by Amy Ephron
Tess realized it was long past one thirty. It was nighttime. And she realized she hadn’t seen a glimpse of the brontosaurus ride since, well, she wasn’t sure since when—since the aerial ballet stint, for sure . . .
The air around them had a distinct chill. It was as crisp and clear as the air in the Swiss Alps. Maybe that was just what nighttime was like in Devon; she reasoned they hadn’t been there long enough to make a complete determination. But there was not a hint of moisture or a sea breeze in the air. Not a trace. There were stars twinkling brightly in the sky, which was midnight blue, and there was a perfect half-moon. Tess couldn’t remember what that meant. If there was a meaning to a half-moon—an old legend or a warning. She couldn’t remember.
All she knew was that she and Max were about to bunk in with Tatiana and Alexei for the night. She wondered what Aunt Evie might be thinking and if she’d called their parents yet.
“You know you can’t leave, don’t you?” said Tara to Tess quietly, as they were trailing behind the others walking up the hill towards the tent. “That if you step outside the gates,” she added, “you won’t be where you think you are. But you already figured that out, didn’t you, Tess?”
Tess nodded.
Tess tried to reassure herself that she was imagining all of this. Like she was so scared, she’d become paranoid or something, and Tara hadn’t just whispered that to her.
Tess tried to pretend it was just a sleepover, that they’d been invited to camp out. It had been Tara’s idea that they bunk in with Alexei and Tatiana. But should she trust Tara? Was something else going to happen in the middle of the night?
Tara had already prepared the tent, turned down the beds, so to speak, so that there was a place for each of them. There were sleeping bags spread out, four of them, silver, soft, a little bouncy as if they were inflated with air, each resting on a bed of pine needles, which Tess was surprised was amazingly comfortable.
Max was fidgeting, though. That was one of the things he did when he got nervous.
“Breathe,” Tess wanted to say to him, but she didn’t want to embarrass him in front of Tatiana and Alexei.
Tess was a little jumpy, too. She tried not to shiver, between the “high” left over from performing the aerial ballet stunt, the frightening encounter with Lorenzo, and the almost other-worldly aspect, well, everything that was so difficult to assess. Where were they? It took all of Tess’s strength to put forth a calm face so that Max wouldn’t be frightened.
Alexei seemed to sense, though, both of their discomforts.
“My dad used to tell us a bedtime story,” Alexei said. “Sometimes I tell it to Tatiana when we’re feeling a little bit alone.” Alexei seemed much older than twelve when he said this. Caring, thoughtful, someone who you could rely on if you needed to.
“What happened to your parents?” asked Tess almost without thinking. She added quickly, “I’m sorry, it might be something you don’t want to talk about.” She realized it might fall into the category of “none of her business.”
“No, it’s all right,” said Alexei. “It is.”
He used that phrase the way their dad might have, It is, as if it was something that had happened and there wasn’t anything to do about it.
“We had a week off,” said Alexei. “I know you think we don’t get those, but we do. Usually only four days. We were camped, curiously, in North Devon. It’s very beautiful there. Most of it’s owned by the National Trust.”
Tess looked puzzled. Max explained. “Like parkland, Tess, in America. Yosemite. Yellowstone. Right?”
Alexei nodded. “And our parents went out for a ride in a carriage. It was nighttime. It started to rain. No one’s sure what happened. But they were crossing a bridge. No one knows if there was lightning, thunder, or the horse got frightened or slipped or bucked in some way that the carriage landed hard and part of the bridge gave way. They found parts of the carriage . . .” His voice wavered now and Tatiana finished the sentence for him. “. . . but never a trace of them or Lizzie, who was my mother’s horse,” she said. Tatiana continued, “The water was cold,” she said. “No way they would have survived it.”
Alexei picked up the story again. “And we stayed here,” he said. He started to go on, but Tatiana shook her head. The two of them exchanged a look, and Alexei added simply, “And, we stayed here and kept up the act.”
“That’s not the way I think of my mother,” said Tatiana, almost interrupting Alexei. “I think of her on the tightrope on pointe, that was always the way she walked on the tightrope, on pointe, doing an arabesque, as if there wasn’t any difference between the air and the ground.”
“And the way I always think of Dad,” said Alexei, “is the first time he let me climb the ladder and clasp the bar and swing. Tara was standing on the ladder below me. I must have been five and Tara pushed me, the way you’d push a kid on a swing, once, twice, maybe it was three times before I had enough speed and motion to let go and tumble through the air and dart straight as an arrow. He was hanging from his knees on a bigger, higher bar, sort of the way we do now, and he caught my hands in his and we went flying through the air together.”
Alexei was silent for a moment after that, even the night air was still, the stars above sparkling before he went on.
“But on nights like tonight,” he said, trying to sound cheerful, “when we’re all a little out of sorts, I always tell Tatiana the story that my father used to tell us. Could I tell it to you now?” he asked Tess and Max.
“I’d like to hear the story,” said Tess. “Max?” she asked.
“Sure,” he said, trying to sound a bit like a tough guy as he usually thought he was too old for bedtime stories, but this actually sounded like it might be reassuring.
“Okay, then,” said Alexei.
“It’s a story about a little girl named Anoushka who could touch the sky. That was my dad’s pet name for our sister, Anna—Anoushka,” he explained.
Tess looked over at Tara, who was sitting a little bit away from them, quietly keeping watch.
Tara was wearing a white shirt that had odd sleeves, largely constructed so they were quite big around her arms, boxy, flowy, almost like they were Japanese.
Tess watched as Tara folded her hands over her head and somehow draped herself in her shirt. She was sitting on the ground, and, like she was doing yoga or something, put her head down on her knees. The way she’d folded her arms, somewhat akimbo, as if she was a dancer draped in the white shirt, made her look, in the crazy night light dusted by the moon, like a white dove with her arms sort of fluttering like wings. She looked so much like a white dove, as if she’d morphed into a white dove, that Tess wondered if she was imagining it. Tara stayed in that position, arms (or wings) fluttering, as Alexei told the bedtime story softly to Tess and Max.
“Once upon a time,” Alexei said, “there was a little girl named Anoushka who thought she could touch the sky . . . It wasn’t her fault. From the time she was a very little girl her father used to toss her up in the air and catch her, which occasionally made her mother quite nervous, but he was an acrobat and he never tossed her up that high. He also taught her to do somersaults and handstands and cartwheels. Her mother was an acrobat, too, and her mom couldn’t help it, she sometimes got the urge to play, too. She taught Anoushka how to dance on a balance beam and sometimes she even let Anoushka’s dad toss her up in the air and encourage her to do an in-the-air somersault. Not an easy thing to do, but it turned out Anoushka was very good at it. One day, he threw her up so high that the daylight darkened and she was surrounded by sparkling stars and Anoushka thought she’d actually touched the sky . . .”
That was about all Tess and Max heard, as they were so tired and Alexei’s gentle voice was so melodic as he told the story, both of them shut their eyes and fell asleep. And before they knew it, it was morning.
~ CHAPTER NINETEEN ~
breakfast, carnival-style
There was the smell of fish smoking on the grill.
Tatiana whispered, “We only get a half an hour for breakfast, so we have to hurry. I bet you’re hungry.”
Tess was. She couldn’t remember what she’d eaten yesterday, other than candyfloss.
“What if we just started walking,” said Max under his breath, “and made straight for the gate?”
“Definitely not a good idea,” said Tatiana, who immediately took Max’s arm. She nodded her head in the direction of one of the tables. Lorenzo was sitting alone watching them. Eyes glued, focused directly on them. He was drinking an espresso from a tiny cup and eating a crunchy cookie called a biscotti.
Max had to admit, attempting an escape while Lorenzo was watching was probably a bad idea.
They took their places in the breakfast line. Each of them picked up a plate and a striped-cloth napkin that looked more like a kitchen towel. The silverware looked like it could use a polish.
“I have to tell you something,” Max whispered. “It’s sort of odd.”
But Lorenzo was looking at them, so Tess whispered back, “You’d better tell me later.” Out loud she said, “I’m so glad you slept well,” as if that had been the intended subject of their conversation, just in case anyone was listening.
The breakfast line was crowded. Everyone was still not quite dressed up for the carnival. The clown was there. He was wearing overalls instead of a clown suit, but he already had his wig on and white-colored paint on his face.
“Don’t worry,” he said to Tess, “I never play with balloons until after breakfast.” He gave her an impish smile and pulled a white rose out from behind her ear. “Flowers are different,” the clown said as he handed it to her. It seemed like he was trying to cheer her up.
The tattooed lady was standing in line right in front of them wearing leggings and a sleeveless T-shirt. She had a tattoo on her right biceps with a picture of a sailing ship with a ripple of water below it and right beneath that on her forearm, a mermaid. It was pretty cool. An eagle on her back with its wings spread out across each of her shoulder blades as if she and the eagle could take off at a moment’s notice. She looked at Tess and did a funny dance. And Tess couldn’t help it, she felt obliged to return the favor and do a tiny little wiggle, too.
Ben was wearing a white chef’s cap. He asked them each to point out exactly which fish they wanted and piled their plates with smoky trout, grilled onions, and baked crispy potatoes that were a little bit burned as he had cooked them right on the coals.
Tess and Max stayed close to Tatiana and Alexei. Tess was struck by the fact that the four of them seemed to be the only children there. Not that they were little children themselves but nonetheless, everyone else seemed to be grown-up.
Alexei led them to a table of their own. Tess ran back to the buffet table and got an extra glass. She poured some water into it. She placed it in the middle of the table and placed the rose in it. Her mom would appreciate that—that she’d made the effort to make it seem as if everything was normal. There was something normal about a rose in a makeshift vase in the center of the table.
She looked around at the other carnival workers. There was some serious eating going on. Tess wondered how long the workday was for them. What time did the carnival open? What time did it close? And where, if anywhere, was there an escape route? She even considered the possibility of tunneling, but that would probably take days of planning, and for all she knew the carnival might pick up stakes and move again before they’d even finished digging the tunnel. Note to self: abandon the idea of tunneling.
Tess looked up to see Tara standing with a metal plate stacked with griddle cakes and a bowl of, well, she called it, fresh sage honey.
“I made it this morning,” said Tara, implying that she had somehow interacted with a bee-hive, which Tess didn’t doubt for a minute. If anyone could tame bees, it might be Tara.
Tess wondered if secretly Tara knew a way to get them home. Or could give her more of a clue of what had to happen before they could go home. But before Tess could ask the question, there was a giant clunk on the table as Lorenzo set his very small coffee cup down with way more force than was needed, causing all the plates and glasses to rattle up and down.
“Your favorite,” Tara said to Lorenzo without missing a beat. “Polenta griddle cakes.” She placed a small stack on a plate for him.
“Italian cornmeal,” said Max.
“What?” said Tess.
“Polenta. Remember. Franny makes polenta with greens and she says it’s Italian, so maybe we are in . . .” He stopped as he realized Lorenzo was sitting at the table listening to every word.
“Are where?” asked Tatiana, not understanding why Max had stopped.
“At breakfast,” said Tess, brilliantly trying to cover up for him. “My mom’s friend Franny makes polenta sometimes for breakfast. But we’ve never tried it with honey. In fact, I don’t think we’ve ever had homemade honey, at all,” said Tess. “Have we, Max?”
“No,” said Max. “I never have. This is,” he said, giving Tara a very charming smile, the kind he was known for, “very delicious.”
After breakfast, when they were walking alone, Tess said to Max, “What did you want to tell me?”
Max looked around to see if anyone else could hear, but they seemed safe at the moment. “When I got up,” he said, whispering, “I took a little walk around. I didn’t try to go outside of the carnival. I just walked around a bit. Up the hill, I wanted to see if I could see anything . . .”
“And?”
“The pine trees aren’t real.”
“What do you mean?” asked Tess.
“Well, I don’t mean they’re not real. They’re not planted. They have,” he hesitated because this really didn’t make any sense, “they have stands on them like Christmas trees. And there are kind of sheets around them. They aren’t planted in the ground.”
“Maybe they’re props,” said Tess, trying to be the practical one here. “Maybe they’re for a show that we don’t know about.”
“Maybe,” said Max, as if that might make sense. “I just thought it was weird.”
“On a scale of one to ten?” asked Tess.
“Okay,” said Max, who had to admit this was funny, “on a scale of one to ten, given everything we’ve been through, I guess you’re probably right. It’s a three.”
“Hopefully the rest of the day might stay that way,” said Tess. But even as she said it, she knew that wasn’t going to be the case.
As if on cue, Lorenzo appeared out of nowhere and said to Max, “You ready, kid? You’re on.” And with a nod of his head, directed Max to follow him.
~ CHAPTER TWENTY ~
the house of mirrors
You got it, Shorty? Y’just stand here,” said Lorenzo.
They were right outside The House of Mirrors, and Lorenzo was again showing Max his spot. “Remember what I told you yesterday,” said Lorenzo. “And make sure, if it’s a group, they go in together. If someone’s in line by themselves, you send a couple folks right in after them. People get a lot less scared when they’re not alone.”
Lorenzo had directed Max to follow him right after breakfast and stationed him at the entrance to The House of Mirrors. Max still wondered what would happen if he made for the front gate. Just took off on a sprint. Was this one of those times when it would be better for Tess if he tried to escape without her and went to get help? They obviously needed some help. The only thing he was frightened about was what might be outside the gates. Where were they? Was there an outside? That probably seemed silly, but Max had been through something like this before.
He kept turning the events over in his mind, and the only thing he could come up with was that the carnival had run away with them. And he couldn’t lose the thought that it was sort of his fault. If only he
hadn’t played with the levers and the pulleys and that thing that looked like a steering wheel.
Max figured he might make it to the gate. But the thing he was worried about was, if he made it outside, would he be able to find his way back in again?
Lorenzo was talking to him, a blue streak, and leading him through The House of Mirrors. He was showing Max the secret escape exit.
Halfway into The House of Mirrors, make a right, then a left at the next pane of glass, then a right, almost as if you were going in a circle. And . . . there was a blank pane. No one would ever notice it. A blank pane, that led straight out into the carnival again.
Max realized he was uniquely suited for this job. He was very good at math. He had counted the steps they’d taken on the first pathway through the mirror, 14 steps, then the right turn; 12 steps, then the left turn; 10 steps, and then a right again, 8 steps. 44 steps in all.
He made up a memory trick: double fours.
That was how he was going to remember 44.
14, 12, 10, 8; 14, 12, 10, 8. Max repeated the number of steps over in his mind. And he realized there was a second memory trick, deduct 2 from each: 14, 12, 10, 8.
He was wearing the carnival uniform again, drab gray, almost the color of an elephant’s skin. It was a jumpsuit that had old-fashioned tortoiseshell buttons. Max figured they were really made out of plastic, not tortoiseshell. As to how he had come to be wearing the uniform, as he didn’t remember putting it on in the morning . . . ? He distinctly remembered putting on his jeans, which had been by his sleeping bag in the morning. But now he wasn’t sure of that, either. He was definitely wearing the carnival uniform now. He figured if he asked Tara how he came to be wearing it, she probably would have answered, “Carnival Magic.” And frankly, he couldn’t come up with a better explanation.
~ CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE ~
sky dancing