by J. J. Howard
“Teach what? I mean, who would I be teaching?”
“We’ve got circus school,” Jamie told me. He’d been hovering.
“I thought you said you didn’t go to school.”
He shook his head, and I saw Louie shoot him some sort of look. “I didn’t grow up on this show,” Jamie said. “Louie woulda made me go to school. All the kids here go. There aren’t that many. Maybe six?”
“Eight when they all show up,” Louie said. “Jamie will show you where. You can do this?”
I felt myself nodding. “I can try. I mean, as long as you know I’m still technically a student myself.”
“Better than nothing,” Louie said, and turned heel and walked away.
“And with that stunning endorsement,” I said, then looked at Jamie. “What’s bothering you?” I asked him. He was looking up at the tent, and he looked confused.
“Nothing.” He turned and motioned for me to follow him — presumably taking me to my new gig at circus school. He shook his head. “I just thought it was named after Europe,” I heard him say, and I stifled a giggle as I followed him down the midway.
Circus school turned out to be in a nice trailer, smaller than the one the crew slept in, but bigger than the ones the performers slept in. Along the walls were low bookshelves, a couple of computers, and a little refrigerator. There was even a shelf of toys and a very small plastic shelf of games. There were six kids inside. The smallest looked like a first or second grader, maybe. He was sitting on the floor playing with some space-robot-type action figures. The oldest was sitting curled up in a chair, reading. She was definitely close to my age, and I’d seen her before. In fact, I’d just seen her about a half hour before, only then she’d been in a black leotard, flying through the air. It was Louie’s other daughter, Eliska. Her hair was still in a bun, and she wore heavy stage makeup, but she was dressed in jeans and a hoodie now.
Jamie seemed to have been right about the sisters; Eliska shot me a look that made Lina’s regard seem almost friendly.
Jamie had brought me to the trailer, and he addressed the older woman sitting on the floor surrounded by the three younger kids. “Maggie, Louie sent Lexi here to fill in for today. Sounds like the new teacher’s gonna be here in the next couple days.” He turned back to me and said, “Maggie’s been filling in since we left Georgia.”
“Hi,” I said, wondering silently why Maggie didn’t just keep filling in. She was obviously at least out of school, unlike me.
Maggie smiled, revealing some missing teeth. “Hi yourself. I’ll be glad to get back to me lads,” she added. She wasted no time in patting the little ones on their heads and hightailing it out of the trailer. I didn’t even have time to ask who or what the lads were.
Jamie looked a bit uncomfortable. “Okay, so you’re fine here? Eliska can tell you where everybody left off. See you later.”
Awesome. Eliska had gone back to her book. I decided at that point I didn’t have anything to lose. My community service of choice back at Sheldon had always been reading to the kids at the library near my apartment, so I figured that was a safe start.
“Hey, everybody,” I said to the kids on the floor. A boy and girl who both looked about fourteen sat apart, each at a computer playing solitaire. I figured I had better get the munchkins squared away first, and then maybe tackle the older ones. “Anybody ever play the Animal Name Game?” I always used that at the library — little kids like animals, and they like to tell you their names.
One little boy immediately started yelling “Jimmy Jaguar! Jimmy Jaguar!” at the top of his lungs.
“I guess that’s one yes.” I smiled at him. “Okay, so you’re all set,” I said to Jimmy. “And I’m Lexi. What animal should I be?” I asked them.
“Lion!” a little girl with red hair yelled. The boy over at the computer said, “Lemur.”
“I could be a liger,” I said to be diplomatic. “A mix of a lion and a tiger.”
“Cool!” said Jimmy Jaguar. We went around the circle and hashed out choices. The little red-haired boy was named Connor, but he wanted to be a dinosaur, and none of us could think of any dinosaurs whose names started with a C. I finally just let him be Connor Tyrannosaurus Rex just to make him happy.
Eliska kept her nose in her book, but the computer twins both politely picked animals to go with their names. I asked them where to find some books — Connor T-Rex was starting to make siren noises, so I figured I’d better hurry. We found some picture books, and I breathed a sigh of relief when I found one I knew: The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales. I read it to them, using funny voices for different characters in the story. I made Chicken Licken have a Cockney accent, and this particularly tickled Jimmy. And once one kid that age starts laughing, the rest pretty much join in. Then when we were done reading, I had them help me find paper and markers, and I told them to draw their favorite character from the stories. Connor drew me as a pink Stegosaurus with long brown hair.
Once they were all happily coloring, I faced the only real lion in the room, Eliska, in her den. “So Jamie said you could tell me where you left off?” I asked her. I kept my voice neutral, like she could answer me or not, I didn’t care.
“How old are you?” she asked me instead.
“Seventeen. I’m a senior.”
“Me as well. I am a senior. Why would Louie send you to teach me?” Her tone was not neutral. It was snotty.
I just looked at her, biting back words. I wanted to tell her, Yeah, you’re a senior in this trailer, and I have one semester to go at one of the top prep schools in Manhattan. (For once I forgot how I hated the whole prep-school superiority thing.) And I also really wanted to point out that if she was so educated, she could have been helping the younger ones, instead of sitting in the corner like a waste. But I didn’t say either of those things. Thank God. Instead, I decided to ignore her. I turned to Annabelle and John, the two older kids by the computers. “Is there something you guys were working on that I could maybe help you with?” I asked them.
John didn’t seem inclined to do much except play on the computer, but he and Annabelle were both more polite than Eliska — not that it would take much — and they got up and led me to the bookshelves.
“With our old teacher we mostly did these math packets,” Annabelle said, holding up an outdated-looking workbook. “But I don’t really want to work on those.”
“Ew, I don’t blame you,” I told her. “I don’t really understand math, either. I guess we could pick out a book to read,” I told them, stalling. Other than reading to kids like I had done at the library, I had zero ideas.
“I liked those funny voices,” John said, almost shyly. “I mean, when you read before.”
“Thanks,” I said, surprised. “I like doing different kinds of accents. My friend El — well, my old best friend back home and I used to pick an accent and talk in it for the rest of the day.”
“I bet that’s funny,” Annabelle said.
I answered in my fake French accent, “Eet eez, Annabelle, eet totally eez,” and she giggled.
I spotted a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird on the shelf and went over to grab it. “Either of you guys ever read this?”
They both shook their heads no. I saw Eliska watching me over the edge of her AP Lit exam review book, but I tried to ignore her. “Well, you have to — read it, I mean. It’s just one of those books that everybody needs to read someday. Want me to read a little to you? I mean, we have to do something, right?”
John looked kind of doubtful. I wondered how many days he’d already spent doing nothing in this trailer.
“I could do an accent …” Once I’d talked like Scout for an entire twenty-four hours. Gavin had had to —
I stopped myself from remembering and concentrated on the kids. I opened the book and started reading, figuring they could listen or not.
“When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow,” I started in my best Alabama twa
ng.
They both listened as I read the first three chapters, and then Maggie came back to take them all to lunch.
Eliska didn’t follow the others, so it was just the two of us sitting there in awkward silence. For some reason, it seemed important to me not to be the first one to leave, so I started tidying up the books. Then I started alphabetizing them. Finally, Eliska closed her book, stood up, looked at me, and said, “You’re better than the last teacher we had.” She didn’t wait for a response, just turned and walked out of the trailer.
After school, I went back to my compartment in the trailer. My bag was sitting on the bunk, waiting for me. I sat down beside it and rooted around until I found the tarot deck I’d brought with me. I pulled out the cards, shuffled the deck, closed my eyes, and chose one card. I wasn’t even sure of the question I was asking — I guess I just wanted to know if everything was going to work out all right. I flipped over the Tower: catastrophe, turmoil, and upheaval. I jammed the card back into the pile and shoved them all back in the box. Then I pushed the bag to the end of the compartment and curled up to try to take a nap. It seemed like only seconds had passed before Heather appeared beside me.
It was time for my second job of the day: cashier girl at the novelties wagon.
Heather led me to the “wagon” in question: a rectangle-shaped trailer painted to look like an old-fashioned train caboose. A big flap on one side was open so that customers could see inside. The pegboard on the walls was covered with neat rows of little stuffed lions, tigers, and elephants, premade bags of cotton candy, and streamers with Circus Europa written in white on red ribbon attached to little sticks. The wooden counter held a small cash register, a stack of souvenir programs, and a whole bunch of glow-stick novelties in clear plastic bins.
Heather spent about a minute showing me where everything was and how to work the register. Then she was gone, and before I knew it, I was peering down at an adorable little boy who was pointing excitedly up at the lions.
“How much are the lions?” his dad asked me. It was a good question. I rummaged around the little trailer until for some reason I lifted up the register, and I breathed a sigh of relief to see a price list there.
“Four fifty,” I told him. The dad paid, and I watched the little boy do a happy dance when he grabbed his lion.
From the opening in the wagon, I could see the entrance to the ring for the main show. I could also smell things getting started: popcorn, candy apples — there was even a meat-on-a-stick place that made my belly rumble. I realized I’d missed lunch and was about to work through dinner, and sighed. I was just beginning to eye the cotton candy, which I don’t even like, when Jamie showed up with a hot dog and a Coke.
“You’re not a vegetarian, are you?” he asked with a grin.
I didn’t remind him that he’d watched me eat bacon at breakfast. “Nope. And this is the best thing anyone’s ever brought me. Literally. I was dying of starvation.” I bit into the hot dog, accidentally making a loud mmm noise, and I heard Jamie laugh. It was even better than an NYC vendor dog.
“Guess it was a good call,” Jamie said as he watched me polish off the dog. “Hey, if they didn’t tell you, this wagon’s only open before and after both shows. If you wanna come ride the Hurricane later, you can. I’ll let you jump the line.”
With that he was gone. I could almost hear the thump of the giant Hurricane speakers, all the way at the end of the midway. It was something top forty, a song I almost knew. And then the ring got quiet for a second, and I recognized it. It was the same song I’d heard my last night in New York, standing on the street and wondering where I would go. God, had that been less than a week ago? I’d had four jobs in the last two days alone. But at least I had a place to sleep, food to eat, and people who knew my name. Maybe it was a start.
Seward Park — Sunday, May 23
This book I’m reading is really making me mad.
I’d reread all the Jane Austen novels for about the fortieth time, and the nice little old lady who owns the used bookstore on Leonard Street — she’s the one to blame for selling me all those Austen paperbacks in the first place — recommended these Regency books to me. There are just millions of them, all really short, and all romances set around the same time as old Jane. They’re awful. I just can’t stop reading them.
This one is particularly heinous. Theodora — that’s the heroine’s name — is just so tiny and beautiful that everyone is so in love with her. Her father, she has him wrapped around her little finger, and she’s supposed to marry Captain Randall, and he’s off at war, but in the meantime his cousin Lord Tilson is there for some reason (he doesn’t seem to have anything better to do), hovering around, and because she’s so freaking tiny and beautiful, he’s just after her. He wants little Theo for himself. And they go out driving in the park, and Tilson is all over it, his big chance. He always finds a way to touch her — on the knee, under the table; when they dance, he dances too close. (The waltz!) And poor Theo just can’t stand it. She’s promised to marry the captain, but Tilson just keeps finding opportunities to lay his hands on her. Even though it’s totally forbidden.
So that’s what’s making me mad. Little Theo lives in a repressed society, and this dude just can’t stop touching her, and everyone else is always hugging her, dancing with her …
Meanwhile, I live in modern-day New York, downtown, no less, and it’s like I’m a bubble girl. No one holds my hand. The only dancing I ever do is at Crash, and it’s to eighties alternative music — all by myself. I guess I take after my dad — Gavin’s not really a touchy kind of guy, either. Eli never used to be, until Bailey came along. Now he’s a regular old Lord Tilson — with her.
I was actually waiting for the happy couple in the park, and I was trying to read slowly because I only had about forty-five more pages. Since Eli and Bailey are always late now, I was going to be down to people-watching when the pages ran out. I had a hunch that things were going to work out pretty good for Theo. I wished I had as much confidence in my own romantic future. If you didn’t count Morgan Logenstern, and I didn’t want to, I was in the middle of a pretty impressive dating dry spell, reaching all the way back to a three-date relationship with Robert Marston during sophomore year. I blamed my dad — he had to send me to Sheldon Prep. The guys there — well, I’d actually rather blame them. The alternative is that there’s something fundamentally wrong with me.
“Xandra!” Bailey’s voice carried across the park, and I looked up from page 204, where I’d been stalled for the past ten minutes, to see her bounding toward me, Eli trailing behind.
“Are you reading romance novels again?” I didn’t like the way Bailey said romance, kind of taunting, and judge-y.
“I have to get my thrills somehow,” I told her in my driest voice.
Bailey grabbed the book out of my hands and read the title on the cover. “The Forbidden Duke! Oh man, Eli, come here, you have to see this.”
I snatched the book out of her hands. “Shut up, Bailey.” I put the book in my bag.
“Yeah, shut up, Bailey,” Eli said, smiling at me. I’d have been grateful for the rescue except I’m pretty sure he’d just missed the entire exchange. “Breakfast?” he asked me.
“You paying?” I asked, illustrating my poverty by pulling the pockets of my jeans inside out and revealing only three bucks and change.
“I gotcha, X,” Bailey answered. She had appropriated Eli’s nickname for me. Bailey appropriated a lot of things.
“Thanks.” I got up and started walking out of the park. I figured Bailey’s offer to help subsidize breakfast was an olive branch for the book thing, and I was grateful. I really was pretty cashless, and unlike just about every other kid I knew, I didn’t have a debit or a credit card. I knew I’d be spending most of Sunday selling off some of my CDs on Amazon.
“Wait, X.” Eli’s voice stopped me. “We’re going to that diner over on Pike.”
“But we always go to Mike’s.” I stopped walking.
“Bailey says their egg white omelets taste like butt.” Eli smiled down at her, pulling her against his side.
“This is what we get for hanging out with people who actually eat egg white omelets,” I growled, but rolled my eyes dramatically and smiled to soften the words.
“I know. Bails, before you came along, we were strictly a waffle crowd.”
“Some of us are still part of the waffle crowd. I figure I have a good ten years until I have to worry about cholesterol.”
Bailey reached out her free hand, the one Eli didn’t have, and pulled me closer to them. “Cheer up, X. They’ll have plenty of cholesterol at the Pike place, I promise. So, anyway, I got tickets …”
My ears perked up. Tickets? Bailey’s dad did something bank-related — I guess that’s why they lived downtown when the family seemed kind of uptown to me. But somehow music was involved.
“Iron & Wine?” she said. “I think I’ve heard you talk about them.”
“Him. And yeah, I have. Ticket for me? Pretty please?”
“Ticket for you.” Bailey laughed and turned to Eli. “She really gets crazy about music. Such a chip off the old Gavin block.”
Eli nodded and raised an eyebrow. “You have no idea. We almost got arrested once for trying to sneak backstage to see the Trashcan Sinatras.”
“The Trashcan Whos?” Bailey asked.
“Obscure early nineties Irish band. Pretty decent live. Xandra over here just had to get an autograph. Those boys just wanted to get out of there and back on the road. They were pretty rude, actually.”
I nodded sadly. “I can’t listen to their music the same anymore. It’s like a tragedy.”
“So we are on for next weekend?” Bailey asked.
“Sure!”
I had cause to regret my enthusiasm a couple of minutes later when we got to the diner. Turns out the tickets were just to soften the blow. Bailey announced at breakfast that she was going to the Hamptons for all of June and most of July to stay at her parents’ house there. And Eli was going with her.