, each painted with a pretty design of flowers or ivy. I briefly wonder if my predecessor had the talent to make the leaves and petals as realistic as they are, or if it’s my current tent partner who painted them.
I glance over at Cassie, who is again slathering her lips in expensive lip balm, and take a wild guess that it was my predecessor.
I sit down at the set of chairs on the other side of the table and begin to look through the B.A.B., but it all seems really basic. Daisies, cat whiskers, hearts, music notes. Even the full face masks are all variants of the same theme: zombie, ghost, ninja.
I close the book and set it aside with a bored sigh. Cassie glances at me, pursing her glossy lips in disapproval, then busies herself with cleaning a brush on a cloth.
I’m about to start taking a mental inventory of the brushes when a little boy who can’t be more than seven rushes in, his mother lagging behind, winded. The boy sits in the empty chair at my station and stares at me.
“Badger,” he proclaims.
“Say please, Aedan. Please, may I have a badger?” his mother intones, and the boy ignores her and says once more to me, “Badger.”
I look over at Cassie, who has taken a decided interest in her fingernails, the hint of a nasty smile on her mouth. She’s clearly going to be no help.
“Okay,” I say to the little boy. “Do you want to look like a badger or do you want a badger on your cheek?”
“Badger.”
Aedan is clearly not going to be any help either.
I look askance at his mother, who only shrugs. “Just make him look like one, I guess.”
All right. Make the kid look like a badger. Which seems easy enough. Only I have no clue what a badger looks like. Aren’t they sort of like raccoons? Or are they more like meerkats?
I give the mother a bright smile and grab the B.A.B., flipping through with frantic hope. Again, all I see are butterflies and whiskers and superhero masks. Nothing at all that looks like what a badger might look like, not that I have any clue.
Desperate, I look once again to Cassie for help, but she’s put her feet up on the empty chair at her station and is doodling in a leather journal. (It’s just doodles, made with a ballpoint pen, but even at a glance I can tell she’s decent, and she might have been the one who painted those flowers on the jars. Darn it.)
“Um, give me just a moment. I think I’ll need some fresh water for this,” I tell the boy and his mother, and then duck out the back of the tent and make sure the flap is tied so they can’t see me pull out my phone. I hold it up like it’s baby Simba in the Lion King, hoping to catch some signal, however faint.
“Staff members are not permitted to use cell phones, Lady Rowena.”
I gasp and whirl around at the booming voice, only to be confronted not with my boss, but with Will. “Don’t scare me like that. Geez. I thought you were Jeff.”
Will chuckles. “Clearly I’m not, and thank goodness for that, but he is on his way. I just saw him leave the tavern with his royal entourage, and he’s making his way around the loop.” Will taps on my phone. “This is one of Jeff’s biggest pet peeves. Instant strike on your record, and just like baseball, you only get three before you’re out of here. Why are you using it, anyway?”
“This kid asked for a badger and I don’t know what a badger looks like.” I tuck my phone back into my pocket, feeling defeated. “Have any clue?”
Will is hopelessly amused by my plight. “Did you actually look at the brochure I gave you today?”
“Not yet. Why?”
Will pulls another one out of his vest pocket and holds it up. There, in the King Geoffrey’s Faire crest, is a wolf, a lion, a dragon, and something that looks like a skunk, though more weaselly.
“Oh,” I say. “That’s what was on Grant’s horse quilt. I see.”
“Yep. Each of the knights has a symbol of the kingdom on their horse.” Will tucks the brochure back inside his vest. He leans close, whispering in my ear. “Leave the phone in your tent tomorrow. Even having one on your person could send Jeff into a conniption.”
I laugh, and when Will leans back to look at me, he adds, “And read the brochure. Jeff’s been known to quiz us on its contents.”
“You’re not kidding, are you?”
Will squeezes his eyes shut. “You have no idea how bad I wish I was. I’ve got to get back to the parking lot. I’ll see you . . .”
I watch him walk away. I have no idea why he was over in this part of the faire when I needed him, but thank goodness he was. I pull the brochure out of my pocket and study the badger. Educated, I slip back inside the tent. The little boy is still there, waiting only somewhat patiently for me. I take a seat across from him, and although I can feel Cassie’s curious eyes on me, I don’t look over at her.
“Okay, a full badger mask coming right up,” I assure the boy, and he grins. His two front teeth are missing.
The face paints are thick like clay, and it takes longer than I would have expected to soften them with my watery brush. But once the paint is on my brush, it’s like the oil paints I’m used to. I start by giving the boy a black nose, filling it all in like a triangle. It’s strange painting on skin. It doesn’t immediately accept color, and I have to paint several strokes to make the color as vibrant as I would with just one stroke on one of my canvases. Added to that, his face is not flat. I don’t have to work to create depth, I only have to work with the depth that’s already there.
I draw stripes up his face, leading from his nose over his eyes, up to the beginning of his hairline. I give him a nice little beard of stripes on his chin, and then I fill the rest in with bright white. When I hold up the mirr
or in front of his face, he yelps in delight. There’s no thank you, despite his mother’s instructions, but she tells me to keep the change out of a twenty, which means that just from one job I’ve almost earned more tips face painting than waiting tables today.
Before he leaves, I take a picture of him grinning his toothless badger smile with a Polaroid camera that I find on the worktable. It’s wrapped in velvet and reads DA VINCI’S WONDER on the side. I pin the Polaroid up on the tent wall next to my station. When I turn around, Cassie is watching, arms crossed.
“Stick to the book. That way you won’t have to bother other workers for help.” Proud of herself, Cassie plops back down in her chair, reapplies her lip gloss, and begins to doodle again.
In spite of myself, I’m embarrassed. She probably heard the whole conversation with Will. Effectively chastised for the second time that day, I sit back down in my chair, take out the B.A.B., and begin to study.
I’m so absorbed in the B.A.B. that when Cassie pulls back the flaps of the tent so that even more sunshine comes in, I’m startled by the sudden brightness.
I lift a hand in front of my face to shield my eyes from the glare. “Where are you going?”
She smiles at me. It’s not exactly a friendly smile, but it’s a smile that means she’s up to no good, and the fact that she’s shared it with me makes me feel like I’m on the inside of something. “The final joust is starting soon.”
“Are we allowed to go?”
Cassie shrugs and that naughty smile deepens. “Business hasn’t exactly been booming.”
That isn’t untrue. Cassie took a customer after my badger left, a teenager who wanted stars on her face, but since then we hadn’t even had a whiff of interest.
“Have you seen the joust?”
“No, but Will explained it a little bit.”
“Ah, Will.” Cassie says his name the way a lot of people say the word “syphilis.” “Well, it’s the final one of the day. The championship.”
“I wonder who made it to this round,” I say, making my voice as neutral and calm as I can manage, even if my heart is beating a shaky rhythm in my chest that sounds a lot like, “Chris-tian, Chris-tian, Chris-tian.”
My Faire Lady Page 6
