Strangely enough, only Venus de Milo seemed to have taken any care with her act. It was simple enough: she styled her hair, painted her lips, all while describing how lonely it was to be a girl like her. But every time Webern had come through the tent, he’d seen little changes, a new double entendre or a shade of toenail polish she’d never worn before. And, in the end, she played the ukulele, her toes deftly plucking strings while her Brooklyn accent raised in the plaintive melody.
“Drop a nickel in, gimme a whirl. Turn my crank, I’m your kinda girl. You wanna catch my number, again and again. I’m your nickelodeon.” She sounded like Betty Boop, but at least she was trying.
Once, the prospect of doing the same routine day in and day out would have depressed Webern beyond all reckoning. But that evening, as he walked home from the Parliament with Frank’s smile still lingering in his mind, it comforted him that so little was expected. He climbed the stairs to his boxcar and stepped inside. Marzipan glanced at him from where she lay on the couch, then turned her eyes back toward the wall. Webern swung open the lid of his trunk and dug through the wigs and tights until he reached the very bottom. He pulled out his pair of green frogman flippers, kicked off his shoes, and stepped into them. They were old and faded, with a crack along one toe, but they fit him like his own skin. They would have to do for now.
In the mornings, while Fat Rhonda served donut holes on her Christmas plate and the Missing Link—really a kid named Nevis from Tucson, Arizona—brewed coffee in the back of the Parliament tent, the clown who had once been called Bump Chuckles assumed his post as Frog Boy.
The freaks shared their beds as freely as their gin, creating an elaborate and ever-changing network of flirtation and dislike, and they constantly loaned money, argued, and gossiped through the thin swatches of canvas that separated them. But, as he had with the other clowns, Webern held himself apart. Just before they opened, he arrived, dressed in green tights, his flippers, and a white T-shirt. He wasted little time setting up. He spread his lilypad—really just a green tarp—and fitted his lamp with a special green light bulb, just like the ones Nepenthe used to bask under at Dr. Show’s circus. Then he stripped to the waist, wadded his T-shirt into a ball, and tossed it to a corner of the stage. In this place, his hump was more performer than he was. It was what people paid to see.
Sometimes, as he sat under the green light, Webern had the feeling he had arrived, a little too late, in the swamp where Nepenthe had been dwelling all these years. He closed his eyes, and marsh gases exploded in the distance, burning their blue fires, while close by cicadas shrilled. He imagined leaping off his lilypad deep into warm, brackish water and opening his eyes to find a trace of her: a single scale, shimmering grey-white in the muck like a sunken treasure. There was so much about her he had never understood.
A hundred times a day, Webern heard Venus perform her ukulele song. “Peek beneath the curtain, get a surprise. I’ll sing a lullaby to pull you inside. Grab the brass ring, I’ll give you a thrill. I’m your nickelodeon.” When he listened closely, the melancholy in her voice surprised him. It comforted him, too. It made him feel less alone. “Are you listenin’? I’m ringing your bell.” As he swam through the murky swamp, her song became his underwater jukebox, a sign he was not the first person to visit these depths.
One evening, after work, she came over to his stage. He was rolling up the dusty lilypad, but when he saw her he stopped and pulled on his T-shirt before speaking.
“Hey.”
“This was her booth, y’know,” Venus said. She snapped her gum.
Webern nodded slowly. “I know.”
“Stop moping around, you cretin.” She pronounced it “Cretian.” “You’re not the only one she left. She didn’t even say good-bye to me. Miss Hoity-Toity. Like she thought I didn’t know. See you in the morning, she says. Where? I says back. The goddamn beauty salon? Some of us still have jobs, y’know. Well, she laughed at that. I knew I wouldn’t be seeing her again, not around here, anyways.”
She stared at Webern, as though she had just delivered her argument in full and it was up to him to rebut it. Despite the warmth of the night air, she had on a white bunny fur jacket with the sleeves tucked into the pockets. If he hadn’t known better, Webern would have thought she had arms in them.
“I did take her to the bus station,” he finally admitted.
“Yeah. Figures.” Venus jerked her head toward the egress. “Wanna get a bite?”
“What?”
“Get-a-bite. Or have you stopped eating too, ya chump? Christ.” She shook her head disapprovingly. “I always told her you were the sensitive type.”
Venus and Webern walked out of the Parliament together, out onto the midway.
“Tonight’s on me,” Venus told him. “My sweetie runs a corndog stand.”
“What happened to Zeus?”
“That creep?” Venus glanced at a stand selling monogrammed Peter Pan hats. The green lights reflected in her rhinestone glasses. “He went the way of all flesh. All flesh except mine, seems like. So I called it quits.”
“Oh.” An old lady and her grandson stood at the shooting game, firing plastic rifles at gophers with glowing eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. You know what your problem is? You’re a romantic. Love’s a nice thing, but when it’s gone, it’s gone. You stay stuck on somebody forever, that’s how you go crazy.” They arrived at the corndog stand, and Venus sashayed up to the counter. “Hi there, Charlie.”
Behind the counter stood a guy in a tank top and jeans sawed off at the knees. His crew cut sparkled with sweat.
“What’ll it be, toots?” He crossed his arms over his chest.
“C’mon, Charlie.” Venus wiggled. “You know how I like it.”
With a sigh, the man yanked a sizzling corndog from the deep fryer and squirted a thick line of mustard down the middle. He held it out. Venus licked her lips and lowered her head. Slowly, the entire corn dog disappeared into her mouth. When she tilted her head back, it was gone, leaving only the wooden stick behind. Webern wondered if she had a gag reflex. Her eyes closed invitingly as she chewed.
“Make it a double.” She tilted her head at Webern. “For my friend here.”
Charlie squinted at Webern, then back at Venus disbelievingly. “That little guy?”
“Yeah.”
Slowly, Charlie drew another corn dog out of the fryer and, with a pained expression, held it out to Webern. Venus grinned slyly. Webern snatched the corndog out of his hand and took a giant step back. Charlie looked relieved.
“Nice to meet you,” Webern muttered.
“See ya later, cutie,” Venus told Charlie.
Webern ate his corndog as he and Venus continued down the midway. When he finished it, he was still hungry. It occurred to him that he hadn’t eaten anything else all day, maybe not the night before either.
“You’re a big talker tonight,” Venus observed. “What happened, dog burn your tongue?”
“No, it was good. Really.” Webern tossed the wooden stick in a garbage can. “Thanks.”
“Forget about it. I like having company for a change.” They passed a booth where a man arm-wrestled anyone who paid a dollar. Venus flashed him a smile.
“Where’d you learn to play the ukulele?” Webern asked.
Venus shrugged. “My dad, he loved music. Roy Smeck, Cliff Edwards, all those guys. He thought a girl like me should have a skill. Made me practice an hour a day. My girlfriends all thought it was a riot, but I kinda liked it. Old-timey, y’know?” They reached a tent with carved ostrich eggs on display, and Venus turned the corner, off the main drag of the midway. “Don’t mind walking a girl home, do ya?”
The sounds of laughter, piped-in music, and buzzing, whirring games faded as the two of them walked toward the train car Venus shared with the albino girl and two trapeze artists. When they reached her door, sh
e stopped. A warm breeze ruffled her bunny fur jacket.
“Y’know, my roomies are out tonight. Went to some roller rink in town. Want to come in for a minute?”
Webern hesitated. “I should go home. I haven’t fed Marzipan.”
“Suit yourself.” She slipped off her shoes and stepped towards him. The sole of one bare foot touched his waist. It struck Webern that for Venus, a hug was wrapping her legs around someone. Her lips brushed against his cheek as she whispered in his ear. “I’ve always liked you, shortcake. You’re a gent.”
Webern closed his eyes. It felt good to have someone else touching him; probably no woman in her right mind would come this near him again. Barely anyone had even spoken to him the last couple of weeks. His hand sank into the white fur of Venus’s jacket, between the shoulder blades. What difference did it make now, anyway?
Inside Venus’s boxcar, two sets of bunk beds stood side by side with a narrow aisle between them. Brassieres, leotards, and stiff tulle skirts dangled from the upper beds, and the air had a ripe sweetness—shampoo and apricots. An open box of chocolates sat on a chest of drawers, the top of each candy pinched, next to a brush tangled with thick, blinding white hair. Carnations wilted in a plastic vase.
Venus sat down on one lower bunk and deftly unbuttoned her jacket with one foot. It fell on the mattress with a wriggle of her shoulders.
“C’mere.” She patted the bed with her knee. “Make yourself comfy.”
Webern sat next to her, and Venus guided her foot into his hand. He stared at her toenails. Tonight they were painted red, white, and blue, like tiny American flags. He touched the pinky with his thumb.
“You do these yourself?” he asked.
Venus kissed him lightly on the lips. The frames of their glasses tapped each other. She sank back onto her pillows. They were different shapes, hearts, a star, a bright red pair of lips—prizes from the midway.
“I don’t think I should be here,” Webern said. “I still love Nepenthe.”
Venus smiled sadly. Her toes stroked his face, his neck. She was still wearing her negligee from the Parliament of Freaks. “Yeah, but honey. She’s not coming back.”
The clown floats through the clear blue sky; in one hand he clutches a multicoloured bunch of balloons. Pink cotton candy clouds hang in the air beyond him; he smiles as a warm breeze drifts him to and fro. In the distance, birds chirp. It seems he could go on like this forever.
Two birds—grackles—fly toward the clown’s balloons. They duck and circle, their glossy bodies twist and dive. The clown watches them nervously. The birds shriek. They swoop toward the biggest balloon in the bunch—it’s aquamarine. One bird pecks with her beak; the other snatches at it with her talons. The balloon explodes, and the birds, frightened, soar off into the sky.
The clown dips a little, but keeps on floating. A worried look darkens his face. He scans the horizon for more invaders. His eyes widen. A whole flock of Canadian geese barrel into him. They jostle his balloons with their wings; they honk and flap, their necks extended, their eyes shiny and desperate. The clown holds on for dear life. Gunshots rend the sky, the birds scatter, and a second balloon, lavender this time, pops.
The clown is down to just three balloons now. He looks toward the ground and feels sick. It’s a long way down. But for now he’s still airborne. Plunk. Plunk, plunk. The clown holds out his free hand, gazes up at the rain clouds. BOOM! With a crash of thunder, a sudden downpour engulfs him. The balloons dip and waver in the unceasing monsoon; the clown is drenched. CRACK! A bolt of lightning, blue-white, zigzags into his red balloon. It bursts; electricity surges down the string. The clown’s bones flash white through his skin. He’s left charred sooty black, holding onto just two balloons.
The storm passes; the clown sighs with relief. But something is still amiss. He hangs in the air uncertainly; he sinks bit by tiny bit. Finally, it becomes clear: his white balloon has sprung a slow-but-steady leak. He gazes at it imploringly, makes puppy dog eyes, but still it loses air, deflating steadily until it sputters out its last and drops, small and useless, to the end of a dangling string.
The clown clings to his last balloon: an emerald green one, the loveliest of the collection. He wraps the string tight around his wrist and kisses it for good measure. Then the wind starts to howl. The balloon tosses in one direction; it swings him back in the other. It tugs upward, as though trying to get away. The clown shakes his fist at the balloon; he scowls. Why can’t it just stay put? It comes down and bonks him on the head. Finally, he’s had enough. He reaches into the deep pocket of his hobo jacket and pulls out a needle, silver and gigantic, gleaming at the tip. He pops the balloon himself.
For one awful moment, the clown stays suspended, knowing what he’s done. He goes pale; his mouth shrinks to a horrified o. Then, without further ado, he plummets.
Webern opened his eyes. Venus’s pink bedspread was twisted around his hips, and the boxcar was very dark. He looked over at the other set of bunks. Up top, the albino girl lay with her hair cascading over the edge of the mattress, a silvery curtain. Pigalle, the trapeze artist, slept beneath her, hands folded under her head like a little girl’s. Webern turned to look at Venus, who lay between him and the wall. She was fast asleep on her side with her back to him. Webern pulled the bedspread down an inch. There, protruding from her shoulder, he saw what she never showed even in the Parliament of Freaks: pale fleshy curled things, the beginnings of fingers.
Webern watched himself slide out of bed and grope in the darkness for something (a blanket? a shirt?) to drape around his waist. He watched himself slip past the pinched-in chocolates and the decaying flowers, out into the warm night. Only then, with his bare feet crunching the sun-baked dirt and dry grass, was it safe to go back inside his own skin again.
Webern walked alongside the sleeping train, past windows where monstrous shadows moved, or where dreamy cries wafted out, echoes from another world. It seemed like he might never reach his boxcar.
When he got there, all the lights were on. Webern stood at the threshold and looked slowly around the room. The unwashed Scotch glasses and crumpled papers were nowhere to be seen; Marzipan was setting up Bo-Bo’s old wooden chess set on the coffee table. Wags sat in his desk chair, his back to Webern. His golden hair shone as he bent over one of Webern’s clown notebooks, scribbling intently. When Webern closed the door, Wags spun around.
“Cheese and crackers! You’re finally back. Well, I got started without you—hope you don’t mind.”
“Started?” Webern asked. He looked down and saw that he was covering himself with the albino girl’s satin bloomers.
“Sure. Time’s a-wastin’. We’ve got lots of work to do.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Webern sat on the boxcar floor in front of the mirror, parting his freshly bleached hair. In the glass, a familiar boy looked back out at him. His white short-sleeved shirt was buttoned to the very top. His eyes sparkled with mischief. And the straps of his lederhosen were snapped and tightened. When Webern turned his head, so did the boy in the mirror. When he reached for the pot of rouge, the boy in the mirror also extended his hand.
“Cut that out,” said Webern.
“You’re snippy tonight, compadre.” Wags grinned. “Don’t worry so much. You’re going to break a leg.”
“Yeah, probably.” Webern adjusted one knee sock. “You’re sure I look all right?”
“Would I lie to you? It’s perfect.”
Webern frowned at the toe of one brown shoe. They had been practicing for a week, but he was still a little nervous. One part of him felt tempted to go to the Parliament dressed as usual in his frog-prince feet, to close his eyes and bask in the dull warm pain of the green-tinged lights, but Wags was so insistent, it was almost impossible not to do what he said.
Webern stood up; Wags did, too. “Would you mind if we ran through the ladder bit one more time?”
“You said it, buster.”
Before he went to Tarantula, Webern had not seen Wags, Willow, or Billow since the September when he turned twelve. In those days, Willow and Billow often disappeared for weeks at a time, leaving soiled clothing and moldering furs strewn about in acrid piles until their return. Webern’s father hardly seemed to notice their absences—he even left the same amount of lunch money piled on the counter—but Webern always became tense and vigilant, wondering if he was finally safe, if this time they really had left him forever.
Late August of that year, he finally believed that the girls were gone for good. They had been away for five weeks at that point, a record for them, and when he dared peer in through their keyhole, he saw their room was spare and empty: necklaces of animal teeth no longer dangled from the light fixture, and the stolen birds’ nests had been emptied of their eggs. Even their collection of lost pet flyers had vanished. He began to let his guard down, just a little; he still locked his bedroom door, but he was no longer afraid to go downstairs for a glass of orange juice in the middle of the night. When he found a squashed iguana in the bottom of his underwear drawer, he even dared to throw it out the window, where it landed beneath the oak tree like some ghastly parody of himself.
A week later, the ghost started to visit him. At first, he thought he was imagining things. Lying in bed, on the brink of dreaming, he sometimes saw the shadows move, or felt invisible snakes slither across his ankles, but when he sat up and turned on the lights, these phantoms always disappeared. However, the footsteps did not.
In the dim glow of his nightlight, a small lamp with the patterns of constellations poked into its black tin shade, Webern concentrated on the sound. It seemed to be coming from directly above his head, and it was slower, more deliberate than regular walking—almost as if someone were imitating footsteps, placing each foot slo-o-owly against the roof tiles: crrrreeeeak, crrrreeeak. Webern’s breath caught in his throat, and he swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He slid his stocking feet across the floor—sidestepped the toys and open comic books that lay scattered on the carpet. Carefully, he unlatched his window, then sat down on the sill and leaned as far back as he dared to look up at the roof.
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