Cirque Du Minuit Read online

  Kelsey had watched them fly so many times, she knew every release, every trick. Minya catapulted from Theo’s arms into a breathtaking somersault, and then back to his grasp. They flew side by side sometimes in a sinuous dance of strength, and at other times, Minya hung from his hands, his knees, his shoulders. It amazed Kelsey, their strength and dexterity while swinging from a bar so many feet off the ground. There was no net, no spotters. For the final, most difficult trick, Minya wore a single safety line.

  Kelsey could never have done it. You can never have him, trapezist or no. He’s not for you. No, they belonged together, Theo and Minya, the gypsy king and his orange-gold shadow, flung and then caught up again in space. The beauty of their dance brought tears to Kelsey’s eyes. Theo swung high, higher. It was time for the big finish. Minya flew upwards, her arms spread wide--

  Kelsey knew right away something was wrong.

  The angle was too great, the height was off. The audience didn’t know. They gasped in awe at the way Minya soared. Kelsey watched Theo, her blood pounding in her ears. He swung back, a twist of his body, and tried to catch her on the way down. His legs strained and he arched, reaching for her. Even from eighty feet below, even petrified with horror, Kelsey noted the mortal concentration on his face. He caught his partner for a moment, grasped her by the hand. His grip arrested her arc and she jerked. She no longer looked graceful.

  Now, with that jerk and break in formation, the audience knew something was wrong, and the gasps turned to silence and panicked sharp screams. Kelsey’s own scream caught in her throat as the trapeze still swung and Theo lost his grip. Minya flew down, down, her yellow-red-orange-gold hair streaming behind as she fell head first toward the earth. It might almost be part of the act, it looked so graceful and dramatic. Kelsey waited for the safety to jerk Minya back, to halt her swan dive toward disaster. She saw the spotter pull the rope, faster and faster.

  The safety never caught.

  *** *** ***

  Kelsey didn’t cry like the other performers huddled around her. She felt too numb, too shocked to cry. The Cirque gathered its members backstage and they clung to one another, trying to process the tragedy they’d witnessed. Minya was gone, taken away in a silent ambulance with no lights. Theo was gone too, nowhere to be seen.

  Kelsey closed her eyes and buried her head in her hands. She couldn’t get the vision out of her head. Minya flying, so beautiful. Minya falling. Minya twisting and crumpling as she hit the ground. Kelsey had looked up and seen Theo still hanging there, arms extended helplessly. He’d had her, and lost her.

  People sobbed and shifted, hugging one another. Jason came over and embraced her.

  “You okay?”

  She gazed over into the searching blue eyes of her coach. “Did you...did you see it happen?”

  “I saw it on the monitor backstage. Did you see it?”

  Kelsey nodded briefly, not trusting her voice.

  Jason took her hand. “Just...please understand, this never happens. We’ve never had a fatality before.”

  Kelsey nodded again, then shook her head, confused. How could it happen? “Didn’t she...” Kelsey rubbed her forehead. How could he drop her? “I don’t understand. What happened to the safety line? It failed?”

  “They think so. The spotter was there and he was pulling like hell, but...”

  In the corner, the shaken safety operator was surrounded by fellow riggers. They were obviously trying to comfort him, but he didn’t look soothed as he dragged violently on a cigarette. At the front of the group, a Human Resource exec from headquarters wrung her hands and spouted empty reassurances.

  Kelsey tuned her out. There was nothing the woman could say that could erase the ghastly tableau of Minya’s fall. The stricken faces of the other performers were mirrors for her own shock and disbelief.

  Circuses were like families. Dysfunctional families a lot of times, but even in her short time there, she’d come to understand that circus people stuck together through thick and thin. To lose one was to lose everyone. Each performer grieved not just for Minya, but for the loss of their own sense of invulnerability.

  “You just think of it as being safe. You know?” Kelsey looked at Jason, wishing for answers. “They work so hard to make all this safe. All the safety harnesses and practices and repetition to make things happen right. I mean, what went wrong?” Her voice finally quavered, and she broke completely, broke down into the same sea of tears that surrounded her.

  Jason hugged her close. “You’re scared right now. It’s normal, it’s okay. It’s a scary thing to witness.”

  “Jesus, I mean...” Kelsey hiccoughed against his ear. “It’s just so sad. I can’t believe she’s gone. Just like that.” She drew away and lowered her voice to a whisper. “What about him? Where is he?”

  “I don’t know. He’s being taken care of, I’m sure.”

  “But will he be okay?”

  Jason’s face seemed to harden a little. “That’s for him to deal with. Circus people can be surprisingly resilient. There will be a show tomorrow, if you can believe it. He won’t be in it, but there will be a show.”

  Kelsey hugged herself as Jason turned his attention to the woman from Human Resources. Kelsey didn’t believe it, not for a second. There could be no show without her gypsy king sailing overhead. There could be no more fantasies, no more desire or excitement. No more vision of Theo and Minya in the storage room. That vision was replaced forever by the sight of a shooting star arcing outward and falling...falling. Kelsey dropped her forehead onto her knees and wept.

  Chapter Two: Descent

  The first knock was timid, a small rap, rap dragging his mind from the haze of sleep. Theo looked around, readjusting to wakefulness, seeking the source of the sound. It was dusk and he had to squint in the dim light. The next knock was louder and propelled him off the couch and to his feet. He swayed and reached for the side table to brace himself, knocking over a bottle of whiskey with a clank.

  He winced and hunched toward the door. Theo didn’t want to see anyone, didn’t want anyone to see him. Again, knock knock knock, this time very loudly. He leaned to look through the peephole, making a concerted effort to recognize the long, light hair and blur of red lips.

  “Theo?”

  He stepped back. It was a woman, but he couldn’t make her out from the tiny little spyglass set into the door. Melinde from Cirque headquarters again, or Diane. They had called and left message after message. Surely they didn’t expect him to show up for work the day after--or had it been two days?

  He looked at the clock. It was late. The evening’s show would be over. Three days?

  No, it was only the second day. What did they want from him? He leaned again to look through the peephole. She was still there, and she wasn’t Diane or Melinde. The woman reached out to touch the door, then turned to rummage in the bag on her hip.

  Theo stumbled back to the couch, taking a deep drink of whiskey right from the bottle to still the pounding in his head. It was so quiet. His little house was too warm, the air oppressive. He was sweating. Go away. Just go away.

  He stared at the ceiling, willing the interloper to give up on whatever errand had brought her here. A moment later, a folded piece of paper slid under the door. He stared at it a long time before he moved.

  He picked it up and turned on a light, but didn’t open it. It was interaction, contact with another human being, which he wanted but didn’t want at the same time. He set the folded paper on the side table and smoked three cigarettes in a row. He lit a fourth for courage and picked up the note, held the red, burning ashes to the edge of it. The paper curled and cringed in on itself. Light hair, red lips...

  He put down the cigarette and tamped out the glimmering edge. He unfolded the smoldering note and stared through the haze of smoke at the messy but emphatic lettering.

  Theo--

  I’m so sorry about what happened. I hope you’re okay. Everyone is worried about you.

  Yesterday th
ey skipped your act, and it was hard for everyone. They want to fill in for now with acrobatics or something. I don’t know why I’m telling you that. I just don’t know what to say. You don’t even really know me, but I’m so sorry and I can’t imagine how you feel. I wish there was something I could do.

  If you need someone to talk to or you need anything, call me.

  Below that, she’d signed her name, Kelsey, and scrawled a phone number. The digits swam before his eyes, as unfathomable as code. He lifted the cigarette and burned them off, every number, and then the rest of her message as well.

  Two days later she was back again, knocking and calling his name through the door. He was less drunk, but still hot, too hot. He shook his head at her persistence and reeled into the bathroom. He turned the shower on cold and stood under the stream, shocked back to life, emerging from layers of misery back to reality.

  Damn her. Blood rushed in his ears and he had to brace himself against the side of the shower to keep to his feet. He looked at the ceiling and yelled as loud as his lungs would let him, just because. Because he had to and because he didn’t care. He yelled again, longer and harder until his lungs hurt, then shook his head and wiped the water from his eyes.

  When he turned off the shower, he could still hear her. Knock, knock, knock. Didn’t her knuckles hurt? He toweled off and pulled on some sweatpants, and slung the towel around his still-wet shoulders. Knock, knock. His hair was shaggy, overgrown. Knock, knock. It dripped cold water onto his shoulders as he stalked to the door and ripped it open.

  White-blonde hair, red lips, and the realization in his brain like a set of gears clicking together. Of course. Her. That new acrobat who slid him looks when she thought he wasn’t watching, her eyes glossy pools of curiosity and innocence at once. The one who’d stumbled in on him and Minya in the storeroom, and watched with that hungry gaze. The one person in the world he could least handle at the moment, with her cloying, immature adulation. He started to close the door, but she put one sneakered foot against it.

  “I’ve been knocking for twenty minutes. Why didn’t you answer?”

  She was angry. Narrowed eyes, arms held tense at her side. He looked down his nose at her. “I was sleeping.”

  “You weren’t sleeping.” She gave a pointed look at his towel and dripping hair. “I heard you yelling. What were you yelling about?”

  “I was yelling because someone keeps knocking on my door when I’m trying to sleep.”

  His tone and his expression, calculated to frighten, did not deter her at all. She pushed into his foyer, or maybe he let her in. She looked around the disarray of his living room. Empty whiskey bottles, scattered cigarette butts. A tangle of blankets on the couch, and the TV flickering in the corner, tuned to nothing. White noise. She turned those assessing eyes his way. He let her take him in, in all his hateful misery. Still admire me now? She looked at her feet and he almost felt sorry for her. Almost.

  “What do you want? Why are you bothering me?” he snapped.

  Her head came up, narrowed eyes again. Anger, a little fear. Pity. Sympathy. Guilt. The emotions played across her golden, prettily formed face like a mirror of all the things he felt. He fisted his hands and towered over her, trying to influence her back toward the door. She stood unmoving, setting her chin.

  “Everyone’s wondering where you are. Everyone’s worried about whether you’re okay.”

  “Everyone? Or you?”

  She opened her mouth and closed it. “Are you okay?”

  The question was ridiculous, and an answer impossible to frame. Was he okay? No. Was he going to discuss it with this scruffy, naïve little circus pervert? He frowned down at her. “I talked to Melinde yesterday on the phone. As you can see, I’m perfectly fine. If anyone is worried about me, this is their problem, not mine.”

  “If you’re fine, why don’t you come back? Why are you hiding in here and yelling in the shower?”

  “I told you why I was yelling in the shower. And I’m hiding here precisely to avoid unwelcome confrontations like this one.”

  She let the words roll off her like water off some fluffy duck. “They’re planning a memorial service for Minya. It’s next Wednesday, after the show. You should come.”

  Dieu, she was so chipper. So indefatigable. A fluffy duck indeed. “You liked Minya, did you?” The way he asked it was intentionally sleazy and suggestive. She couldn’t misunderstand. Now, finally, she inched back toward the door.

  “We all miss her,” she said quietly. “I’m sure you miss her most of all.”

  “You go away,” he said, losing patience. “Go away, and don’t come back here knocking any more. Because you saw me and Minya that day, you think now we are some kind of friends?” His English was fracturing, stymied by temper. She shook her head, big blue-pool eyes and blonde hair tilting over her shoulders, but he wasn’t done. “You think you see that day, me and her, and now you know me? You know Minya? You know my grief and my problems? You can bother me and involve and tamper in my private life?”

  “No. I just felt like-- Look, that day--”

  “You were wrong to do it, to spy,” he said, pointing at her. “Do you even realize it?”

  “Yes, I’m sorry. I’m sorry about that day. I would have apologized before but...it’s awkward.”

  “You didn’t have to watch.”

  The girl stared at her feet, toeing at the joints of the tiles. She was a baby. What, twenty years old? “I didn’t know it bothered you so much,” she said. “If you didn’t want to be watched, why didn’t you find someplace more private?”

  “Like a dark storeroom?”

  “Like your place, or hers.” She waved a hand, backed almost to the door. “Look, I just wanted to be sure you were okay, that’s all.”

  He sucked in a breath through his teeth, annoyed with himself for losing it. Annoyed with himself for trying to hurt her, for wanting to hurt her some more. “Go away,” he said. “We’re not friends. I’m not your thing to watch after. Not then, not now.” He opened the door and nudged her through it. “Go away. This show is over for good.”

  *** *** ***

  I will not cry. I will not cry.

  Fat chance. It was dark, almost eleven, and Kelsey stumbled down a Paris street weeping rivers of tears over a man she barely knew. A man who clearly hated her. It was so embarrassing. She’d styled herself as the giving, caring Samaritan reaching out to a fellow performer in need, when really she’d just wanted to see him again. He’d called her on it, humiliating her in the process. This show is over. Go obsess about someone else.

  Her giddy exultation at being so close to him--in his own little house on Rue des Jours!--was completely destroyed by his cutting words and derisive sneers. She’d imagined a heartfelt conversation. An emotional embrace and sudden, deep friendship and understanding. How stupid! She must have looked so stupid and infatuated in his eyes. To suffer such contempt, and yet still find herself transfixed by his gypsy handsomeness. His high cheekbones, the haughty flaring nostrils and strong jaw that flexed whenever he meant to speak. But the things he’d said to her...

  As she walked down the busy downtown street, Parisians stared at her, avoiding her and her tears. Ugh, Friday night. Everyone was out, ready to party, except for one lame, impossibly brainless American girl who just wanted to go home and go to bed. She kept her head down as she neared the area of the Cirque dorms. That was all she needed, a lot of questions from the other cast members. To her relief, she made it to her apartment and dived into bed without running into anyone she knew.

  Of course, then she couldn’t sleep. Embarrassment turned to anger. How dare he treat her so rudely when she was just worried about him? She thought she should storm back over there and wake him up again and demand an apology, but that would only make her feel like more of a psycho stalker than she already was. She finally drifted to sleep determined to forget about him altogether. He was right. She had no business with him and he had no business with her. She would be b
etter served concentrating on rehearsals and her newly expanded role in the show.

  To replace the trapeze act, as a temporary measure, she and several other gymnasts had improvised a tumbling routine and acrobatic choreography that looked a lot more difficult than it actually was. The bigwig owner of the Cirque, Michel Lemaitre, had even come by to preview it and give it a nod of approval. She wouldn’t waste another second thinking about Theo Zamora.

  That resolve lasted until Wednesday, until the day of Minya’s memorial service. Every performer was there, along with the trainers, stagehands and riggers, and the administrative staff from headquarters. Michel Lemaitre was there too, looking severe and mournful in his expensive tailored suit. The involvement of the big boss brought a kind of dignity to the ragtag ceremony. There was no video retrospective, no photos, and Kelsey was glad of it. She couldn’t have looked at them without imagining Minya in her final moments, in her yellow costume streaking through the air. No, instead they talked about performance and trapeze, about risk and love and circus. Kelsey was by no means a career circus performer, but she mourned along with the others, thinking of the Minya she knew, the secret Minya kneeling before her gypsy king.

  Speaking of which--where the fuck was he? Of all the people who should have been here... No one mentioned his absence, or even referred to him in passing. Later, when Michel Lemaitre left and the alcohol and cigarettes came out, Kelsey wandered around aimlessly, confused. Was it some circus thing? If your partner died, you didn’t come to the memorial service? She had a quick word with Diane, who assured her tightly that, to the best of her knowledge, Theo Zamora was fine and probably simply unable to attend.

  Unable to attend?

  Jason came up behind her and squeezed one of her shoulders. “Hi, Kelsey. How are you doing?”

  She turned to find her normally straight-laced coach with a cocktail in hand. “I’m fine. Just...still sad.”

  “Sure. We’ll all be sad for a time. Need a drink? I can grab you one.”