The Cirque

by Ryann Kerekes

  “How’s Gertie?”

  The mood felt lighter, the pressure lessened and my shoulders visibly relaxed. “Let’s just say she ate some Mexican food last night that did not agree with her.” I smirked, remembering how the sound of her gurgling stomach had woken me, not to mention the awful smell coming out of her. She had just moaned softly and turned over.

  He smiled and I relaxed a little more. “Where’d you go?” he asked.

  “Taco Willie’s.”

  He made a face and shook his head slowly. “That probably wasn’t a good idea.”

  “You know it?” I asked, forgetting he was from here.

  He nodded.

  “What does she normally eat? You didn’t leave any food. Or instructions.”

  “She just eats whatever I’m having.”

  “You don’t eat,” I pointed out.

  “The cafeteria food was never spicy enough, didn’t taste like anything. Bruce usually hooked me up. He loved that dog.”

  We made small talk for a few minutes. It felt so good to be around him again. I loved that for a few minutes our main problem was discussing bad Mexican food. I couldn’t handle anything more just yet. Seeing him here like this was almost too much. I just needed to feel normal with him, even for the briefest passage of time. He set his hands on the table in front of him and I reached for him, but he pulled them back to his lap.

  “We can’t,” he said quietly and the spell was broken.

  We were in a jail visitation room and nothing would ever be the same again. I pictured myself living here in Clovis just for the chance to visit him a few days a week for a few hours at a time, but knew that wouldn’t be what he would want for me. We were quiet for a few minutes and his face grew serious.

  “Why’d you come here?” He swallowed and waited for my answer.

  I took a deep breath and steadied myself. “I can’t let you go,” I said simply. His blue eyes held mine and communicated so much without saying a word. “I told my parents the truth and my dad helped me get you an attorney.”

  He nodded. “They told me I had a phone call this morning, and I thought it might be you, but it was some guy saying he was my lawyer. I wondered if you had something to do with that.”

  Gabriel said he had a pre-trial hearing in front of the judge in a few days and his lawyer was coming out to New Mexico to represent him. He told me he was being charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

  Wait. Assault? Not murder charges? My heartbeat quickened and I knew my face showed my confusion. “Are you saying…? Is Frank alive?”

  Gabriel sat up straighter in his chair and leaned forward. “Yeah, what did you think?” he whispered. He looked at me curiously.

  “I thought…. I asked Del. It sounded like Frank was no longer…around.”

  “He’s not around. He’s in prison. For the rest of his life, hopefully.”

  “Oh.” So maybe this wasn’t as bad as I feared.

  It was a felony, but because the crime was committed when Gabriel was seventeen and because of the circumstances surrounding it – that he was protecting his younger foster sister – Bill, his lawyer, thought he had a good chance of getting things cleared up quickly with the judge.

  The two hours went by much too fast, and before I knew it the guard was back, holding the door open, waiting for the visitors to file out. The people around us were hugging and kissing one last time, wiping tears away as they walked to the door. Gabriel stood up and moved around to my side of the table.

  I wasn’t sure if he’d kiss me, but I waited, figuring I’d put myself out there enough. I still wasn’t quite sure where we stood. He tilted my chin up and took my mouth with a hungry desire that had been building for the last two hours as we sat across from each other, unable to touch. The kiss made me feel warm and flushed and I knew he needed me as badly as I needed him. I moved my hands up his back but as I started to get lost in the moment, he pulled away. He looked down at me and brushed his thumb across my bottom lip, drying the dampness he’d left there.

  “Don’t forget about me,” he said.

  “Never,” I breathed. And then he was gone.

  ***

  The next day I drove Tanner’s Jeep back to Albuquerque. If I waited any longer, they’d be leaving on the next leg of the tour, and Dallas was eight hours away. There was nothing I could really do for Gabriel from the Mesa Inn anyway, and if I left then, I’d still have enough money for a plane ticket home once Del paid me the rest of what I’d earned. Something about asking my parents for the money would lessen the point I’d be trying to make – about living my own life.

  Gertie and I flew back to New York the following day.

  My dad met me at the airport and drove me to my apartment. “Your mom’s staying at your apartment, and just to warn you, she’s pretty ticked about the ballet.”

  “Great.” I’d figured as much. I buckled my seatbelt and he pulled away from the curb. I leaned my seat back and pressed my fingers to my temples.

  “She’s not mad at you. Well, she’s obviously not happy about being lied to. But she’s mostly mad at the ballet company director. Thinks he made a huge mistake. Which he did.” My father looked at me from the corner of his eye.

  “No Dad, they were right to let me go. I didn’t belong there anymore.”

  “No?” he asked.

  “Nope. I didn’t enjoy it.”

  “Well, then I’m glad you moved on to something else.” He patted my knee. “Next time, tell us what’s going on, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  This was the one thing we had in common – neither of us understood my mother’s obsession with ballet. Yet neither of us had the courage to question her. No one questioned my mother, especially not about ballet since it was the one topic where she was the expert.

  Gertie whined from her kennel in the backseat. I reached back, unlocked it, and picked her up, moving her onto my lap.

  “What’s with the dog?” he asked, looking over at her. I knew she was scruffy and may have looked diseased, with her row of crooked teeth and the snaggletooth poking from her bottom lip, but somehow his question made me a little defensive. I pulled her tighter toward me.

  “She’s Gabriel’s dog. And when he went away, he left her with me.”

  He nodded and kept his eyes on the road. “Can we talk about your friend?” The way he said ‘friend’ made me question if he thought Gabriel was more than a friend or if he thought I shouldn’t be friends with someone with a past like that. It was probably both.

  “Sure. What do you think’s going to happen with his case?”

  “I’m sure Bill can help him. I just want to know what your involvement is with him.” His hands gripped the wheel tighter.

  “He’s a good person, Dad, and he’s important to me.”

  “I’m sure he is,” he said, but his voice wasn’t sincere.

  I told him about Gabriel’s charges and that he was protecting his foster sister. I also told him that Gabriel had helped me deal with an obnoxious guy from the show, but didn’t elaborate on any details. He listened intently while I talked. He nodded and was quiet when I finished.

  “Can I ask you about this divorce thing?” I asked, stealing a quick glance at him.

  “Shoot,” he said back, offering me a small smile. I noticed his hair was turning white at his temples and he looked tired.

  I actually had no idea how this worked and didn’t know what to ask, but thought we should probably talk about it. “How are you feeling about the separation?”

  “It’s hard, but I think it’s the right thing for your mom and me. I’ll always be your dad and I’ll always be there for you.” He attempted a smile.

  “I know, Dad.” I looked out the window for the rest of the trip. I wasn’t used to quite this much sharing with my dad.

  We pulled up next to my building and he helped me with my luggage while I carried Gertie to the fourth floor walk-up. Seeing him and my mom try and make small talk and simultan
eously ignore each other was awkward, but luckily the tension only lasted a few minutes because that’s all it took for my dad to leave.

  Mom stood staring at me in the kitchen and I didn’t know what to say. I set Gertie down and she walked around and sniffed the floors and legs of the furniture and sneezed.

  “Well, should we talk about it?” Mom asked after a few minutes.

  It. Is that what she was calling my breakup with ballet? “I don’t know,” I said carefully. I rummaged around in the fridge and set down a bowl of cottage cheese for Gertie. She came running in from the living room. My mom watched her curiously.

  “Who’s this, that’ll be staying with us girls?”

  “This is Miss Gertrude.”

  At hearing her name, Gertie looked up at us with cottage cheese in her beard and let out a burp, then plunged her head back into the bowl and continued eating. My mom and I smiled together for the first time in a long time.

  Chapter 20

  The next few weeks were tense while I figured out how to live with my mother again, and during that time I constantly worried about Gabriel. Gabriel’s attorney was pressing the judge to dismiss the charges based on the circumstances, but it didn’t bode well that Gabriel had disappeared for two years after the assault.

  My mom didn’t trust Gabriel’s past, but once I told her about him helping Sierra and then me, she agreed to have an open mind. I talked to her about Gabriel nonstop, just to reassure myself that my time with him had been real. It was more than my mother and I had talked about any topic, other than ballet, in years. I told her about his paintings and wished I had some there with me. She was interested and asked lots of questions about his style and what he painted. I did tell her more about him but left out the part about him being a knife-thrower. She didn’t need to know every detail of what I did while I was away.

  I needed something to get me out of the house. I scanned the Internet for dance auditions around the city and quickly learned that everything required a resume and a headshot. Some even asked for YouTube videos, which I did not have. When I told her, my mom was more supportive than I could have hoped. She took me to a photographer and paid to have the headshots done. And I worked on documenting my dancing experience on a resume. It was only then that my mom learned of the contemporary dancing I’d done with Shane at Aerial Mystique. She seemed genuinely proud of me.

  After spending hours looking for an authentic audition at a reputable dance studio, and scrolling past postings for ‘Redheads for music video’ and other similar calls, I found an audition I was really excited about. It was for a small dance theater seeking males and females with experience in ballet and contemporary dance. The only requirement was that applicants be familiar with overhead lifts and have previous performance experience. I sent off my resume and headshots and crossed my fingers. I just couldn’t sit around the apartment anymore petting bald patches into Gertie’s fur and worrying about Gabriel.

  ***

  I went to the Zen Theater for my dance audition after begging my mom to stay home. I was nervous enough and didn’t want an audience. I planned to audition by performing my piece from the dance I did with Shane.

  I wasn’t really prepared for my reintroduction to the New York City theater and dance crowd. The auditions were intimidating – the personalities were bigger, the jumps higher, the dancers more bold. I stood next to a girl dressed like a ninja in black leather pants and dark sunglasses. She had a self-assured sexiness I didn’t even dare dream about. When she finished her audition, she slid down into the splits and puckered her blood red lips to blow a kiss at the casting director.

  Great. I was up. I stepped tentatively onto the stage and avoiding eye contact with the director.

  “Cue music,” he called.

  Once my music started, a familiar sensation possessed my body, taking me over, guiding my moves. I moved across the stage, careful and perfectly in control of every movement. I was precise, neat and graceful. I knew I’d danced it well and when my music stopped suddenly, I finished out my movement and went to center stage. I stood before the director, out of breath, and waited.

  “Good, number twenty-three.”

  I looked down at the number pinned to my stomach. I was number twenty-three. I looked up with what I knew was a goofy grin on my face.

  ***

  I got a call from my dad a few days later. The prosecutor agreed to drop the criminal charges against Gabriel if he underwent anger management classes. He would be on probation for five years, but he was free. Gabriel was to be released that afternoon.

  While he was locked up, I was connected to him through the attorney my dad had arranged who reported news to my dad, but now I didn’t have any way to get in touch with him. He was one of the only people in the world without a cell phone, plus he had no fixed address, no car and no job. I waited by my phone and obsessively checked every few minutes to make sure I hadn’t missed his call. I was hopeful he’d find a way to reach me, but with each day that passed I lost another tiny piece of hope.

  Chapter 21

  I began performing with the Zen Dance Company, dancing alongside two other girls in a slow Tai Chi inspired piece. It was beautiful and moving and each night on stage helped me to heal from the ever-present achy feeling in my chest at the loss of Gabriel.

  Heading home from my Friday night show, I stopped dead in my tracks. Through the window of an art gallery, a familiar sight startled me. It was one of Gabriel’s paintings. I’d recognize it anywhere. It was the one he did when we first met, with the gold and pink angel drifting in a smoky gray sky. I had no idea how it could have gotten here. Was Gabriel in New York? I stood staring, breathing against the window. The art gallery had long since closed, but I had to find out where they’d gotten it.

  An idea struck me and I rummaged through my bag for my phone. I didn’t know or care how late it was where Sasha was touring that night, but surely they’d be done with their evening show by now.

  I waited while the phone rang. Once. Twice. Three times. Crap. Pick up, Sash. “Hello?” I said.

  “Ari!” Sasha shouted. “Quiet, you guys. It’s Ari.” I heard her voice scold the muffled voices in the background. “We’ve missed you! We just had our closing show. Hold on, Tanner’s practically mauling me. Let me put you on speaker.”

  “Ari!” Tanner’s voice cheered through the speaker.

  Tears pricked my eyes. “Hey Tanner.” I smiled at the sound of their familiar voices.

  After getting caught up on the latest gossip, and telling them about my new show, I worked up the courage to ask about Gabriel.

  “He came back and worked a few shows after he was released from jail. He met up with us in New Orleans,” Sasha said.

  “Del took him back?” I asked, surprised.

  “Yeah, well the other big news is that Del finally wised up and fired Dmitri.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah, so Del had no problem taking Gabriel back – in fact, he said you’re both welcome to come back on tour next summer.”

  “Hmm. I don’t know about that. I guess it’s nice to have the option though.”

  “Anyway,” Sasha continued, “Gabriel worked a few shows so he could save up a bit more money then he took off again.”

  My heart jumped. “I just saw one of his paintings at an art studio here in New York.”

  “Then I think you have your answer,” Tanner said.

  I was speechless for a second, trying to recover from the thought that Gabriel might be in New York. “If he’s here, why hasn’t he come for me yet?”

  “Just be patient with him, Ari. He’ll figure it out,” Sasha said.

  “And when he does,” Tanner said, “don’t forget to wear your pinker-than-pink lip gloss!”

  I chuckled. Leave it to Tanner to lighten the mood, and of course Sasha’s advice was probably spot on about not rushing Gabriel.

  “Okay, you guys. Love you.”

  “We love you too!” they shouted in unison.
>
  I clicked the phone off, feeling more hopeful than I probably should.

  ***

  I spent the morning sitting at the coffee shop across the street from my apartment. My mom had moved out this past weekend into her own place, leaving the apartment to Gertie and me.

  I’d decided to work my way through the books Gabriel had read this past summer, starting with Wuthering Heights, the first book I saw him with – only his copy had been missing its cover.

  In the book, Heathcliff and Catherine were inseparable. Heathcliff was troubled and dark, and Catherine was in constant need of his attention. But they were never lovers. There was an unnerving resemblance to my relationship with Gabriel, only our story wasn’t a work of fiction.

  My conversation with Sasha and Tanner had restored some hope that Gabriel would surface when he was ready.

  I closed the book and watched the traffic pass. The leaves rustled by, swirling around my ankles and I sensed a change in the air.

  “Did you like the ending?” I heard a deep voice ask.

  As if in slow motion, I looked up and saw Gabriel standing in front of me. He looked calm and content, with his signature smirk firmly in place. He wore dark jeans and a navy blue sweater that made the soft blue of his eyes stand out. I jumped up, knocking my chair back against the sidewalk. I wanted to throw my arms around his neck, but it had been so long since I’d seen him, I didn’t know how to act. I didn’t want to freak him out.

  I watched him curiously for a second, before realizing he was still looking down at the book and was waiting for my answer.

  “They never got to be together,” I said meeting his eyes. I placed my hand carefully on his chest and felt his heart thumping steadily against my palm, proving that he was really there. “I didn’t know how to find you.”

  “I’m here now,” he said simply. He pulled me to his chest, and his familiar scent washed over me, overwhelming my senses. He held me against him, running his hands along my arms. I rested my head against his chest and listened to his erratic heartbeat that succeeded in drowning out the traffic speeding by. A moment later, he stepped back and let his eyes travel down the length of my body, as if he wanted to soak in the sight of me. I felt hot under his gaze.