Chapter 6 The Girl in the Carnival Gown
The Girl in the Carnival Gown
We’re riding our bikes to school when the carnival passes, and with a shared look, the three of us decide we don’t really need to go to school today.
Trailers clunk and shuffle along the dusty road.
Dismantled amusement park rides lie jumbled in unrecognizable pieces.
Ragged tarps cover other trailers, leaving us vying to peek through the holes.
Across each vehicle, a banner proclaims Blackrose Carnival!
Opening Tonight! No specific information is given, the banners recycled for every stop, all of them tattered, one nearly ripped through.
In our flyspeck town, we know only carnivals like this, tiny operations that arrive unannounced for Friday night and depart Sunday morning, on to another town, indistinguishable from ours.
We pedal madly after the procession, as if we could somehow lose them along the half-mile downtown stretch.
As expected, they pull into the supermarket.
The owner will go inside and negotiate with Mr. Cole, hoping to convince the old man that he should pay them for the sheer glamor of having a carnival in his parking lot.
He’ll listen, and then he’ll demand a hundred dollars for the inconvenience.
They’ll haggle, but in the end, Mr. Cole will be counting his five twenties and ordering his staff to set up food stands out front to take advantage of the hungry crowds.
We drop our bikes beside the supermarket and lope toward the collection of trailers. Reggie strides off on reconnaissance. His twin brother, Ray, follows me, Def Leppard blasting from his Walkman headphones.
I’m cutting behind a trailer when I spot a dog.
It’s a huge beast, a mastiff crossbreed bound by a rusty chain that barely allows it room to turn around.
When the dog spots me, it whines and lies down, head on its paws.
There’s no sign of a water bowl despite a blistering June sun baking the asphalt.
Bare skin flanks the dog’s studded collar where its fur has rubbed away. Scars crisscross its back.
I hunker down and croon under my breath, and the dog whines again.
Reggie strides around the corner, saying something, but the slap of a door cuts him off.
“Hey!” a man shouts. “You trying to get your face bit off, boy?”
I rise, and he realizes I’m not a boy. His gaze slides over me in a way that raises my hackles. Reggie sees it, too, and he surges forward. A look from me stops him. I pull the bill of my ball cap down, as if that’ll hide me.
The carnie is in his early twenties. A scraggly mustache and beard tries and fails to hide a serious lack of dental hygiene, and his hands and hair compete to see which can hold the most grease.
“We were wondering—” I begin.
“Step away from that dog, girl,” the man says. “She’s a killer.”
I look at the dog, head still on her big paws, brown eyes turned up to me.
Reggie snorts. “Yeah, she’d kill for a good meal. When’s the last time you fed her?”
The man steps toward him. “Maybe you wanna grow up a little, boy, before you talk like that.”
Reggie’s twelve, but he’s already nearly as tall as the man, lean and lanky, and he fixes the carnie with a stare that has the guy hesitating midstep and then planting his foot hard, as if to avoid withdrawing.
“You boys get on out of here,” he says. “If your cute little friend wants a look around, I’ll give her the tour.”
I’m ready to cut off Reggie’s inevitable retort when a man walks around the trailer. He’s in his forties, wearing an old-fashioned waistcoat pulled tight over his belly. He beams with the smile of a used-car salesman running behind on his monthly quota.
“Well, well, our first customers,” he says. “You’re a little early, kids, but I hope Charlie here was properly regaling you with the delights to come.”
“We were just talking about your dog,” I say. “She hadn’t gotten her water yet, and I was offering to fill her bowl, knowing how busy you are setting up.”
The man tilts his head, his eyes glinting with something deeper than his salesman’s smirk.
He studies me a moment. Then he says, “Charlie will obtain the necessary water and kibble. And I’ll find you a few game tickets in thanks for noticing poor Dixie’s plight.
I’m Theodore Blackrose, owner of this fair festival.
Barker, ringmaster, magician, and…” He winks with a look at the departing Charlie. “Carnie wrangler.”
“I’m Esmerelda,” I say. “But everyone calls me Ezzi.”
“Ezzi?” His brows shoot up in mock horror. “What a tragic debasement of such a magnificent moniker. I shall call you Esmerelda. And your companions?”
“Reggie,” I say because he really hates being called Reginald. “And his brother, Raymond.” Ray nods without taking off his headphones. “Game tickets would be great, sir, but we were actually wondering if you might have some work for us.”
“How can I refuse such a polite request? The extra help would be immensely appreciated. Come this way, please, and I’ll take you to our foreman.”
The foreman is more than happy to take advantage of three kids dumb enough to offer their services.
We haul fifty-pound bags of popcorn kernels to the snack kiosks.
We unpack prize boxes so tightly packed that the tiny stuffed toys spring out like confetti.
We scrub dust from those tattered banners and rehang them below the supermarket sign.
We even assemble a couple of midway rides…
and make mental note of which ones, so we don’t ride them.
It’s backbreaking work, but I love the chance to dig below the surface and see how a carnival works.
Reggie does, too, and he’s right in there, the two of us asking questions until the carnies feign laryngitis.
Ray never takes off his headphones, and it might look as if he’s bored, but we’re twelve—if we’re bored, we say so…
or, in Ray’s case, he would just wander off midtask to sit on a picnic bench.
He’s enjoying himself, though, and works in silence alongside us.
When we’re finished, we collapse on the narrow strip of mowed grass that passes for landscaping.
Mr. Cole gave us iced lemonade and watermelon—in return for slipping him the carnival food prices so he can undercut them—and we’re enjoying those while waiting for the foreman to bring our pay.
He finally comes over and hands us each a ticket.
“Free admittance to the carnival tonight,” he says.
Reggie stares down at the stub. “A five-dollar ticket? For eight hours of work?”
The foreman reaches into his pocket and peels off three one-dollar bills. He passes them out with a snide, “Don’t spend it all in one place.”
I catch sight of Mr. Blackrose and glance over, my expression enough to bring him striding our way.
“What seems to be the problem?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I say. “We were just thanking your foreman for our payment. Admission tonight and a dollar bill.”
There’s no sarcasm in my voice, yet the ringmaster’s eyes glint again with that knowing look, appreciation for my technique.
“Well, now, I’m glad you’re such good sports,” he says, “but that’s just our foreman’s idea of humor. I have your proper payment.” He reaches into his pockets and takes out a handful of two-day tickets. Then he pauses. “You three don’t still need parental accompaniment, do you?”
We all shake our heads.
“Excellent. Then let me magically transform these”—he flicks his wrist, and the handful of blue paper turns into three gold pieces of cardboard—“into all-access weekend passes, complete with front-row seats to my Saturday night magic show.” He winks at me.
“I think I’ve already found a lovely local assistant to join my fair Annabelle. ”
We take the passes with thanks.
I check on the dog—Dixie—before we leave. Her chain is empty. There are bowls with water and food, but both are so grimy that I’d like to serve Charlie his dinner in them. There’s a hose nearby, so I surreptitiously empty, clean and refill the bowls.
As I head to where Reggie and Ray wait, whispers snake out from the magician’s tent, drawing me to it. The black canvas is painted like a midnight sky with oddly shaped constellations. When I peer at the constellations, I realize they’re roses. Black roses, like the carnival’s name.
The whispers continue, low and urgent, and something in the tone sets my hackles rising, like when Charlie gave me that gross once-over. It’s not his voice, though. It’s a girl’s.
I step closer still, hoping to make out the words, but all I can catch is that murmur with gaps of silence, as if she’s speaking to someone who’s talking lower still.
I reach to touch the midnight-black canvas.
It’s cold and clammy, and I shiver. The girl’s voice comes again, and tendrils of fear waft out, wrapping around me, rooting me in place as I strain to listen.
The voice fades before I catch a single word. I stand there a moment, staring at those odd constellations. Then Reggie whistles, a double high-pitched signal that they’re ready to go. I reluctantly step back from the tent. Then I turn and run.
As soon as I get home, I tell my mom that I skipped school. She’s fine with that. It was the last day, mostly games and stuff that we’re too old for anyway. My parents are strict, but as long as I follow the rules, there’s wiggle room to make my own decisions, and I’m encouraged to do that.
Ray and Reggie’s mom will say the same thing. They live right next door, and our parents have been friends since they were kids. We’re a tight-knit group here just beyond the edge of town, a rural cul-de-sac of families joined by either kinship or friendship, often both.
At dinner, my parents want to hear all about my day. My sixteen-year-old brother doesn’t say anything—he’s too busy wolfing down his food, as always. That’s Zeke, short for Ezekiel. Yep, our parents like old names. At least they don’t make us use them.