Rain Village - Carolyn Turgeon [60]
“Oh!” she exclaimed, covering her mouth. “You can’t see her! She doesn’t really see people, you know. None of them do, the flyers, they’re snobs. Aren’t you in the ten-in-one? I heard they were getting new folk.”
She laughed and tilted up on her toes. The smile across her face was like a door being thrown open.
“No, no,” I said. “My friend sent me to her. My friend Mary knew her; she used to be a flyer too. A long time ago, though.”
My heart was racing, talking to this child. I felt silly, but she was part of something I longed for, fiercely. I felt it then, something I would feel again and again over the years: that the only world I was made for, this world of light and glitter, would never be part of my blood and skin the way it was part of this girl’s and Lollie’s. I envied her with all of my being, and it was as if she alone could grant me a pass into this life.
The girl looked stunned, I realized, and I felt the old shame come upon me. The words from my mouth just hung there.
But she surprised me again.
“Marionetta?” she asked. “Marionetta the flyer?”
I looked at her.
“Yes,” I said.
Her whole face shifted, as much as if the sun had flicked on in front of her, pouring lemon-colored rays through her hair and skin. Her mouth opened slightly. She almost looked as if I’d struck her.
“Do you know her?” I asked. “She had black curly hair that swarmed around her face, and eyes like cat’s eyes.”
The expression on her face was not disdain, as I had imagined before, but something as soft as wonder.
“We all know her,” the girl said. “They tell stories about her over the fire. People say she used to be covered in ice but that she glittered like a diamond. Some even say she murdered someone!”
She laughed. “We all tell stories about her,” she said.
It was the beginning of my past remaking itself.
“I’ll take you,” she said, grabbing my hand. “My name is Ana. My mom and dad do the horses. The Vadala horses, you know. My sisters and brothers and parents are in the show, and I will be soon, too. Now I just feed and brush the horses, bring them out to my dad when he practices.”
“I saw the Vadala horses,” I said, smiling. “They’re wonderful.”
We wound our way to the back of the train. All around us performers stood in groups. Everyone stared as we went past, down to the train cars at the end of the line.
She snorted. “Of course they are,” she said, and giggled. “They’re the most beautiful horses in the world! Later I’ll show you. How long will you be staying? I can’t believe you knew Marionetta—I can’t wait to tell everyone!”
“I don’t know how long,” I whispered, but she was already talking again.
“Lollie has one of the nicest cars in the train,” she said. “My dad says she’s a diva. He said Mary was one, too, that she slapped one of the roustabouts when he rigged her up wrong.” She squeezed my hand and laughed. “I was just a baby when she left.”
We stopped in front of a car that had a flying pink woman emblazoned on the side.
“Oh!” I breathed, surprised.
“See what I mean?” Ana laughed, rolling her eyes. “D-i-v-a.” Then she reached over and hugged me, kissed my cheek. I stood unmoving, abashed.
“Bye!” she singsonged, then slipped away. I watched her skip up to a group of young boys and then turn toward me, pointing. I turned to the car quickly and hurried up the steps, into my future, before someone came to throw me off the lot.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It never occurred to me that it was an audacious, crazy thing to do: walking right up to the car of one of the most famous circus stars in history, the famous Flying Lollie, expecting to be greeted with open arms. I would later think that it came out of that same need that had first driven me to Mary Finn, that had made me plot and scheme as I hung in the kitchen window. A blind faith and hope and longing that made me demand more of the world than it wanted to give me. I was four feet tall with hands like starfish and as small as plums. The kids in the town square, the girls in the factory, my sister and brothers might have all called me a munchkin