Chapter 8
There was renewed vigor backstage as Chicot got her pirate outfit on.
For some reason, Monty and Elvis were singing some nursery rhyme and high-fiving each other a lot.
Chicot didn’t question it. She simply absorbed the energy in the room as she pulled on her gear and tied a bandana around her hair.
Monty took a step toward Chicot after she finished with the bandana. “Here, this will look better.”
She slipped her fingers into Chicot’s hair, tugging on it gently so she could pull parts out of the bandana.
Chicot couldn’t really tell what this accomplished, only that Monty’s fingers felt nice and Ken’s comment about swimming was ringing in her ears.
When she finished, Monty held up a mirror, and Elvis whistled.
Whatever Monty had done, it meant Chicot’s hair, which had been bullied by her jester hood, now hung in an artful mess around her face.
It made her look boyish in a good way, androgynous and young and ready to strike out on the open sea.
This was exactly what Wee had become for their version of the show.
“Wow,” Chicot said. “You’re good at this.”
Monty pursed her lips. “I’ve just had short hair for a long time. I know what works.”
Then, they stepped on stage together, bantering as they set up, much like they would with Lyza. This time, after Elvis made his usual short jokes about Chicot, he added:
“And the poor thing can’t even do her own hair!” He gestured at Monty. “Our resident tough lady pirate had to do it. That’s Middle, if you didn’t know!”
Monty threw her head back and laughed, the crowd roaring in agreement.
Chicot responded like she would in the jester costume, because she wasn’t so great at spoken improv yet, and shook her head, letting her hair flop around.
The crowd seemed to like this too, and after the show went off well, the three of them laughed with Lyza—who had been waiting for them backstage—about it.
She was often there between shows, sitting on the crate and swinging her legs as they all talked.
“For some reason, I thought you were about to call me ‘our resident lesbian’ on stage,” Monty said.
Elvis snorted, throwing his head back as another chortle came out of him.
Chicot grinned at the noise, pulling up her jester hood and looking at the small mirror they’d hung on the wall to straighten the points.
“I know better than that!” Elvis looked at Monty and grinned. Chicot could see them in the mirror.
“I know, but once it was in my head, it took me a second to realize you said lady pirate.” Monty slipped her bandana off since she had to change for the final show of the day, where they used lit torches for their juggling, rather than daggers.
It was a requirement that whatever she wore be fire retardant, which to Chicot seemed fair.
She then waited for Elijah, who would probably turn up shortly.
He’d decided to continue to promote for them until The Pirates Three were finished, since Chicot couldn’t.
“Well, we could call you our resident bisexual disaster on stage if you’d like.” Lyza gently kicked the crate she was sitting on with her heel. “It would be accurate.”
“No, thank you!” Monty threw her hands up in the air, laughing as she looked at Chicot. “Can you believe these two?”
Monty was doing this more often now, including Chicot in their bickering. It seemed to be a subtle way of saying they had actually become friends. Chicot shrugged though.
“Seems about right for siblings.” Chicot hopped on one foot as she put her jester shoes back on.
“See, Chicot agrees.” Monty smirked at Lyza, nudging her as Lyza stuck her tongue out at Monty. Chicot shook her head, tying the laces on the backs of her shoes as they continued to bicker.
“Chicot!” Elijah burst through the door, causing them all to jump, Chicot in particular because she’d been standing closest to it.
“What?” Chicot drew her arms in close, like she was about to get yelled at by her mom. Elijah closed the door behind him, then reached out for Chicot, setting his hands on her cheeks.
“What did you say to Brewhilda?” Elijah asked. Chicot scrunched up her face, waving him off so she didn’t have to have this conversation in front of Lyza. She didn’t need to know the hurtful things that Brewhilda said.
“Nothing really,” Chicot started. They all stared at her now, Monty in particular looking between Chicot and Elijah. Lyza bit her lip, worrying it as her large eyes darted over Chicot.
“Well, she’s reporting it to the director, so it’s not nothin’.” Elijah put his hands on his hips, letting Chicot pull away from him. She pressed her lips into a hard line, glancing once toward Lyza, trying to signal to Elijah that it was about her.
“Ken can tell you the details,” Chicot added. “But it was really nothing that serious. I don’t think the director will be mad.”
“He probably won’t,” Lyza said quickly. “Brewhilda makes at least one complaint like that a season.”
Elijah sighed, looking at Lyza and then at Chicot again. It seemed like he’d noticed the way that Chicot had looked at her, so maybe he’d drop it. He patted her on the shoulder, the small wooden space suddenly feeling so much tighter as everyone stared at her.
“I believe you,” Elijah said. “But try not to get us into any trouble, yeah?”
“I won’t.” Chicot bowed her head. “Promise.”
Elijah settled down as Elvis and Lyza started to placate him further with other stories of Brewhilda telling the director about this or that.
Monty stood in the corner, her arms crossed as she watched Chicot, eyes narrowed.
Luckily, there wasn’t really time for her to stop Chicot before she had to be on stage with Elijah.
The two of them had their crate and table in hand before Elvis even had his stilts fully ready, so Chicot narrowly escaped whatever conversation Monty wanted to have.
After they’d finished their show, Elijah left her backstage to get the details of what happened with Brewhilda from Ken. She was still organizing their props when Monty slipped through the back door, standing in front of it once it was closed.
“Okay, so what did Brewhilda say?” Monty asked. Chicot held her ruffled jester collar in front of her like a shield. When she didn’t answer, Monty tapped her foot impatiently and told her to spit it out, so Chicot sighed.
“She said something nasty about Lyza.” Chicot made quotation marks with her hands. “Something like, ‘she probably did something stupid, like getting pregnant.’ Which, I know Lyza is pregnant, but it’s not like Lyza’s openly telling people that yet, and Brewhilda was being mean.”
Monty’s throat bobbed and she set her jaw, looking down her nose at Chicot. “And what did you say?”
“Well, Ken from the sausage stand called them out for gossiping about someone being pregnant first.” Chicot rubbed the back of her head, then stopped herself for fear of pulling her hood down accidentally. “Then I called them out for having worse morals than the sausage stand guy.”
Monty’s lip quirked up at the side, but her jaw was still firmly set. Chicot could even see her muscles flexing under her skin.
“Was that all?” Monty asked.
“Pretty much.” For some reason, Chicot wasn’t afraid. Monty ground her teeth, her shoulders squared. But Chicot hadn’t attracted her ire. That anger was directed elsewhere. Which, reasonable, Chicot thought. Brewhilda had said something pretty fucked up.
“Okay.” Monty released her fists, wiggling her fingers for a moment before she looked at Chicot. “Sorry, thank you for telling me.”
“Of course.” Chicot shrugged. “It was nothing, but Monty? Don’t do anything stupid.”
Monty froze. After a moment, she shook her head, raising her open palms at Chicot.
“I’m not going to,” Monty said. “I just needed to know.”
Chicot nodded and finished getting her belt flag on. She stepped out into the faire again, her mask on and her bag full of tricks. She stayed fairly close to the stage in the afternoons, not wanting to stray too far since she had a shorter break between shows.
When she returned, Monty was already backstage, carefully setting her stilts between two studs on the wall so they wouldn’t fall over.
Chicot just started to change, the two of them getting ready for their next show in a comfortable silence.
Soon after, Elvis appeared in the doorway, the three of them quickly finding their rhythm again, and they didn’t lose it the rest of the weekend.
The shows flew by, and Chicot fully got things down and polished out the last of the rough edges at practice the next week.
The summer started moving much faster, maybe faster than Chicot wanted it to.