* Author : dave ring
* Narrator : Dominick Rabrun
* Host : Summer Fletcher
* Audio Producer : Peter Adrian Behravesh
*
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Originally published by Shift: A Journal of Literary Oddities.
Rated R.
La Camaraderie du Cirque
By dave ring
Gather round, and let me tell you the story of Veronica’s Oiseau de Feu.
They were dark times, for me. Every bloody day, Chuckles, Magda and Felix tried to trip me when I walked by, ugly faces snickering underneath their greasepaint. My everything, Michel, ignored them, even when they pull that shit right in front of him. It infuriated me. He said it was to preserve “the camaraderie du cirque.” I loved Michel. But when Michel stood by doing nothing while those painted-mouth idiots tormented me, my love was lost in a rage that could turn a forest into cinders.
On those days, I screamed into my pillow: “Fuck the camaraderie du cirque!” Though my pillow did just as little as Michel to salve my wounds.
Before my banishment from the tent, I used to lurk behind the cheap velvet curtains and watch Michel and Lars from backstage after all the tickets had been sold and the punters put in their seats. Dear Michel and sweet, foolish Lars. Our main act. Under the lights, they gleamed. They wore tiny silver posing pouches and white cords criss-crossed around their muscled limbs, like they’d been the pawns of bondage-minded sailors. As if you could pull at a loose string and the two of them would fall apart into a sloppy pile of oiled pectorals, triceps and thighs.
Lars was the smaller of the pair. When he balanced atop Michel’s head or his fist, it always seemed as if his gaze was transfixed by someone in the crowd. As if their shared gaze was the only thing holding him in place. Sometimes, later, you heard different punters saying that they were sure it was them that Lars was staring at. Not the girl next to them, or the swarthy guy on the other side. Them.
Before my fall from grace, Lars confided that he’s really not looking at anything. He couldn’t even see the crowd without his glasses. He was just staring at a fixed point in space, concentrating on his center of gravity.
Like the crowd, Michel stared at Lars. At his center of gravity.
Like them all, I’d stared at Lars. Wishing that just that once, Michel would twitch, and Lars would fall. But it never happened, no matter how much I wanted it.
It was summer when Magda discovered my spying. We’d made it all the way up to the City of Trees. Michel and I had spent the day laughing and chasing each other through the dappled light, staring in awe at the airships that cluttered the sky beyond the cathedral ceiling made by branches of elm and honey locust. I didn’t even notice her beside me until she put out her cigarette and the final, thin plume of smoke that rose up made me sneeze. I’d wiped away the tears on my cheeks even though she’d already seen them.
“They’re the real deal, Paolo.” I barely heard her over the orchestra. She dropped her cigarette butt into my beer.
My eyebrow cocked up, forming a question braver than anything I could have said. Besides, she knew I rarely spoke aloud. I hated my voice.
“You have your girlish charms.” This wasn’t a slur, not from Magda. Magda’s appetite for dark maidens was as legendary as it was voracious. With a bit of kohl and a careful fall of satin, I could play the part. Still,
