Embrace Me (4 page)

I get the door. Lella can't. She's our legless-armless woman. She's not a freak. She's disabled but has been doing this for so long, the thought of getting government assistance hasn't occurred to her, and I'm not about to clue her in.

“Hey, Roland. Come on in. You're in time for grub. As usual.”

“I could smell it all the way in my own trailer! Smells like chicken.”

“Chicken and dumplings!” Lella announces.

“It's not bouillabaisse or anything.”

Roland, dressed in his usual jeans, flannel shirt, and quilted jacket of completely non-coordinating plaids moves Lella over a bit and sits down on the end of the bed. “The circus is already gone.”

“I figured. Those guys are good.”

Sometimes we set up our own circus tent for smaller venues like county fairs and carnivals. Sometimes, like here in Omaha, we join with Max's Magical Circus, setting up along the midway, our acts leading folks into the tent to view Max's offerings. Mixed in with the usual circus fair, the magic acts keep folks gasping. Little do they know how many people can actually swallow a sword.

“Did Buddy leave?” Lella asks with a shake to her voice.

Max has the requisite clowns too. Including Buddy. Buddy's been eighty-sixed from our campsite.

“Yeah.” Roland rubs a hand over a short, gray crew cut. “Yeah, thank heavens. What a jerk.”

“How somebody that mean can be so funny in front of a crowd is beyond me, it truly is.” Lella closes her eyes. “I mean it's one thing to be gawked at by the crowd as they file past us and get the occasional insult, but from one of our own?”

“He's not one of us.” Roland. “Not even close.”

I give the stew a final stir. “No, he's not one of us. Just think, Lell, in a few years we can leave all this behind.” I pull three bowls down from the small cupboard over the small sink in the small kitchen.

Hey, it's home.

Roland holds his heart. “I know you two girls can't be on the road forever, but at least have the heart not to talk about your end game with me around.”

I slide a ladle out of the drawer. “You'll be fine without Lizard Woman and The Human Cocoon. Besides, the days of our kind of attraction have come and gone.”

“People are curious. They're always gonna look.”

“We cause discomfort now, the way we remind people that life sometimes isn't perfect. People years ago understood all that.”

Lella and I have this conversation all the time. I guess we think if we talk about it enough, some vibes will go out to the general public that we're glad they look at us. We need the work. We understand.

Roland nods. “That's right. Too bad you girls aren't like Clifford. I'd have you around for a good long time.”

I hand Roland a bowl of stew. “I think he enjoys it a little too much.”

“Oh, but Clifford's a dear!” Lella.

Clifford's our Human Blockhead. I swear he'd perform his act in the middle of McDonald's if they'd let him. Lella's right, though. He's a good guy. He's fixed my truck a few times and always changes the oil for me.

I feed Lella her stew while Roland eats his. It was a good season. Nice weather a lot of the time, no highway accidents or mishaps, and lots of melt-in-your-mouth funnel cake.

“You make a lot of money this year, Roland?” I ask.

“It wasn't the best year. But it wasn't even close to being the worst.”

Roland pays us well. I've got no complaints there. And he's doing all right himself. Maybe he's got plans he's cooking up too.

He finishes his chicken and dumplings and sets the bowl in my sink. “We'll head 'em on out in about an hour.”

“Reginald packed and ready?” I ask.

“Yep. Both heads and all six legs.”

Reginald's one of Roland's crazy stuffed animal oddities. He has his own platform. The other exhibits include a giant toad, a 600-pound squid, and Henrietta, the four-legged duck. Okay, Henrietta is still alive.

“You all need help packing up?” he asks.

“We'll be ready.”

“Lell? You gonna ride with Valentine?”

“Surely I will. We love playing that license tag game, don't we, Valentine?”

“We sure do.”

He lays a hand on the doorknob. “Okay. Rick'll just pull your trailer without you.”

“Give Rick a thousand thanks.”

A little over an hour later, the meal cleaned up and put away, Lella, having thanked me a hundred times for feeding her, sits on her donut, strapped in the passenger seat of the truck. We pull onto I-80 south of Omaha. Another season over. Another year closer to a little house near the water. I always picture yellow siding with sherbet colors for the trim.

“So, Lella, where do you want to live someday?”

“Well, I do know you'd like to live on the water.”

“I like the sound of the surf.”

“I do as well. It's going to be expensive if we settle right on the beach. But surely there's still a patch of undeveloped shoreline we can find on the cheap.”

“I'm hoping. I'm going to make more jewelry this winter than ever before, Lella. We'll get there. You and me. Five years . . . seven years, tops.”

How many times we've had this conversation? I have no idea.

We drive for another hour without speaking much. The road tumbles beneath the wheels of my dark green truck, and I put in Lella's favorite CDs. George Winston, John Tesh, and some other haunting solo pianists.

“Valentine, I need to ask you a serious question, if you don't mind.”

“Go ahead, Lell.”

“Why do you want to live your dream with me in tow? I'm so much work. Feeding me, taking me to the bathroom all the time. I'll just tie you down.”

“You're my friend, Lella. And who wants to live alone? My face already isolates me. We need each other.”

I glance to the side and I'm not surprised a tear falls down Lella's cheek. She waits until it makes it to her jaw, leans her head over, and wipes it off with her shoulder. “I'd like five minutes with the woman who burned you, Valentine. Surely, I would.”

I fail to remind her she has no arms or legs. But I guess with a heart the size of Lella's you can get along without them.

I lean out my bedroom window despite the chilly morning.

We winter in the town of Mount Oak because that's where Roland grew up. His sister Blaze owns this huge, crumbling white house here in town, on those fabled “other side of the tracks.” It's not literally on the other side of the tracks—the Chessie lines run a couple of blocks south of here. This used to be a nice area a century ago, but now, well, this house looks like a boarding-house for the bedraggled and the slightly stunned, a place where people end up after they've reached their pinnacle and come back down. The shutters are painted a dark green, and the shrubbery hugs the stone foundations and the lattice under the square front porch.

I live in the back room on the third floor. Used to be a sun porch. I'm flooded with light early in the morning, which is okay. I've always been an early riser. A night owl too.

The nights feel cold with all the drafty windows on three sides. The one brick wall somebody painted black. That wasn't nice.

Unfortunately winter gives me more time to smoke, and I'm up to two packs a day.

Blaze calls up the steps. “Valentine! Are you smoking out that window again?”

“Sorry!” I grind out my smoke in the ashtray on the window-sill and shut the window.

Rick the contortionist enters my bedroom, sits down on the desk chair, and holds out a magazine. He's about 120 pounds, long-legged, short-waisted, narrow-hipped, and his ice blue eyes tell you he's the kind of guy who can keep a secret.

It's a body modification magazine. Piercings, tattoos, and whatnots. “Look, Val.” He points to a picture of some weirdo with a forked tongue.

And I'm the freak?

I sit on my bed and he hands me the magazine. “What do you think? It would make the Lizard Woman angle complete.”

“It's bad enough that I look like a reptile with my burnt face, Rick, I sure don't need to look like an evil reptile. This guy looks satanic.”

“Sorry, Val. I just thought maybe you'd be interested.” He gingerly lifts the magazine from my hands.

“I am still human you know, Rick. Forked tongues are fine on lizards, but I'm not really a lizard, remember?”

“Sorry, Valentine.” He presses a hand down on his dirty-blond hair and closes his eyes.

“Just like you're not really made of dough, like you're not really a pretzel. Got it?”

“Sorry, Valentine. I'm really sorry.”

He slinks off, feet splayed outward, a little like Gumby, only with pockets. He sinks his hands in them. I feel bad, but you have to make some people remember you're a human being. It's an occupational hazard, I suppose.

“I just didn't think I'd have to do that with Rick,” I say to Lella after telling her all about it as I brush her auburn hair back into a high ponytail. Lella is stunning. I've never seen anyone prettier.

“Valentine, were you nice to him?”

“Not really.”

“Be gentle with his heart. Even a three-year-old could see that Rick is awfully fond of you.”

“Which leads me to believe he stretches his optic nerves out of shape as well.”

“Oh, Valentine!” But Lella laughs.

I finish her hair, pat on some light makeup, and dress her in a yellow fleece top and a pair of sweatpants I cut off and sewed across the bottom. “I'll go get dressed and then bring you down for some breakfast.”

“I'm not at all hungry yet. Would you mind just turning on the TV? Robert Schuller is on soon. I dearly love that man.”

“Lella, you and your TV preachers.”

“Now, Valentine, don't begrudge me my pastors.”

I turn on the TV and find the right channel. “He looks like a leprechaun.”

She just laughs.

“They all look like leprechauns.”

“Oh, Valentine, that simply isn't true. I can think of at least two that look like trolls.”

I back into the hallway, leaving her door open.

Blaze calls up two flights of stairs. She's that loud. “I'm going to church! You want to come?”

“Yeah right!”

“Just figured I'd ask!”

“I'll make dinner tonight!”

“Thanks!”

I watch her back her station wagon out of view.

Lighting a cigarette, I head to the bathroom. It's a cramped space under the attic stairs in the hallway. The door's in my room, thus making it my own commode. It's a good thing, having my own commode. Just before entering the glorified closet, I start up iTunes on my laptop and the tones of my favorite song enter the quiet space beneath the steps.

“Embrace me, my sweet embraceable you.”

Lady Day, sliding up and down the notes, swings the words in the gentle circles of a parent grasping the hands of her toddler and twirling around like the swing ride at the fair.

I grab a pot of Ponds and look in the mirror. Imagine a purple-red alligator purse. I have hardly any lips left, except on the left side. My skin is dry. I rub in the moisturizing cream, sighing with a small relief.

It's too bad I didn't have insurance when it all went down.

After I dress I head down for breakfast. I'd like to detail a quaint B&B or farmhouse meal, but I'd be lying. Breakfast at Blaze's table consists of a gallon of milk, a box of shredded wheat—the big biscuits you break up with your fingers—and a pot of coffee.

She doesn't mind if we use her kitchen as long as we clean up the mess and whatever you do, don't leave the metal cabinets open. I don't feel like cooking, so I shred up a cereal biscuit, pour on the milk, and let it soak while I fix a cup of coffee. I load in cream and sugar.

I eat all the sugar I can.

It's hard to chew without showing the world or dripping, so hot cereal or sopping shredded wheat, as long as nobody's around to watch me drip, works.