Lance shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a maverick. I like to play it fast and loose with tradition.”
Josie rolled onto her back again and stared up at the sky. “I’m not giving up on you, you know. Not yet.”
“I don’t want you to. Everyone has a past. And sometimes the past is like . . . I don’t know, like an anchor, holding you back.”
“Or keeping you from drifting into dangerous waters?”
“That’s another way of looking at it, yeah.”
Josie sat up. “You want to head back?”
“No, we’re not in a rush. Why don’t we lie here for a while? It’ll be sunset in an hour, and we can watch the stars coming out.”
He reached out to take her hand, but she pulled it away at the last second. She was still looking at the sky, and Lance didn’t know whether she hadn’t seen what he was doing, or she had seen it and didn’t want to participate.
He didn’t try again.
LANCE’S EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY passed without anyone noticing, because they still believed he was at least two years older.
The carnival’s route across the southern states took a year to come full circle, and when it reached New Mexico again, Lance went to see the foreman. “Been a year, Jerry. I’m thinking—”
“I know, kid.” Jerry was lying underneath his old Hyundai, which was propped up on bricks. His right hand snaked out and groped around on the grass. “Pass me that torque wrench.”
Lance crouched down next to him and handed him the tool.
“Happens a lot, Newbie. The anniversary comes around, you get to thinking that maybe it’s time you moved on.” Jerry slid out from underneath the car. “Newbie—Hunter—where are you going to go, huh? You’ve never once mentioned a family, far as I know. Or anyone on the outside. All we really know about you is that you’re looking for someone called Housten. Or avoiding them, we can’t tell. Well, we’re your family now, kid. We took you in, gave you a place and a purpose.”
“I know, and I appreciate that.”
“In a couple of years, Morty’s gonna retire. His kids don’t want any part of this place, and he hasn’t seen them in forever anyway. Morty says he’ll pass on the ownership of the carnival to me. And I’ll need someone to take my place. And that’s you.”
Lance sat back on his heels. “Me.”
“Yeah, you. You know the place inside out, you get on well with pretty much everyone. You’ve got a head full of good ideas. I could see that right from the start, Newbie. Why do you think I’ve been moving you from one job to the next? So you can get to know every part of this business. Morty did the same to me.”
“Yeah, but I’m not sure this is what I want to do. What I’m meant to do.”
Jerry smiled. “Meant to do. Yeah, good one. No one knows what they’re meant to do, because that suggests predestination. I’ve no truck with that garbage.”
“Mary-May told me—”
Jerry put up his hand. “The old woman has a gift, I’ll give her that. But even on her best days her predictions are still vague. Anything she tells you can be interpreted in lots of different ways. Hunter, I want you to stay. Morty wants you to stay. Now you tell me why you think you should leave, and it better be a good reason. Don’t tell me you’ve finally found this Housten person.”
“No.” Lance took a deep breath, held it for a second while he stared at Jerry, then let it out. OK, he told himself. Go for it. “My name’s not really Hunter, and I’m only eighteen.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Jerry twisted around, grabbed the edge of the car’s hood, and hauled himself to his feet. He looked down at Lance as he wiped his greasy hands on a cloth. “What’s your point?”
“I know that carnivals get inspected by the IRS, to check that everything’s kosher and all that. We’re overdue for an inspection. When it happens, it’ll raise a lot of questions about me if I’m still here. And that’s going to do you guys a lot of damage. So I need to move on.”
“You got a thousand bucks? Because if you do, I know a guy who can arrange things so that your fake identity is watertight. You’ll have a birth certificate, school records, employment history. Everything you need.”
Lance stood up. “Jerry, the people I’m avoiding won’t be fooled by something like that.”
“Sure they will. You’re not the first one here who’s needed that sort of help. We keep it on the down-low, naturally. We don’t talk about it. But it does happen. Trust me, your real past will be gone forever. You’ll really become Hunter whatever-middle-name-you-want Washington. Do this, kid. Stick with us. I know you like it here and you’ve got a good thing going with Josie.”
“No, we’re just friends. There’s nothing going on between us.”
“Not yet, maybe, but she’s into you big-time, Newbie. Maybe she’s just not in a place yet where she’s able to realize it for herself.” Jerry walked around to the driver’s side of the car and leaned in through the open window. He turned the key in the ignition and the engine purred to life. “That’s got it. Listen to that, Hunter. . . . There’s no sweeter sound in the universe than a smoothly running engine.” He crossed his arms and leaned back against the door as he looked at Lance. “But an engine doesn’t maintain itself, right? You’ve gotta make adjustments every now and then. Pay attention to what it’s telling you. If you don’t, if you start to think that everything’s going to stay the same forever, you’re going to end up in a whole heap of trouble. It’ll seize up at exactly the worst possible moment. Same with running a carnival. You keep your eyes and ears open, and you can anticipate most problems.”
Lance nodded. “OK.”
“Who are you hiding from?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“When you joined us, we gave you a lot of chances to tell us if you were on the run from the cops. I know you well enough by now to tell that it’s not the law. And you’re a good guy around the girls, so I’m guessing that you didn’t get some girl knocked up. I’m also pretty sure that you being here doesn’t put the rest of us in danger—except for with the IRS, and we can take care of that. So who is it? Who’s got you scared?”
“You don’t want to know. Trust me on that, Jerry. You’re better off not knowing.”
Jerry grinned. “Wow, you’re an undercover spy. All right, Hunter. But we do need to sort out your identity. What do you say? A thousand bucks.”
“I can manage that.”
“I’ll tell my guy to get started. He’ll be in touch when everything’s ready.”
• • •
Later that morning, as Lance and Josie passed Mary-May’s tiny caravan, the old woman called out. “Can I see you for a second, Hunter?”
“Sure,” Lance said. “See you later, Josie.”
Mary-May watched Josie go. “A troubled girl, that one.”
“You’ve read her?”
“I don’t need to read her to know that, Hunter. So many people come here to hide.” She stepped back into her caravan. “My stove isn’t working. Can you take a look at it?”
What Mary-May called a stove was a small one-ring electric hot plate, polished to a shine but clearly a very old model. Lance switched it on and held his hand over the ring for a few seconds. “The red light is on, so there’s power coming in, but no heat.” He unplugged it from the socket, then turned it upside down and began to unscrew the bottom panel.
Mary-May said, “Your friend Paragon was on the news this morning, did you see that?”
“No. What happened?” Lance had chatted with the old woman several times during his year with the carnival. She was the only one he trusted with the truth about his past.
“He saved a skydiver whose parachute didn’t open.”
Lance popped the bottom panel off the hot plate. “Wow! Did they show it happening, or were they just talking about it?”
“They showed it—the skydiver was performing for a charity event. Paragon’s a black man, did you know that?”
“I think he prefers the term African-American. But, yes, I knew.”
“Oh, my father would have been incensed. He despised blacks.”
Lance didn’t want to get drawn into an argument about racial prejudice, so he just nodded and kept peering at the inner workings of the hot plate.
“I remember once a black man came to our town looking for work, and my father and his friends made sure the fellow knew he wasn’t welcome. They beat him with baseball bats and ran him out of town.”
“That’s unforgivable,” Lance said. “You don’t treat another human being like that.”
“They were arrested, of course. That was the last time I saw my father.”
“Well, I hope your dad and his friends rotted in jail for the rest of their lives.”
“Oh, they weren’t convicted. The judge was a friend. He threw out the case because he said there wasn’t enough evidence, even though the beating happened in broad daylight in the town’s busiest street and dozens of people witnessed it.”
“So why did you never see him again?”
“I couldn’t bear to live in the same house as that man! He was a thug. I would have loved to have seen his face when he learned that my husband was half black.”
“Husband? I never knew you’d been married,” Lance said.
“Oh yes. Dennis and I were married for twenty-three years, then there was the affair and the messy divorce. I still loved him, though. I suppose I always will.”
“Even though he had an affair?”
“I was the one who had the affair.” Mary-May gave Lance a weak smile. “That broke his heart. For a long time I lived alone, but I still had my gift, of course, and people used to come to me for advice. One day the carnival came to town. Morty’s father was the owner then, and he heard about me and asked me to join them.” She shrugged. “And here I am now.”
“Do you like your life here, Mary-May?”
“I do. I meet a lot of different people, and sometimes I can really help them. I have everything I need.” She looked at the hot plate. “Or I will, if you can fix that for me. Is it fixable?”
“Yeah, I think so. I’m no expert, but . . .” Lance stopped what he was doing and turned to face the old woman. “Wait, how could you tell that Paragon is African-American? He never appears without his helmet, and his armor completely covers his skin.”
“When he landed and the reporters were running toward him, he was helping the man get his parachute off. Paragon had to take off his gloves to undo the clasp. His hands were black, so I guess the rest of him is too.” Mary-May smiled. “I’m not as dumb as I look, you know.”
“That thought never crossed my mind.” Lance tapped the inside of the hot plate with his screwdriver. “Here’s your problem. This little copper flange-thingy is corroded. It’s not making proper contact with the heating element. How old is this hot plate, Mary-May?”
“Oh, twenty years, at least. Can you fix it?”
“Sure, I just need to clean the flange. I can’t say how long it’ll last, but it should work for a while. In the meantime I’ll see if I can make a replacement.”
“You’re a good boy, Lance.”
“Hunter.”
“Yes, Hunter.” She smiled at him for a second. “I wonder why you chose that particular name.”
“I like the sound of it, that’s all.”
“Not because you’re searching for someone? The woman who killed your brother and parents?”
“My real name is Lance, but that doesn’t mean I want to stab anyone. A name is just a label. It doesn’t have to have a reason.”
“You don’t want to stab anyone, but you’re training with your Japanese friend to throw knives.”
Lance smiled. “Right.” He finished cleaning the blue-white bloom from the copper flange, checked that it was correctly moving into place when the switch was flipped, then reassembled the hot plate and plugged it back into the socket. “Let’s see . . . Yep, it’s working now. It’s heating up.”
“Thank you, Hunter. You’ve saved an old woman from having to spend her evening eating cold beans straight out of the can.”
“You should join the rest of us for dinner. Josie’s a great cook.”
“I’m sure she is. But sometimes I prefer my own company.”
Lance moved back toward the door. “Because a lot of people here are a little scared of what you can do?”
“People think they want to know what the future has in store for them, but they really don’t. Thank you, Hunter.”
“No problem. If it breaks again, let me know.”
“I meant, thank you for listening. People forget that the crazy old fortune-teller has a story of her own. Everyone has a story, and that makes everyone important.”
“I guess.”
“Even you, Lance. I know you think you want to blend into the background and not be noticed, but that’s not always going to be possible. You’re important. And in time, you’ll learn exactly what that means.”
THAT EVENING, as Lance joined the line for the late-afternoon meal—Josie had cooked a huge pot of chili—Masatoshi spotted him and filtered back down the line to join him. “Check it out, Hunter.” He held up one of his throwing knives, flipped it in the air, and caught it by the blade. He handed it to Lance.
“The weight is off. What did you do?”
“Hollowed out the handle, and added a little surprise.” Masatoshi grinned as he took back the knife and slid it into his belt. “I’ll show you later.” He nodded toward the front of the line. “Chili again?”
“Yep.”
“Cool. So, listen . . .” Masatoshi glanced back at the people in line behind him—two clowns who were deep in conversation with Kevin the cat-wrangler, all wearing their full costumes—and lowered his voice. “Heard you had a little talk with Jerry. About a sensitive issue.”
Lance shrugged. “Maybe.”
“I’m the guy.”
“OK.” The runner in front of Lance picked up his tray and moved on, and Lance was next in line.
Josie greeted him with her usual smile as she filled Lance’s bowl almost to the brim. “Just how you like it, Hunter. Light on the kidney beans, heavy on the paprika.” She always kept aside a special bowl for Lance—it looked like all the others but Lance knew it was slightly larger.
“Nice one, thanks.”
“You free after this to take me for a run into town? I need to pick up some fresh veg.” Still looking at Lance, she handed a full normal-size bowl to Masatoshi.
“Sure, as long as we’re back before opening. I’m on the gate tonight. How about, what, forty minutes?”
“Perfect.”
Masatoshi followed Lance to the farthest of the four long benches that had been set up in the boneyard. As he set his tray down, he said, “Man, you’ve got to be the slowest guy in the world, Hunter. She’s into you big-time.”
“Maybe.”
Masatoshi sat down and began spooning the chili into his mouth. “Maybe my butt! Dude, if you’re not interested in her, just tell her. Make it clear. She’s been making cow-eyes at you since she joined us. So, y’know, either buy the tickets or get out of the line and let someone else have a chance.”
“We’re not talking about this,” Lance said. “Show me the knife.”
Masatoshi whipped the knife out of his belt and tossed it high into the air in one move. Lance didn’t bother to watch its arc to see where it would land—he knew Masatoshi well enough to know that the knife wasn’t going to hurt anyone.
It thudded down blade-first into the table an inch away from Lance’s left hand. “So what did you do to it?” Lance asked.
“New idea I’ve been working on. The hilt’s gonna hold a large
capsule of fake blood, designed to burst on impact. I’ll have a weight at the base of the hilt, taking up about half the space. So the knife hits the target and stops, but the weight inside keeps going. It bursts the blood capsule, and the blood shoots out through that little hole just above the blade. Neat, huh?”
Lance dropped his spoon and pulled the knife free from the table. He turned it over in his hands. “And the point is?”
“Well, obviously, I throw it at the target—a human target—it hits within, like, a quarter-inch of their arm or whatever, and the blood shoots out. Freaks out the audience. Then we show that the target is unharmed.”
“Yeah, that’s what I figured. Not a good idea, Masatoshi. You show them that the trick is a fake, then they’ll start wondering what else is fake. No, the knife act has to be as real as possible.”
Masatoshi took the knife back. “Yeah, I guess. Took me all morning to hollow this out.”
“So, about the other thing. You’re the guy?”
“I am. Or to be more accurate, I know the guy. I know how to get you what you need. Eight hundred bucks.”
“Jerry said it was a thousand.”
“For you, I’m not taking a cut. But don’t tell anyone else. I can get you a driver’s license, birth records, school records, employment history. Everything you need. But you’ve got to come with me to see the guy in person, and he’s in Texas. So it’s gonna be another six weeks. You OK with waiting that long?”
“Sure.”
Masatoshi nodded, then muttered, “Oh, great. Here comes your special pal now.”
Lance turned to see Kevin approaching. The cat-wrangler sat down next to Lance, and Masatoshi started eating faster.
“So how are you guys doing?” Kevin asked, using his in-performance voice. When he was in what he referred to as “boy mode,” his voice was fairly deep and his manners were masculine, but in “girl mode” he always kept his voice soft and his movements graceful.
Lance had long since grown used to seeing both sides of Kevin’s personality, but he knew that Masatoshi—even though the knife-thrower had known Kevin for longer—was still uncomfortable around him.
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