the Forgotten Man (2005) (12 page)

"Does the boy know I've come for him?"

"You didn't want me to say, so I didn't say. You want me to get him?"

"It's best if you take me to him. That way he won't run."

"Whatever you want. I jus' don't want no trouble with the family."

"There's no trouble."

"I'm glad to get rid of him, all the trouble he made. He was a pain in the ass."

Wilson followed the manager out past a giant tarpaulin showing a stripper crooking her finger. The paint was faded and her hairstyle was ten years out of date. A voice balloon over her head read: C'mere, big boy!!!

Wilson clucked to himself.

Three exclamation points.

These people were something.

Elvis Cole Elvis Cole, fourteen years old, heard about Ralph Todd's 21st Century Shows Diversions from a kid named Brucie Chenski who lived in the trailer park where Elvis and his mother stayed when his Aunt Lynn threw them out. Brucie was sixteen years old, the only other teenage boy in the park, and a sociopathic liar.

First day they met, Brucie told Elvis his older brother was a dealer and the two of them were going to San Francisco to get Free Love. Everything Brucie said was like that: large dramatic adventures involving his brother, dope, and Female Conquest. Elvis never believed him. Then one day Brucie said, hey, bro, my brother and I fucked these whores at the carnival. The part about the carnival nailed Elvis's attention like an iron spike through his feet.

What carnival?

The carnival out past the water tower, Brucie says, Jesus, they got this one girl was in Playboy, I saw her picture right out of the magazine, tits out to here, they got rides, a retarded midget that eats worms, these strippers who are total slut whores, my brother sold this girl some acid and she sucked our dicks while -

Elvis interrupted.

They got a human cannonball?

Yeah...

Elvis walked away, just like that, not even caring when Brucie called out the carnival was already gone.

Elvis hitched a ride to the water tower, which sat on a great wide pasture at the edge of town. As Brucie warned, the carnival was gone and the pasture was empty. Elvis kicked through litter for almost two hours until he found a poster that showed the dates and locations for the carnival's next four stops. That was enough.

Elvis hitchhiked to the highway, where, twenty minutes later, two college girls gave him a ride. He caught up with Ralph Todd's midway two days later, one hundred forty-six miles from home.

He had gone to find his father.

That first night, when Elvis finally reached the carnival, he saw a huge banner spread across the gates to the midway that showed a blazing man flying through the air -

See Him EXPLODE from a Cannon!!!See Him BURST into Flames!!!

See Him DEFY Death!!!

The AMAZING Human FIREBALL!!! every night at 9pm!!!

It was five minutes before nine when Elvis went through the gates. A crowd was gathered at the end of the midway. Elvis could see the cannon over the heads of the people in front of him: a long red, white, and blue tube as big around as a manhole, lying atop a flatbed trailer. The strip show was on one side (SEE exotic GO-GO DANCERS from the FAR EAST!!!) and the freak show on the other (SEE the LSD BABY!!! DEFORMED by MOD science!!!).

Elvis shoved his way to the front of the crowd only to find the crowd had gathered for the freak show. A sign hanging from the cannon read: NO SHOW TONIGHT.

Elvis felt a frantic despair, like he had lost his last good chance of finding his father, then pushed back through the mob. He found a ticket kiosk where he asked when the Fireball was going to perform.

A woman with two missing front teeth said, "Might not be for three or four days. Eddie hadda fly to Chicago."

"He's coming back?"

"Sure, kid, but he won't catch up to us until the next town. You're gonna miss his show."

Three or four days. That wasn't so bad. Elvis decided he would wait for three or four weeks, if that's what it took. All he had to do was wait. All he had to do was be around when Eddie got back.

Eddie.

Elvis.

Same first letter.

Maybe that's why his mother had changed his name.

Elvis drifted along the midway until the carnival closed. He was hungry and cold, but he hid in the tall grass behind the tents until the grounds were empty and the thrill rides were dark, and then he slipped back into the midway. He slept beneath the cannon. Saying the name out loud.

Eddie.

The next morning, Elvis watched as the roustabouts and carnies emerged from trucks and trailers to begin their day. They streamed across the midway into a large kitchen tent set up behind the trucks. Elvis fell in with the crowd. He joined a line and was given a tray filled with eggs and French toast, pretending to be just another teenager in the crowd.

That afternoon he met Tina Sanchez.

He was walking along the midway past a ball-toss concession when a woman cursed angrily in Spanish. She stood on a bucket, straining on her tiptoes to reach a row of stuffed cats on a very high shelf.

Elvis said, "Can I get that for you?"

She twisted around to see him, then stepped down from the bucket. She was short and sturdy, and almost as old as his grandfather.

"Unless I grow another six inches, I guess you'll have to. Climb over the counter there, young mister."

Elvis hoisted himself over the low counter into the booth. Wire baskets filled with worn softballs were lined beneath the counter, and the side walls of the booth hung with rainbow-colored animals. Rows of fluffy silhouette cats lined shelves at the far end of the booth. You got three balls for a quarter; if you knocked down three cats, you got a prize.

She said, "I gotta take down the top row. Just drop'm into this bucket here, okay?"

"How did you put them up there?"

"I had a young fella working for me, but he left last night. They do that, you know. Probably after a woman. Now I gotta find a ladder."

Elvis pulled down the top row of targets, putting them into the bucket like she asked. Each cat was eight inches tall, and wedged into a little groove built into the shelves. Fluffy hair stuck out around the cats so they looked bigger than they were. Elvis figured that with all the hair and the tight bases, it would be almost impossible to knock off a cat unless you hit it dead center.

"That's a big help, young mister. You want a prize or a dollar?"

"I guess the dollar, but I'll take that guy's job instead. I'm looking for work."

She frowned at him.

"How old are you?"

"Sixteen."

She frowned harder.

"I'd say more like thirteen or fourteen, you ask me. You a runaway?"

"I'm trying to find my father."

She pulled a dollar from her pocket and pushed it toward him. She added a second dollar.

"Take this and go back to your mama. She's gonna be worried sick. You're too young to be off by yourself like this. You could be murdered."

Elvis's mother had been leaving him alone since he was a baby, but he didn't tell her that. His mother vanished three or four times every year for as long as he could remember. He woke on those mornings to find her gone - no word, no note, just gone. He never knew when or if she would return, and when she did, she never told him (or his grandfather or his aunt) where she had been or what she had done. She was like that. But every time she left, he - secretly in his secret heart - prayed that she was going to find his father, and this time - this time - would bring him home. Which is why he loved her still; for the hope that one day she would bring his father home.

Elvis glanced at the cats filling the bucket.

"How are you going to get them back on the shelf?"

"I'll get a ladder."

"Tell me where it is and I'll get it for you."

She looked up at the shelf that was beyond her reach, and a little smile played at her lips.

"What's your name?"

"Jimmie."

The woman abruptly put out her hand, and Elvis knew he was in. She had one of the strongest grips he had ever felt.

"You can stay long enough to help me fix up these cats and put them back, but after that you gotta go home."

An hour later she offered him the job, and that night she let him sleep on the floor in her tiny Airstream trailer.

Elvis Cole ran for coffee when Tina needed a refill, wiped each of the one hundred eighteen softballs (he counted) with an oiled cloth, and touched up the shelves where the nightly onslaught chipped, splintered, and bruised the paint; he retrieved thrown balls, replaced targets that had been knocked down, helped work the counter, and in between he tried to find out more about Eddie Pulaski.

Three days later, the midway was struck, packed, and trucked seventy-four miles where they set up in a new town. The following day, Elvis was eating lunch when several roughnecks took seats around him, their trays laden with food. They were young guys, with weathered skin and callused, banged-up hands.

A man with an anchor tattooed on his left forearm lit a Marlboro, then abruptly looked at Elvis.

"Seen you around. Who you with?"

"Tina Sanchez."

The man blew a cloud of Marlboro and sucked food from his teeth.

"Nice lady, that Tina. She's been with this midway a long time."

The man beside Elvis belched. He was the oldest.

"Hell, she's been here longer than me. They used to be with the Big Top, y'know, that whole family. You ever seen her bend a nail? She can bend a twelve-penny with her thumb, just push it right over, a little woman like that. They were tumblers."

Elvis said, "Do you guys know when the Human Fireball is coming back?"

"He's the big ticket, kid; the boss ain't gonna let that cannon sit. We're pullin' out the cannon for tonight's show."

Elvis's heart pounded so hard he thought he would jump out of the chair. He made excuses all afternoon to leave Tina's booth, each time running to watch the roustabouts position the cannon and string a tall skinny net to catch Eddie Pulaski at the end of his flight.

By eight-thirty that night, the business at Tina's booth was furious. A crowd of high-school baseball players crowded the counter, firing balls in a competition to see who could peg the most cats. Five minutes before nine, an announcer's voice cut through the din of the crowd; the Human Fireball was only moments away from exploding into the air, Come one, come all, SEE if he survives!!!

Tina rolled her eyes, and waved him away.

"Oh, go on, go! You wanna see him so bad you gonna pee yourself."

Elvis sprinted down the midway and pushed through the crowd. More than a thousand people had already gathered and the show had begun. The Human Fireball stood atop the upraised cannon with a microphone in his hand.

Eddie Pulaski looked nine feet tall in a white leather jumpsuit festooned with red and blue stars. He had shadowed eyes, flowing black hair combed back over his skull, and shoulders at least three feet wide! He gestured broadly to the crowd with wide sweeps of his arm, explaining that the cannon was charged with high explosives, enough to bring down a small skyscraper, enough to hurl him high over the midway into the far net.

The crowd oo-ed and ah-ed.

And if that wasn't enough, Eddie exclaimed, he would be doused with gasoline and burst into flame, hurling through the sky like a blazing fireball!

The crowd oo-ed and ah-ed again, but then Eddie raised his hands for silence. Only questions remained:

Would he land safely in the net, or would a stray breeze blow him off course?

Would the explosive charge be too much or too little?

Would he fly fast enough to snuff the blazing flames or would he burn alive in the far net?

There was only one way to find out!!!

Elvis pushed forward to get closer, shoving past men who cursed and boys who hit him.

Eddie tossed the microphone to an assistant, another assistant splashed him with a bucket of liquid, and Eddie hoisted himself into the cannon without another word.

The crowd fell silent.

Elvis Cole's heart pounded.

The assistant counted down through the microphone: ten!... nine!... eight!...

The crowd counted with him, their voices a thundering chant.

The second assistant lit a ring of flames around the mouth of the cannon.

... three!... two! ... one!...

The Human Fireball thundered from the cannon in a whoosh of white smoke. He burst into flames as he passed through the ring of fire and arced into the night. Long flames trailed behind him, blowing out as he reached the peak of his flight, and then he landed safely in the net. Eddie Pulaski bounced to his feet as the crowd cheered. He raised his hands to the applause as if he were the King of the Universe, asked the crowd to tell their friends - Last show tomorrow night, friends! - then he gripped the edge of the net, swung down, and was gone.