That Time I Joined the Circus (11 page)

“Ouch.” Nick mock-winced. “That hurts. But you’re an old soul — shows in your eyes. You’ll be fine.”

The way he said it, flat-out like that, no joking or irony, seemed almost to make it true. And then I snapped out of the spell
his
eyes had briefly put me under and felt nervous again. Who was I kidding?

“Practice on me,” I heard him saying.

Had everyone in the whole circus decided I needed practice?

“But your mom is a professional,” I told him.

“My
mother
, yes. But I never let her do a reading for me,” he said as he expertly shuffled the cards. “So I really
won’t know any more about it than anyone coming in off the street. It will be the perfect unbiased opinion.”

“You never let her?”

He narrowed his eyes slightly. “I don’t actually claim to believe in any of this.” He gestured to the cards and the crystal ball. “But my mother is quite insightful. Good at reading people. I was never anxious to volunteer to sit still and have her work her mojo on me.”

“Well, you’re safe as kittens with me.” I reached over to take the now neatly shuffled and stacked cards from him.

“I’m not so sure about that.” He smiled wickedly at me.

I tried to ignore that one. I laid out the cards, hoping I didn’t blank on any of the divinatory meanings I had obsessively memorized for each of the seventy-eight cards — at least not in front of Nick. I turned over the first card, and I looked down to see a naked man and woman: the Lovers. Great.

“Attraction and temptation are indicated by this card.” I tried to sound professional and avoid looking at him at the same time.

“Maybe there’s something to this after all,” he said under his breath, and then looked up at me. “Go on.”

“We’ll have to see what it means in the context of the other cards,” I hedged, my heart beating so loudly, I was pretty sure he’d be able to hear it. What was wrong with me?

“Yeah, it seems like a really mysterious card.” He grinned at me and leaned forward so that his right arm was touching mine. At least no other reading I could do tonight — or
maybe ever — could be any more distracting. I quickly turned over the next card. I had already gotten the most embarrassing one, so I might as well keep going. I flipped over the Two of Swords, which shows a blindfolded woman kneeling, holding two crossed swords in the air.

“An impasse,” I told him. “Whatever you are … asking about, there is an immediate obstacle or challenge to … finding the answer you are looking for.” I snuck a look at him then, but he kept his face impassive. “It looks as though you’re stuck in your own mind. You’re deciding something.”

Nick nodded slowly; the playful smile had faded, and he looked a little serious. “Sounds about right.” He seemed to shake himself and remember that he was supposed to be encouraging me. “Go ahead, you’re doing great. What does the next one say?”

I flipped over the third card, the one that was about the questioner’s distant past. I was pretty curious about Nick’s past myself; I wished I did know how to use these cards to pull some kind of answers out of him. But another part of me felt like that was a really bad idea.

“Uh-oh,” I said to him, smiling a little. “The Queen of Cups, reversed. This is a card of dishonesty. May indicate an untrustworthy woman. Sounds like somebody in your past wasn’t who you thought.”

Nick nodded again, looking more interested. “As long as she’s in the distant past, good deal. Keep going,” he told me.

I guessed that was all I was getting there. I turned over the cards in the fourth and fifth positions, and both were
from the Pentacles suite, more about material fortune than emotional, and both positive cards. The sixth card, indicating the immediate future, came up the Fool.

“Well, well. I wonder who that could be?” Nick grinned again at me. He took my hand in his and raised it to his lips, slowly. What was with this guy and hand-kissing? It was like he
knew
he was dealing with a girl who was addicted to Jane Austen or something. The little trailer got really warm then.

I finished the reading, but I have no idea what cards he got, or what I said about them. He kissed me again, on the top of my head, after he got up from the table.

“You will do very well tonight,” he said softly, and then he was gone.

It took me maybe fifteen minutes to stop staring at the chair he’d abandoned and get up and move.

He was right about one thing. There was no doubt at all about who the Fool was.

13 Broome Street — Thursday, September 30

Okay, so I stopped posting status updates on Facebook a long time ago. I noticed that whenever someone posts something completely mundane and stupid, like
Sushi 2nite!
seventeen people have to comment on that.
I
Sushi!
and
Spicy Tuna 4 meee!
But if you ever try to actually say something serious about your feelings or, like, your life, every one of your 386 “friends” is suddenly mute. So there you have it: My life is a post with no comments. Less interesting than spicy tuna.

I guess I could start a blog, but that would be like posting my diary online: no thank you. Plus, if no one has the time to respond to a seven-word status update, who, exactly, do I think would be reading some lame blog anyway?

It was only fifth period, and the day was already dragging. I was sitting on the floor, a little ways outside the caf.
All of a sudden, somebody’s face was right in front of me. Bailey smiled at me tentatively, looking kind of concerned.

“You okay, X? You seem a little … I don’t know. I guess just, are you okay?”

I nodded at her as she straightened back up, readjusting the strap of her black Balenciaga schoolbag. I only knew the brand name because I’d been with her when she’d bought it, and it cost just about the same as a month’s rent on our apartment. I think I’d bought some gum on that outing.

“I’m just kind of tired, I guess,” I told her. “But thanks for asking.”

The thing about Bailey is, she has these bags and shoes that cost as much as the car my dad used to have, but she never makes fun of me for having the same bag since tenth grade, or the fact that it’s from the Gap. When we first hung out, and I would admire something that was really expensive, sometimes she would try to buy it for me. After I said “no, but thank you” enough times she gave up, and she doesn’t do it anymore, but that’s the kind of person she is. I sometimes forget that when she’s being sort of the Adventure Barbie Bailey. And then I feel like a crummy person.

“How’re you doing today?” I asked her.

“Okay.” Again, Bailey sounded kind of down-tempo. Usually she was more of an up-tempo girl. I wondered briefly if Bailey had a soundtrack in her head, too. Probably that was just me. Before I could think better of it, I asked, “Bailey,
do you ever hear music in your head? You know, like even when there’s none playing?”

She looked thoughtful for a second. “Sometimes, I guess. I sort of wish there were music playing all the time — you know, like on
The Real World
or something.”

I laughed. “Exactly — that would be great. And if all the boring parts of my life would be edited out. Of course, that would make the Xandra show about as short as your average commercial break.”

“Stop, loser.” Bailey hit me on the arm. “You are always so self-depreciating, or whatever. I think you are totally interesting.”

I smiled at her and through sheer force of will didn’t tell her the word she wanted was
self-deprecating
. I fell in step with Bailey’s long strides.

“If only life could be like it is on one of those shows,” I said. “Everything’s interesting and dramatic, and every argument is solved by them playing a song over the closing credits.”

“Yeah, and they get to vent about everything in those confession boxes,” Bailey said with a laugh.

“But actually, it would kind of suck for there to be cameras around all the time, ready to go when I did something stupid or embarrassing. Like most days.”

She hit me again — and it hurt a little this time. “Hey, I told you to stop being so mean to my friend! You have to start being nice to yourself, X.”

“Okay, I’ll work on it,” I grumbled at her, but I smiled, too. “But that would be really cool if …”

“Ohmygod, I have to go! I have, like, a million things to do before tonight!”

“What about period six?” I started to ask her, but she was already gone.

Orlando, Florida — Saturday, October 30

I sat across from my first paying customers — a couple dressed as pirates in honor of Halloween. The girl pirate was getting the reading, and she seemed a little unimpressed until her final card was the Star.

“This is a really positive card,” I told her. “It’s usually a sign of —”

“Ohmygod — I knew it! I’m so going to be in that movie! And then I’m outta here! I am
definitely
moving to LA now.”

The boy pirate looked a little crushed, but she didn’t seem to notice. I decided not to confuse her with the actual meaning of the card, and let her go away happy. (At least one of them was.) This was my first lesson in the customers seeing what they wanted to in the cards, and me not trying to stop them.

The rest of the first night went by in a blur of costumes.
It was hard to try to read people’s faces when so many of them were wearing full-face makeup or masks, but I got through it. I had a line of people waiting right away. Luckily, I also started getting some help.

Nick came to check on me and found more people than I guess he’d expected, and then he stayed. He kept showing up each evening, helping me get set up, and then hanging around to sell the tickets and be my sort-of bouncer. I had only seriously needed his help one time so far — this guy who had been more interested in creeping me out than finding out about his future.

A couple of days after my debut, Nick was helping me light all the candles. I’d hit play on my iPod. I saved the special playlist for the customers; one of the hundreds I’d made last summer was playing. “Is this Radiohead?” he asked me.

“Thom Yorke,” I answered, tilting a candle with a tiny wick to the side and trying to get the flame to grow. “He’s the lead singer of Radiohead, though. Writes most of their songs. My dad saw him perform in the early nineties — he was in a band called Headless Chickens. I always loved that name.”

“Reminds me of a circus geek,” he said.

I cringed. “Aren’t they supposed to bite the heads off live chickens? Have you ever seen one?”

“I can’t actually say I have. You’ve seen the protestors
just for the animals that perform. There’s no way anybody’s going to bite the heads off animals in today’s circus.”

“Guess not,” I told him. “This conversation took a strange turn.”

“Don’t look at me, music encyclopedia girl.” He smiled and handed me his matches. “You’ve got fire now. By the way, in return for my awesome help tonight, I want you to make me a mix.”

“Sure,” I told him. He kissed me on the nose, and my heart jumped. “Break a leg,” he said, and then went out to get the first customer of the night.

The lines stayed long all that week. As soon as it got late and the second show in the ring was over, there were mostly teenagers outside on the midway. That’s when I got a pretty good crowd going outside the trailer. I had hung some lanterns out there and put candles in them, and with the music and the darkness, it was kind of clublike. It also didn’t hurt that I now basically had a male model out there, drawing in all the girls.

One night, I gave readings for what seemed like about a hundred teenage girls, all dressed in what seemed the suburban Florida uniform for fall: a tight little sweater, itty-bitty denim skirt, and big furry boots. I did not understand the boots, because it was still over ninety degrees at eleven o’clock at night, but these girls were all set to tromp through at least a light dusting of snow.

I did my own share of sweating, trying to figure out each girl, see past the uniform. Tell her something she could maybe use, but not something she didn’t want to hear. I concentrated on the tan, blond girl in front of me, trying to figure out what might be unique about her. Then I turned over her immediate obstacles card: the Death card.

The girl, whose name was Crystal, saw the card and promptly flipped out. “Really?! I’m gonna die — that’s what that means, right? Oh my God!”

“That’s not what it means,” I told her. “I mean, it can actually be a really positive card. It can mean just the end of something —”

“
Oh my God!
The end of
my life
!” Crystal yelled. “Ashley! Get in here! Now!”

A girl who could have been Crystal’s twin, at least as far as hair and clothes, ducked inside, Nick right behind her.

Crystal started crying, and Ashley glared at me. “I’m going to die!” Crystal sobbed. “This girl told me — she p-p-pulled this card, and it said … it said …
Death
!” She turned and saw Nick standing there and threw herself into his arms, sobbing, while Ashley continued to glare.

Nick patted her back and told her it was going to be okay, she wasn’t going to die. I opened my mouth to finish explaining about the card, but Nick just shook his head at me. He led Crystal away, the angry Ashley in her wake.

A couple of minutes later, after I read for a cute little ninth-grade couple who held hands the whole time, Nick returned.

He threw himself into the seat opposite me. “God, that girl could cry.” He pulled his now damp shirt away from his chest and made a face of disgust. “I thought she’d never stop. And then when she finally did, the other one started. I got them some Cokes and took them over to the Tower — told the guys to let them ride as many times as they wanted. Say, Lexi” — he leaned forward, raising his eyebrows at me — “you think we could maybe take the Death card out of rotation, hmm? I don’t love the idea of being cried on for an hour every time you pull it.”

“I didn’t tell her she was going to die,” I started to protest, but he put his hand up.

“I know what you’re going to say — it can be a positive card, new beginnings and all. But maybe this crowd just isn’t quite up to making that distinction?”

I shuffled the deck until I found the offending card, then I leaned forward and slipped it into the front pocket of his button-down shirt, patted the pocket, and smiled at him. He shook his head, stood up, and walked back toward his post, muttering something under his breath that I couldn’t make out.

I got my cards and table ready for the next customer. Taking the Death card out was just more of what I had already been doing: cheating a little. I had pinched up the corner of my old friend the Lovers card, and I’d been reaching for it whenever it looked like it would really be appreciated. I mean, the card is about relationships, and we all have those.

I got a chance to advise one girl who kept hinting about a friendship — with a guy — that she wanted to turn into
more
. “Things will never be the same,” I told her. “So just think really carefully before you leap.”

“Is that in my cards?” the little blond girl asked. (I wondered if I should tell her to skip the Hurricane — she was exactly Jamie’s type.)

I smiled, probably a little ruefully. “No, it’s in my life,” I told her. “And I wish it weren’t. But everyone’s different, every relationship. Either way, it won’t hurt to consider things an extra time or two, right?”

She smiled back. “It’s not like he sees me that way, anyway. So I’ve got plenty of time to think.”

The next girl had her boyfriend in tow, this really beefy, loud guy, who was for some reason wearing a leather jacket in blatant disregard for the heat.

I turned over the Fool card and started to explain the meaning, but he started talking over me right away. “She’s the fool,” he said. “No doubt about it.”

I tried to ignore him, but it wasn’t easy. Basically it seemed like he was trying to get her to leave her family and move to Boston with him, and he tried to twist every card and interpretation to fit that end, even though from her face, the girl didn’t want to do anything but stay right down here in the land of sunshine and furry boots.

“Hey, girlie,” he finally said to me when I tried to tell his girlfriend that the Six of Cups meant happiness gained from family. “You obviously don’t know anything. What are you,
sixteen?” He was yelling by this point. “Who are you to tell us what to do? So why don’t you shut up and give us our money back? How about that
interpetation
?” He said the last word wrong, without the
r
, and even though this jerk had just made every fear I’d had about this job come true, I still found it funny. Just as my very badly timed laughter was bubbling up, my bouncer appeared.

“Excuse me,” Nick said from behind Jerky. “I think it’s time for you to leave.”

He smoothly reached around with a ten-dollar bill and put it in the front pocket of Jerky’s jacket, which, now that I really looked, was made of cheap-looking vinyl. Jerky tried to grab Nick’s hand, but Nick was faster and grabbed his instead, and from the looks of things was pretty much crushing it. I tried not to smile, reminding myself about karma.

Nick led the now loudly protesting Jerky out of the trailer, and his girlfriend turned around to mouth
I’m sorry
to me.

“Break up with him,” I told her, taking momentary advantage of my de facto status as a fortune teller with a hot bouncer.

She smiled sadly, and I knew right away that she wouldn’t. Why do people stay with jerks?

Nick put his head back in the tent. “You okay?”

I sighed. “I’m good,” I told him. “Thank you — really. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t been here, though. But you can send in the next one.”

Nick shook his head. “Louie ought to know better.” He sounded angry. “As soon as I realized he planned to leave you alone, I knew I couldn’t go yet.”

With that, he went back out to manage the line. And I was left in a daze. He’d stayed for me? He was leaving the circus? Why did everyone have to leave? And why hadn’t I seen this coming? He didn’t work here. He had no attachment to me beyond a little speck of guilt that was now certainly assuaged.

Some freaking fortune teller.