Show Stopper

by Hayley Barker

  It’s ages before she says anything.

  “If that’s really the kind of thing you think you’d enjoy,” she says, finally.

  “Why wouldn’t I enjoy it?”

  She looks at me again then, and there’s a strange look on her face I’ve never seen before.

  “Do you really want me to tell you why?” she says.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Well…” she pauses for a moment and then she seems to collect herself. “Oh, ignore me. It doesn’t matter what I think. I’m just a Dreg; it’s not like I know what I’m talking about.” She turns away and then with her back to me she says, “I think you should go to bed. It’s not right, you being down here with me.”

  She’s never said that before. She picks up a bag of carrots and starts dicing them really quickly, chop chop chop, with the knife.

  Why is she so bothered about whether or not I go to the Cirque?

  “Priya?” I don’t know why I feel so awkward. “Are you OK?”

  “Fine.” Her voice is more restrained than normal. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I don’t understand what I’ve done wrong.”

  She sighs and turns to me. “No,” she says, more gently this time. “I don’t suppose you do.” She puts down the knife and leans on the work surface, her body slumping down like it’s an effort to hold herself up. When she looks up at me, her eyes bore into me. “The Cirque isn’t some magical wonderland, Ben. It’s a prison camp.”

  She crosses the room and looks out of the window at the city. You can see the rooftops of the Cirque from here, all lit up and twinkling. “That place is full of kids, most of them younger than you.” She laughs then, coldly and mirthlessly. “There don’t seem to be many adults in there, from what I understand. Do you think they make a choice, Ben? To leave their families, to live as orphans?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe they like being free, away from their mums and dads. And anyway, they’re only…” I stop myself before the words come out.

  “Only Dregs? Is that what you were going to say?”

  I hang my head. I didn’t mean to upset her even more.

  She walks back to the counter and starts chopping the carrots again. “You’re right, of course. It’s only Dreg kids in there; they don’t really matter at all. Dregs don’t have feelings anyway, isn’t that right?”

  I don’t say anything.

  “It must be right. That’s what they tell you at school, isn’t it? That’s what your parents say, what your government says. Of course it’s right.”

  I’m not sure whether she wants me to answer her. I don’t know what to say, so I just sit there silently.

  There’s a strange feeling inside me as I sit, watching her back while she keeps furiously chopping the vegetables; it feels a bit like guilt, a bit like shame. It doesn’t make sense. Why do I feel like I’ve done something wrong?

  In the end, I fold the sari up, leaving it on the stool, before I skulk away out of the room and back to bed.

  HOSHIKO

  Amina’s still not back and everyone else is asleep, except for me. In my arms, Greta’s breathing is deep and calm. I bury my head into her soft hair and pull her in tightly.

  How would I feel if she finally agreed to sleep on her own? I’d hate it, I know I would.

  This night-time comfort I bring her, it’s a two-way thing. Usually, cuddling up to her helps stop the pain a little. Not tonight though. Tonight, all the memories, all the pain, all the fear won’t behave themselves. Not content to be held at bay, they seep in through the cracks of the walls I’ve built up inside to torment me.

  I try to think about other things, but the images whirl in my brain like crazy black-and-white snapshots, revolving round and round.

  For a second, I see Mum, Dad and Miko, how they were when I last saw them, a frozen tableau, arms stretched out to me. I try to reach back, to touch those trailing fingers, but they’re gone, a blur, receding into the distance. Before I can fully focus on their eyes, their faces, before I fully remember what they were like, they slip from my grasp, like they always do.

  Why can’t I remember? Why has it all gone? All faded away to nothing, so that all I get are these torturous glimpses?

  Greta still remembers. She takes herself back home sometimes, when things here are really bad. She gets this glazed look on her face and you know she’s gone away to another place altogether. It makes it harder for her, I know, but sometimes I envy her, this little girl next to me. She hasn’t lost them yet, her family, not like I have.

  It frightens me how detached my thoughts have become. Pictures of the place that was home are all blurry and fuzzy, like wisps of smoke. I try to grab hold of them, but they vanish in my hands. It’s as if I’m telling someone else’s story when I try to remember anyone clearly, even my mum. I can’t work out any more which is a real memory and which is my own detail, added to fill the gaps. That’s exactly why they ban members of the Cirque from having any contact with their family: to cut the ties that bind, stop us pining for home.

  I hate that it’s worked.

  I used to cry for them all the time. I used to be filled with a desperate, hungry longing for my mum and dad, and my baby brother. He was only one when I left. A chubby little thing, I remember, as impossible as that seems. How could he have been chubby, living in the slums like that? My mum was still feeding him, that’s why. She was very pale and weak, like a tiny twig. He must have been sucking away all her nutrients, as I did before him.

  She was sacrificing herself for him, for both of us, quietly wasting away with a gentle smile on her face. That’s what she was like: very selfless, very soft, very patient. That’s all I see when I look back: an increasingly faded outline. One day I’ll find out, somehow, what happened to my family.

  I turn away and face the wall, my fingers picking at the cracked and dirty plaster.

  A trickle, a flow, a flood: the dam bursts.

  Out of nowhere, a great sob rises up from deep inside me. I bury my head in the thin pillow, trying to suppress the sound. It won’t work though; if anyone’s still awake they’ll be able to hear me. I’ve heard others sobbing in the night often enough before to know that.

  I never cry any more. What’s wrong with me tonight? The last thing I need is to wake Greta up. It would distress her: she’s never seen me like this. No one has. Apart from Amina.

  In the end, I ease my arms from underneath her and get out of bed, as softly as I can. I pad silently over to the window and cling on to the bars, leaning my head against them and looking out.

  Nestled up high, almost touching the stars it seems, are the huge houses of the rich and famous, ring-fencing the city. There’s one with a light on still, right at the very top, and there’s a figure silhouetted at the window.

  I hear a sound behind me and I turn around to see Amina, stretching and yawning her way over to where I stand.

  “How’s the patient?” I ask her.

  She gives a rueful smile. “He’s OK, I guess. I mean it was a clean break, it would heal fine if…” She doesn’t need to say it; I know what she means. If he was allowed time for the bone to knit then it would be OK, but if he’s out of action and not making money for the Cirque then Silvio won’t be inclined to be patient.

  Amina has the dubious honour of being the only Dreg ever who’s been kept in the Cirque even though she can’t perform any more. She’s twenty now: that’s old for someone in here. Until a year and a half ago, she was one of our best performers. She fell one night though, and that was that. She’d been up all night with a sick child – Aran, his name was – trying to coax him back to life after he’d been set upon by a group of Pures visiting the circus for their sick sport. It didn’t work – he died in the end anyway – but she didn’t get any sleep, hadn’t had for days. That’s why it happened.

  There were archers in the arena that day, twelve of them. Timing is always imperative when you’re on the trapeze, but when you�
�re also dodging the deadly sharp arrows being fired at you from all directions, it makes it kind of tricky to concentrate.

  I remember it so clearly, swinging across on the trapeze, holding my hands out, waiting for her to catch hold, like she’d done a million times before. I remember the arrow, soaring through the air, piercing her neck, quivering there while the audience exploded with glee. I remember her mouth, opening in shock, her eyes widening. She only lost her concentration for an instant, that was all, but an instant’s too long in our business. She missed her moment. She didn’t catch my hands and her foot flashed past the centre-point of the wire. Just a millimetre, just a fraction, that’s all it took.

  It was like slow motion, swinging up there, watching helplessly as she fell. Her arms, reaching up to me; her eyes, so big and frightened as she dropped down, down, down into the crowd below.

  The Pures surged the arena that night, ignored the security warnings, pushed through the guards and the barriers. Hundreds of them, all desperate to get to her first. A seething, crazed mob.

  One moment I saw her land, the next they were on her, tearing her to pieces.

  And they say we aren’t human.

  It’s almost laughable. These Pures, with all their airs and graces, that sense of superiority they wear like a crown. They’re animals, beasts, every last one of them.

  God knows how Amina didn’t die that night. They left her for dead. They thought she was dead. They’d have torn her into pieces if the guards hadn’t finally seized control. She’s never been the same since. You can’t perform on the wire when your arms and legs have been broken multiple times, when your ribs are crushed and fingers bent and useless.

  The only reason Silvio let her stay was because of her healing skills. She’s never been officially trained, obviously, but her mother taught her the basics when she was tiny, before they took Amina away, and she’s been doing it ever since. No one tells her what to do; she just seems to know. It’s in her blood. It’s been in her family for generations, apparently: healing, medicine.

  That’s why Silvio tolerates her. She’s still of use to him, unlike all the others. She cuts costs, keeps people alive for him who would otherwise have died, fixes and mends his best assets, gets them up and back out on the stage. He never bothers with the cost of an actual trained doctor, just calls on Amina to get him out of scrape after scrape.

  The only time I’ve ever felt anything but hatred for him was when he spared her life. That night, I felt like hugging him.

  I took her strength for granted, before then. She’d always seemed so strong, so tough. My hero. I’d never have made it through without Amina teaching me, supporting me, making me believe there’s life after here; that there’s an end in sight to this wretched existence. She’s still my hero, of course, but I know she’s not invincible now. I know I have to try and protect her, just as much as she tries to protect me.

  I can feel her scrutinizing my face. “You’ve been crying,” she says. “What’s up?”

  “I don’t know really.” I sigh. “Nothing. Everything. You must be exhausted. Go to bed, honestly, I’m fine.”

  She smiles, but she doesn’t move. She wraps her arm around my waist and we stand there, side by side, gazing out on the moonlit night.

  I lean my head on her shoulder, resting it on her mass of wild curls.

  “I was thinking about my family,” I tell her. “I can’t remember what my mum looks like.”

  She doesn’t say anything for a moment.

  “It’s hard,” she says. “I forget things too.”

  “Do you?”

  She nods sadly.

  “Just don’t let them take away who you are and where you’ve come from. That’s the way you keep your family with you, that’s what I tell myself. The details might get a bit fuzzy at times but we never lose our loved ones; they stay here, deep inside us. They make us who we are.”

  Amina always knows what to say to make me feel better.

  “Do you think it can ever change?” I ask her. “The way things are?”

  Her reply is immediate and resolute.

  “Yes. If we keep on believing. If we don’t give up hope. If we stay united. Yes, it will change. Look over there,” she says, pointing over the city to the distant horizon. There’s a faint pink tinge to the sky. “There’s a new day dawning.”

  She strokes my hair softly and I feel my shoulders relaxing.

  She takes my hand and leads me back to my bunk. When I curl up next to Greta, she tucks the thin sheet around me and sits on the floor next to me, still stroking my hair like she used to, long ago, in the early days.

  I feel myself drifting off.

  BEN

  By the time I make it down to the breakfast room, everyone else is already eating in silence. Francis has his phone out, as usual, playing some violent game or other – Dreg Destruction, it looks like, Father’s reading the news on his tablet and Mother’s checking through her emails.

  I try to catch Priya’s eye when she’s putting the plates down but she doesn’t look at me and give that secret little smile like she usually does.

  Mother suddenly gives a derisive snort. She sounds so disgusted that we all look up, even Francis. She silently hands her tablet over to Father and he scans through the message on the screen. He chuckles and hands it back to her.

  “I take it the answer’s going to be no?”

  “Yes! The answer will be no!”

  Her cool blue eyes turn towards Francis and me. “They’ve offered us first-night tickets at the Cirque,” she says. “VIP. Opening night. That’s tonight.”

  I look at Priya, standing in the corner now, with her head bowed. I don’t want to make her cross again but I can’t miss this opportunity.

  “I think I’d like to go,” I say tentatively. I have this funny feeling Mother’s not going to like me saying it.

  She looks at me and tuts. “You actually want to go and see that load of rubbish? Watch a load of Dregs degrading themselves?” She raises one eyebrow in that sardonic way she has. “Why, exactly, Benedict?”

  I feel myself squirming under her scrutiny.

  “Everyone at school’s going,” I say, realizing as soon as the words come out of my mouth what a weak answer it is. “And it would be educational,” I add, “seeing what happens out there for once. Know thy enemy, and all that.”

  “Hmm. Everyone at school, you say? Francis, what’s your view on this?”

  He shrugs. “Might be fun, I suppose. Especially if there’s any action, if you know what I mean.” His eyes light up. “I think I’d like watching that!”

  My father slams his cup down, sploshing coffee out on to the table.

  “Don’t even think about it.” His voice is uncharacteristically firm.

  “I have to think about it, Peter,” says Mother. “I have to keep my eye on the party leadership now. Raising my profile at a major event like this could be the difference between winning and losing.”

  “No! I will not have you putting the boys at risk in order to further your own reputation!”

  “You speak as if I’m doing it for my own vanity. This is for you too, and them. I work hard for everyone in this family. I’m doing this for us all!”

  “You’re doing it for yourself. We agreed, after what happened before, that we’d protect them, no matter what.”

  What happened before. They always use those words to describe it. As if we don’t know exactly what they mean.

  It’s still so vivid in my mind.

  A hand in a crowd, grabbing me, pulling me away from them. A knife at my throat. Gunshots.

  “It’s been two years, things are different now. The Dregs are under much tighter control.”

  “That just makes them more resentful, can’t you see? It makes another attempt more likely, not less.”

  “We’ll take extra security guards, the police will be on hand. What can they do, really?”

  “Plenty! They can do plenty. Why on earth would you want to
expose the boys to any of that rubbish anyway?”

  Her tone is diplomatic. “We can’t keep them wrapped up in cotton wool for ever, Peter.”

  “We’re not wrapping them in cotton wool, we’re protecting them, as best we can. Parading them in front of a load of angry, embittered Dregs is foolish. Foolish and dangerous. And these aren’t just any Dregs; these are circus Dregs. The lowest of the low!”

  She acts as if she hasn’t heard him. “There’ll be cameras there, thousands of people, all posting about it online.” A smile forms at the corners of her mouth as she pictures it.

  “We are not going. I absolutely forbid it.”

  They both lean forward, glaring at each other. Her, dressed for power as always: crisp white shirt, expensive blue jacket, sleek red bob. Him, not quite pulling off the same effect; shirt a little too tight these days, tie slightly askew, hair thinning on top.

  I hold my breath.

  It’s not long before my father looks away. “Do what you want. Do what you bloody well want.” His voice is exasperated, resigned, defeated, all at once. “You were always going to anyway!”

  My mother’s smile returns; a little smirk of victory. “Well, that’s settled then. Get your glad rags ready, boys.” Her voice is dripping with sarcasm. “We’re going to the circus!”

  HOSHIKO

  The morning alarms jolt me awake. I must have only fallen asleep about an hour ago and now my head feels even more heavy and fuzzy than it normally does. There’s a warm indent next to me where Greta was lying. She’s probably up already and running about in the communal area with all the other little ones. God knows how they find the energy to play. Amina’s not around either – she’ll be checking on her patient in the san.

  I join the long line filing its way into the canteen, grab my rations and suddenly notice Amina’s mass of dark, curly hair. She’s already here, in the corner, at the end of one of the huge wooden tables which fill the room.

  The big room is busy already but there are two places free opposite her, for Greta and me.

  I slide in on the bench and stare down at my tray. Two vitamin tablets, which allegedly contain all the nutrients we need, a grey-looking oatcake and a glass of milk.