He licked his lips, then took my hand again. As he entwined his fingers with mine, he looked down at our hands. For a few moments, neither of us said anything, content to let our bodies cool.
“I was afraid I wouldn’t see you again,” Gabe said finally.
“Me too,” I admitted.
I wanted to believe that I didn’t care. That making out with a guy, then leaving him behind when I moved on to a different city was fine with me. And maybe it was, most of the time.
But pretending I hadn’t felt a pang of regret and remorse as I’d snuck out of Gabe’s room this morning would be a lie.
Gabe looked up at me. “Are you glad you did?”
“Yeah, I am.” I smiled. “What about you?”
“I’m not sure yet. I’m leaning toward maybe,” he said with a smirk.
I laughed but he silenced me with another kiss. It wasn’t as intense as the first one, but that didn’t mean it didn’t taste just as sweet.
“Should we go again?” Gabe asked as we came nearer to the bottom. “We should go again. If I give the guy twenty dollars, do you think he’ll let us go around again without getting in line?”
“He’ll do it for ten,” I said. The guy running the ride would actually probably do it for even less than that, but if Gabe was that easy to part with his money, I didn’t want to stiff him on a tip.
Gabe dug in his pocket, and when he pulled out a ten-dollar bill, I was beginning to think that he might have a never-ending supply of cash in there. When we reached the end of the ride, Gabe offered him the money, and the guy gladly let us go again.
“Where were we?” Gabe asked as soon as the gondola rose higher in the night sky, and turned back to face me.
He pressed me against the side of the gondola as he kissed me. Part of me knew I should be afraid. We were nearing sixty feet off the ground, and we were leaning back over the side of a swaying car.
But I didn’t care. I barely even noticed.
When he stopped kissing me, his arm was still around me, and he smiled crookedly as he stared into my eyes. Then he leaned back, putting what little space he could between us.
“You know, since I have you hostage on this ride, I should be using the time to find out more of the deep, dark secrets that you refuse to tell me,” Gabe said.
I laughed. “Why are you so obsessed with me having secrets?”
“Because you have them,” he insisted with an unrelenting grin.
“How do you know?”
“Am I wrong?” he countered.
“There’s nothing deep or dark about me,” I replied evasively. “I bet you’re the one with all the secrets.”
“Never.” Gabe tried to look me in the eyes when he said it, but there was a subtle shift, a glimmer of something dark, and I knew he was lying.
“No, I can tell. I can see it in your eyes,” I told him. “You’re hiding something.”
He didn’t deny it this time. “So are you.”
“Okay.” I folded my arms over my chest and stared expectantly at him. “So tell me your deepest, darkest secret.”
“I…” He started to say something, but his expression became pained. He turned away and leaned forward on the railing in front of us, resting his arms on it. “I would if I could.”
“Why not?” I asked, surprised that he was admitting hiding anything.
“We’ve only … this is what? Our second date?”
“We’re counting last night as a date?” I asked, thinking of my earlier conversation with Roxie.
“Any night that ends in kissing is a date,” he assured me with a smile. “How about on our…” He paused, thinking. “Fifth date, we tell each other our big secrets.”
“You think we’ll make it to a fifth date?” I tried to make a joke of it, but my smile felt forced.
It actually stung a little thinking about future dates. The sideshow never stayed anywhere for more than a week or two, and I knew for a fact that Gideon planned on pulling out of here next Sunday. Unless we saw each other every day—and I doubted that even the clingiest of suitors would plan for that—there would be no way we’d make it to five dates.
“I’m trying to bribe you,” Gabe said. “If you tolerate me for three more dates, you get to know a secret. That’s a heck of a deal, really.”
“But what if I don’t have a secret?” I asked.
“You do.”
“And what if you’re lying and you don’t have one either?”
The corner of his mouth was curled up slightly, but his eyes were serious. “I’m not.”
“Okay. It’s a deal,” I said, knowing I’d just agreed to something that would never happen anyway. The carnival would have closed up, and I’d be long gone before I ever heard his secret, or he ever found out about mine.
The ride came to a stop, and Gabe got off first. He took my hand, helping me down, and then, with our hands still linked together, we walked around the rides, but we didn’t go on any more. We talked, not about anything important, and he made me laugh.
It was the closest thing I’d ever had to a true date, the way I imagined dates would go. For a little while, I even forgot to worry about who might see Gabe and me together, and how they might react if they did.
That all came to an abrupt halt when we approached the shimmering tent where my mom worked. The curtain was tied open, meaning she didn’t have any clients, and though she couldn’t see us from where we stood, if we went any closer, she definitely would.
“Do you wanna get your fortune read?” Gabe asked, since I’d stopped short.
“Um, not tonight.” I let go of his hand and stepped away from him. “What time is it?”
He checked his neon-colored Swatch. “It’s nine thirty.”
“I should probably get going.” I offered him a rueful smile. “The acrobat show is over. I need to find my friends.”
“What’s the rush? Are you Cinderella?” Gabe asked. “Will you turn into a pumpkin at nine thirty-one?”
“No, it’s just later than I thought. That’s all.” I took a step back, moving away from my mom’s tent, but he stayed where he was, giving me a curious look.
“Okay. So can I call you?”
“Um, I’m kinda in between phones now.” Since I’d spent so much of my life on the road, I hadn’t had a real phone number in years.
He took a step toward me now. “What about our third date?”
“You still wanna do that?”
“You don’t?” Gabe asked, sounding surprised.
“I do,” I said. “When?”
“Tomorrow?”
“Okay,” I agreed, before even trying to decide whether I’d be busy or if that worked or not. “Where?”
“How about we meet here again? Since you don’t have a phone. Unless you want to give me your address—”
“Here’s great,” I replied quickly. “Does eight work for you?”
“Yeah. That’ll be great.” He nodded. “I had fun tonight.”
I smiled back at him, hoping I wasn’t beaming too much. “Me too.”
Before he could say any more, I turned and ran back toward the circus tent. When I was certain that I was far enough away that he couldn’t see me, I darted between the booths and headed back toward the campsite.
11. temperance
The midway and the rides stayed open until midnight, but the shows stopped at eleven. The carnival was really divided into two parts—the rides and games that a person would find at the fair, run by Doug, and the sideshow and acts that someone would find at a circus, run by Gideon.
Though Gideon had the final word on everything, the midway and the sideshow really worked as two separate autonomous entities. We even kept our camps separately. Those of us who worked in the sideshow kept our motorhomes parked in an oblong, and during the day, we’d often gather together for meals.
Doug had his own carnies and gophers who ran all the games and the rides, but the sideshow only had Hutch and me. Hutch technically ran the
museum, but that didn’t keep him too busy, so he ended up helping out with odd jobs a lot.
After Gabe left, I spent the rest of the night trying to avoid the fairgrounds, since I didn’t want to bump into him or his family again. I cleaned up around the camp, helped Gideon out with some of his bookkeeping, and prepped a meal for when the carnival closed. Most people returned from work with a huge appetite, so we usually ate the biggest meal of the day around midnight.
My mom returned a little before eleven. I was outside, cooking up potatoes in tinfoil on the grill, and she walked right past me without saying a word, hurrying into our Winnebago with her shawl pulled tightly around her.
“Mom?” I called after her, but she didn’t answer.
She’d finished up early, and she’d ignored me. Both of those were bad signs, so I moved the food off the grill, then went into the trailer to check on her.
“I don’t need you,” Mom snapped as soon as I came inside.
Hunched over the kitchen sink, the lines in her face looked more prominent than normal. Her hands gripped the end of the counter with such intensity that her knuckles had turned white.
“Why don’t you go lie down?” I suggested gently. “I could put on music for you and turn it down low.”
“That won’t help, Mara!” Mom shouted. “Nothing will make this damn headache go away, so why don’t you just go run along and do whatever the hell it was that you were doing before I came back and ruined your night?”
“Mom.” I sighed.
My mother was an animated and passionate person, but she didn’t usually yell at me like this. The readings did this to her, draining her energy, hurting her mind. Not all the time, but more and more, nights were ending like this.
“I was just making food outside. Did you want me to get anything for you?” I asked.
“I already told you no!”
A half-empty glass of water was sitting on the counter next to her, and she grabbed it and suddenly hurled it at me. I ducked out of the way just in time, and it smashed into the wall behind me.
“Mom!” I yelled. “You can’t just throw a glass at me!”
“I don’t know, Mara!” She waved her hands wildly as she spoke, and her eyes were frantic. “What can I do? I can’t do anything! And I don’t even know where Blossom is! I can’t help anyone!”
“I know you’re hurting, but this isn’t helping,” I told her as calmly and reasonably as I could. “You need to find a better way of coping. You can’t keep acting like this every time you have a bad night.”
The door creaked open behind me, and Gideon leaned in. “Is everything okay in here?”
“Everything’s great! Nothing’s fine!” Mom shouted, and then laughed, as if to punctuate her schizophrenic statement.
I could only turn back and look at him. I didn’t say anything to Gideon—not just because my mom was right there, but because if I tried to speak, I’d cry. Helplessly, I shook my head and pressed my lips together to keep the tears from spilling over.
“Go on, love,” Gideon said softly, his British accent warming his words. “I’ll calm her down.”
“Where are all my tapes, Mara?” Mom demanded.
A stack of cassette tapes had been sitting on the counter. They’d fallen out of cupboards yesterday when we’d been driving into Caudry, and I just hadn’t put them all back yet. But now, in a fit of rage, Mom swung her arm out, knocking them all to the floor.
“Lyanka.” Gideon pushed past me and walked toward her. “You need to stop.”
“No. Why do you all think you can tell me what to do? Did Blossom hide all my tapes?” Mom asked him, her voice trembling.
“This isn’t about her.” He rubbed the back of his neck, then he turned back to me. “Why don’t you find somewhere else to sleep, all right? I’ll take care of her, but it might be a long night.”
I nodded, then rushed out the door just as my mother began swearing at him. She continued shouting for a while after I left, and it traveled through the thin walls of the motorhome. But eventually Gideon put on music, and that either drowned out the sound of her yelling or calmed her.
People started arriving back at the campsite shortly after that, and we all ate together around picnic tables underneath a couple strings of white Christmas lights. When we finished, I opted to head over to the trailer that Luka, Seth, and Hutch shared, and Roxie decided to tag along.
There were other places I could’ve hung out if I wanted to, but Luka, Seth, and Hutch had the nicest one. It was a 1986 Winnebago Minnie Winnie 24RC, and they’d paid almost thirty grand for it last summer. Considering the sideshow was going broke, that was an exorbitant amount of money.
Luka and Seth had made all the money on their own, though. Between shows, they’d go out to bars and trick drunk guys into betting that they couldn’t do something. Seth was supernaturally strong, and Luka could heal from anything, so he’d swallow glass or pound nails into his hand. It still hurt like hell, but for the right price, it’d been worth it.
They’d made most of their money before Hutch had stumbled upon us. He’d run away from a rough home life with his entire life savings in his pocket, which amounted to a couple grand. It was that final contribution that put them over the edge, so Luka and Seth had let him live with them.
He’d still added the smallest share, so he had the bunk above the cab, while Luka and Seth claimed the bunk beds in the back. It was a chic trailer, and the boys had it decked out with the latest amenities, like a TV and VCR and a tape deck with speakers built in throughout the trailer. Not to mention a top-of-the-line AC and heater, so we all spent a great deal of time hanging out in their camper.
When we went into Luka’s camper, I slid into the dinette bench next to Roxie. Luka went over to the fridge to get out a couple bottles of beer, and Hutch pulled out the deck of cards before sitting down across from us.
“Where’s Seth?” I asked, noticing that their third roommate hadn’t followed us inside.
Luka set four beers down on the table, then sat across from me. “I think he went over to hang out with Carrie.”
“And that’s why I’m here.” Roxie grabbed a bottle and flipped the top off. “There’s only so many times I can put on headphones and pretend that I can’t hear Seth and Carrie having sex over Joan Jett.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” I said, and took a beer for myself.
“So, what are we playing tonight? Poker? Gin? Blackjack?” Hutch asked as he shuffled the deck of cards.
“How about gin? We haven’t played that in a while,” Luka said.
“Gin it is.” Hutch finished shuffling and dealt the cards. When he’d finished, we all organized our hands. “Okay. So here’s what I don’t understand. Can you see my cards, Mara?”
I shook my head. “Not unless you show them to me.”
“But your mom could see them, right? If she were playing with us?” Hutch asked.
“No.” I looked at him over the top of my cards and saw the bewilderment in his brown eyes. “She’s not psychic.”
“But then how does she see stuff?” Hutch lowered his cards and the furrow in his brow deepened.
“She’s a necromancer,” I explained. “She has contact with the spirits, and she sees what they tell her. Sometimes they give her insight into the future, or into people’s true motives. But that’s only because spirits can see more than we can.”
“And that’s different than being psychic how?” Hutch asked.
Laying his cards facedown the table, Luka chuckled a little. He leaned back in the booth, content to drink his beer and watch Hutch try to sort this all out.
“Hutch,” Roxie said, eyeing him severely. “You’ve been traveling with us for, like, nine months, and you still haven’t figured this stuff out?”
“It’s confusing.” Hutch shrugged and lowered his eyes as he shifted his cards around in his hand. “Maybe you don’t know because you grew up around it or you’ve been playing with fire and shoving swords down your
throat most of your life. But for me, it’s all a bit strange still.”
“Where I grew up, there was nobody around who could do the things I did,” Roxie said, her expression darkening.
“They all thought I was a freak and practically ran me out of town,” Luka chimed in. “It wasn’t until I joined the sideshow that things started making sense.”
“Right.” Hutch looked between the two of them. “Because people explained things to you.”
“A psychic can see your thoughts, read minds, that kinda thing,” I told him. “A necromancer talks with the dead. That’s the difference.”
“And Gideon’s psychic,” Hutch said.
I nodded. “Right.”
“So he could read my cards, if he were here right now?” Hutch asked.
“He could, if he wanted to,” I allowed. “But he usually works to keep out of other people’s minds. He doesn’t like invading their privacy.”
“How does he do that?” Hutch asked.
“There’s a couple different ways,” I said, explaining it as I best understood it from what Gideon had told me. “One of them is practice, another way is keeping himself distracted and busy. He’s always reading or talking or doing something. He never just sits alone.”
“Alcohol helps,” Luka added, taking another drink of his beer.
Roxie nodded, laughing in agreement. “Oh yeah, alcohol definitely dulls the extra senses.”
“So then why do you guys drink?” Hutch asked.
“Sometimes, that is why,” Luka said.
“The year before I joined the sideshow, I was on a nonstop drinking binge, trying to make it go away,” Roxie said.
Hutch looked over at her. “You don’t like being able to make fire?”
“Pyrokinesis is all fun and games until you accidentally burn down your family’s house, destroying everything you own, including your pet goldfish, and burning your stepdad’s hands,” Roxie told him flatly.
In her early teens, Roxie had begun to realize that she had the power to create fire, but that wasn’t the worst of her problems. Around the same time, her stepdad realized that she was blossoming into a beautiful young woman, and he decided that he should act on it.
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