I saw Apple nearby pick up and carry a screaming man with glass lodged in his eye. Vera and Toro were at the edge of the ring, directing the panicked crowd out into the open air as quickly as possible. Other stagehands swarmed around us, carrying audience members who had already passed out or who were too injured to get out on their own.
That first breath of fresh nighttime air, when I finally got it, was like a miracle and a nightmare—as healing to my raw lungs as sleep at the end of a long, cruel day, but a breath I knew my sister could not take. I felt as if her still burning, choked lungs were housed in my body too.
Apple was standing in the field, directing the stagehands to lay out the people who were too hurt to walk. “Lord save us all,” he kept saying just under his breath, as if he didn’t think his prayer would be heeded.
Everyone outside, troupe and crew and audience alike, did what they could to help the injured. Many people were so badly burned that I could hardly stand to look at them; their clothes stuck to their ravaged skin in the places where both skin and clothes hadn’t been burned away.
Ciaran and Tam were already jogging back toward the flames to help carry out more victims.
Then a huge, animate darkness ran past them, like a shadow in a dream. It was Bear.
Running right into the heart of the fire.
A scream bloomed and died in my throat; I didn’t know whether I wanted to call Bear back to safety or urge him on in the hopes that somehow there was something he could do for Rosie. If anyone had a chance of getting through to her, I knew well, it was Bear.
He passed by Vera, who was kneeling over someone in the line of the unconscious, a short person in a soot-streaked, singed red jacket.
Mama.
I stumbled toward her, reaching out, feeling just as I had when I was small and had woken from a nightmare and nothing but Mama’s arms would make me feel safe again.
But Vera held me back before I could reach her. Her muscular arms bound me as thoroughly as ropes. “Don’t touch her, darling,” she said. “You’ll hurt her. The burns are bad, but they’re just on the surface—see how she’s breathing steady? She’ll be all right. She’ll be all right.” She took a long, shaky breath. “Angela, you’ll be all right.”
I’d recognized Mama by her costume, and now, up close, I could see that I’d never have known her face like this: eyes not just closed but swollen shut, and all of the tidy dark beard that had been her first living burned away.
I knew Vera was right that touching her would only make things worse. I had to believe that she was right about Mama not being too hurt, either—I couldn’t bear to think of the alternative.
It was true that her breathing was steady.
I nodded.
Vera let me go and crouched over Mama again.
I steeled myself to go back in, and I turned toward the fire.
I saw a painting of a nightmare; more than half the tent was already incinerated, and long red flames were licking up the remaining canvas and support beams in a mockery of the vertical stripes of the tent fabric itself, stabbing bright sparks up into the sweet night sky.
The big top was a skeleton. Where I’d seen Rosie hang in frozen terror a few minutes before, there was only empty space. Where the trapeze had hung, I could see all the way through to the sky.
I scrabbled toward it, and Tam was there at my side, trying to hold me back. But fe’s a performer, and not even a dancer like Ciaran. I’m a stagehand and much stronger, and I wrestled out of fer grip with ease.
I ran a few good steps before someone caught me again. Apple this time.
The skeleton that was the circus tent collapsed into flaming rubble.
I howled in Apple’s arms.
Rosie. Rosie.
My other half, who burned, confused and afraid, in a fire I’d caused, who drowned in flame, and, for all she’d flown through the air in her shows, couldn’t fly away.
I collapsed back against Apple, rasping silently now instead of crying, my voice worn out, shaking too much even to try to get away anymore. I could hear him murmuring something, and when I looked up, I saw that his eyes were closed in prayer.
In that moment, I knew I was no good to anyone like that—to all the other people’s sisters who lay among the circus ruins. All the other people’s sisters who might yet be saved.
I forced discipline into my body, something I learned as a toddling performer long before it was drilled into me as a stagehand. I forced myself to stand, to make myself ready to help the others.
And then I saw some of the rubble move.
Like a blackened stone pushing up from the earth, a dark bulk rose.
Bear.
Bear, curved around something like he was an arch, a cornerstone, a covered bridge. Curved around something all dark red and gold. Bear, half bald and bleeding with burns, his great, insulating body curved around—
Around Rosie.
Around the small, crumpled blossom of my sister, who still breathed.
7
Rosie
Ash.
Loam.
Silence.
Closed
eyes.
Places built
around and under
pain.
Who taught me this trick,
how to leave
the body that hurts?
Who gave me this gift?
We will rest,
she and I.
Until the pain shrinks
into something I can
bear on my back.
Until I can fit
in the costume again,
and bear
to see her
in hers.
We will rest.
Ivory
The circus closed while we made repairs and healed.
Mostly healed.
Even the rebuilding felt like that, like medicine. As if the circus was a sick body that we were nursing back to health.
Except, the body was gone; the main tent had been reduced to ruins. We were rebuilding it from scratch. Reincarnating it.
And I knew the circus’s death was all my fault.
The fire. The gas lines. The dallying with Tam that made me triage my way through the preshow checklist.
I might as well have been an arsonist.
In the aftermath, a few members had left, though not more than often did when we arrived in a new city: some of the newer stagehands, a few of the clowns. None of them had been with the circus long enough for me to know them, really. Still, our core remained. Toro took me aside to discuss the financial repercussions of the fire. Vera did what Vera always did: plowed her strength into the cleanup effort and quipped with as much lightheartedness as she could muster. And though it helped with morale, the whole troupe felt like a collective ghost, a spirit, wandering without our body. It was only the main tent that had burned, sure, but that was our heart, our home.
We didn’t make campfires at night anymore. Didn’t even talk about it—we just abhorred them. We became a cold and quiet group, working silently to bring our body back to life.
I could barely talk, even to Tam. I rested against fer shoulders, as fe did sometimes against mine, and we stroked and braided each other’s hair and held each other softly.
But all the kinds of fire, of heat, in me seemed dangerous now—hadn’t it been kissing Tam that had kept me distracted from the fire that nearly killed Rosie and Mama?
* * *
My father and Rosie’s both stayed by Mama’s hospital bed day and night, taking it in turns to sleep or to attend to other necessities, which for my father meant his political work, while Rosie’s father spent as much time at my sister’s bedside as our mother’s. When they were both there, each of our fathers held one of Mama’s hands.
She wasn’t wearing the ring.
The burns were worst on Mama’s face, I think because of the beard oil she wore. Her face was bandaged, but we knew the beard was gone. The doctor told us that her skin had been damaged
badly enough that probably no hair would ever grow there again.
The old fool said it like it was a blessing, but I knew Mama would mourn the loss when she woke up.
Except she kept not waking up.
I was glad that our fathers were there, because I couldn’t be with both Mama and Rosie at the same time. And I was glad that Bear was there to sit with Rosie, because I couldn’t be with either her or Mama when I was with the circus. I knew both Mama and Rosie would tell me, if they could, to focus on the circus.
So I tried to be loyal to all three of them. I spent every moment either by their sides or working to restore the circus they both loved.
Lord Bram—my father—paid for the best of everything for Mama and had hired chirurgiennes to see to all the troupe’s injuries, even the minor ones. He did that before I’d even had time to think about what would happen to the injured.
He had paid my tuition at Lampton’s too. I hadn’t known until after I came back, and then only because Vera told me. Mama never did. I’d felt a strange mixture of guilt and thankfulness and anger when I’d learned this—how could I not feel grateful, or guilty, that I hadn’t understood to whom I owed my gratitude? Though, of course, Lord Bram had so much money that a year of tuition meant nothing to him.
Would I have stayed at school, I wondered, if I’d known I didn’t have to worry about the financial sacrifices I’d thought Mama was making to send me there?
No. I knew that wasn’t really why I’d come home. There were other ways I felt indebted to Rosie and Mama and the Circus Rose.
Lord Bram had offered to pay for hospital rooms for everyone, but most of the troupe wanted to stay on the grounds, together, in the tents and caravans they knew. I was sure Rosie would want that too, and I’d argued fiercely to keep her with us.
Her injuries were not superficial; she had a broken arm, and her burns were worse than Mama’s. But the Brethren-run hospital’s philosophy was all brightness: clean white sheets, mirrors for every gaslight. I could understand it. Everything is spare and clean, and no illness will go unseen.
I knew well, though—better than anybody else—that it was not what Rosie needed. When something bad happens to my sister, what she needs is darkness. Quiet. Solitude, as long as she has me or Bear to share it.
I couldn’t watch her flinch and screw up her eyes tight, the way she would when she started to wake up and realized the bright harshness of the environment she was in. It would be like the fire all over again. Even after a good show, Rosie still needed darkness and peace and silence for her mind to heal.
Oh, the doctors could help heal her body—and her body was fit and resilient and would heal the rest of the way on its own.
But her mind needed the quiet that only darkness could give it. That was something the doctors wouldn’t understand.
Our fathers didn’t understand either . . . but they understood what Bear meant when he stood over her body, silent and hulking, his usually gentle gaze all predator as he simply dared someone to try to take her.
And when I snapped at them that I knew what was good for her better than someone who had never lived in the same home with her a day in her life could ever know, I wounded them both into silence and acceptance. I was glad.
But Lord Bram would hear of nothing but the hospital for Mama, and Mama didn’t need the darkness the way Rosie did. So I let him win that point.
The stage crew had some of the worst burns. Apple’s hands and forearms were especially bad—I’d seen him pull heavy, flaming benches off several audience members who would have died without his strength and courage. He’d grown quieter than ever; he hated that he’d lost the use of his hands while they healed. He spent most of his time alone, and when I did see him, it was usually with his bandaged arms raised as he knelt in the Brethren manner of prayer.
“May this loss remind us that we never lose what we truly need,” I heard him say one night.
He had prayed this way before the fire, but now more of the crew prayed with him. I never joined them.
* * *
Three days after the blaze, Ciaran and I were pushing wheelbarrows of sooty rubble toward the fast-growing pile at the edge of the park. Most of the dancing boys had been outside the tent when the fire started, resting and stretching in their long wait until the finale, so they were the least injured of any of us.
They’d done more than their share to step in for the injured crew. The dancing boys were strong, and Ciaran had marshaled them quickly.
“I’ve always admired the way you lead them,” I told him. “It was one of the first things I liked about you.”
He glanced at me, a grin lighting up his handsome face. “And here I thought it was my sex appeal!”
I rolled my eyes. “That too.”
It was, of course, and we both knew it—just as well as we knew that there was no longer any shred of chemistry or tension between us. That was part of what made Ciaran one of my favorite people to spend time with, even though we were both so busy on our opposite sides of the Circus Rose coin that we rarely had the chance. We’d had a sweet-natured romance that had mellowed out quite naturally into an even sweeter and mellower sense of mutual, platonic support and caring. I knew I could talk to Ciaran about things that were bothering me and he would offer a warm but clear-eyed perspective.
We dumped our wheelbarrows and stood catching our breath for a moment. I pulled my flask from its place at my hip and took a long drink of cool water.
Ciaran reached out for the flask and drank too, then poured a little water on his face and wiped off the soot that streaked his dark brown skin. “I hope you appreciate the sacrifices we’re making, Ivory, doing work that messes up our makeup.”
“I do.” I said it lightly, but as I accepted the flask back from him, I looked into his eyes. “Truly, Ciaran, I am grateful for everything you and the boys are doing. It’s amazing how you’ve all rallied. You shouldn’t have had to do this, none of you. I am sorry you have to.”
“Lord, Ivory, what else would we do? Of course we want to help. We’re part of this family too.”
I didn’t quite know what to say to that. The dancing boys were only ever supposed to be with the Rose for a short-term contract. Every time they renewed it, they said that they’d move on when the next renewal came up, but they just loved us too much to leave quite yet—even though they could surely make more money headlining their own show.
Ciaran continued: “And why are you sorry? It’s not as if you lit the fire.”
I suddenly felt hot, soot-gritty tears start running down my face. “I might as well have. I was negligent. I was supposed to do the safety checks and I rushed through them because—because I was thinking about Tam.”
Ciaran knew all about Tam; he was the only person besides Rosie in whom I’d confided about my crush.
He gave me a severe look. “We all rush through things on opening day, Ivory, for goodness sake. It wasn’t your fault.”
“If I were actually focused on something worthwhile instead of just thinking about the next time I’d get to kiss fer—if we hadn’t been kissing when the fire started—”
“Ivory. Stop.” Ciaran faced me and took both my shoulders in his hands. “I was there when the fire started. I’d slipped back in to watch Rosie’s act while my boys were cooling down. It came from nowhere. What on earth could you have done? What could anyone have done but what we did? Do you think I don’t wish I was stronger and faster so that I could have gotten more people out more quickly?”
I felt him watching me. “It wasn’t your fault,” he said, more gently this time. “No more yours than mine or anyone’s. It was a horrible accident.”
I took a deep breath. “And we’re trying to fix it,” I said.
He nodded. “Surely that matters more. Besides”—he flashed another of the bright grins I’d once found so irresistible—“what could be more worthwhile than kissing?”
We took up the empty wheelbarrows and began the much quicker walk
back to the center of the grounds.
* * *
Despite Ciaran’s good advice, I wasn’t quite ready to lose myself in Tam’s touch again the way I had when the fire started. But I couldn’t stop wanting to spend time with fer.
After an especially long day of managing repairs, I found myself—found, as if I’d been lost—sitting on the ground near the caravan with my head resting on my arms, my eyes closed, feeling as if my body weighed ten thousand times more than I could carry.
I felt someone take my hand and lift it a little, so lightly, and I looked up.
A beautiful freckled face with the darkest and gentlest eyes shining at me—just shining, with a sympathy that didn’t hold the slightest trace of pity.
“You deserve to get away for a while,” Tam said. “Vera says so too. She’ll deal with things for you while we’re gone.”
I felt tears start to come into my eyes, and Tam hesitated.
“If you’d like, I mean.”
I shook the tears away. “I really would.”
We walked to a theater a few blocks from the cathedral. It was called the Orpheum, and Mama and Vera had taken Rosie and me to plays there once or twice when we were little. They’d stopped taking us when they realized many of the productions had become morality tales and were sponsored by the Brethren. I’d always thought fondly of the Orpheum, though, and wondered what it would be like to come back.
The air inside was ten degrees cooler, and it smelled like greasepaint. I breathed it in deep. I hadn’t been in an audience in so long. Tam walked to the ticket booth and paid for us both before I even had a chance to offer.
“The matinee is just about to start,” I heard the woman at the booth say. “You’d better go right in.”
And before I knew it, Tam was at my side, taking hold of my arm and pulling me into the theater. “Aisle seats,” fe murmured, handing two lilac-colored slips of paper to an indifferent usher. “I couldn’t be having you say I’m cheap.”
The Circus Rose Page 8