White spots dot the edges of my vision. The world turns into a blur. It’s like the merry-go-round, except I’m standing still, my back against hot metal.
One second I’m choking for a sip of oxygen.
The next I’m slumped on the dirt.
I watch, sideways, as a man dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans punches Asshole #2 in the stomach. Once, twice. His name isn’t really Asshole #2, of course. It’s Randall Todd. He’s a pig and a bully, but in kindergarten, he brought his yellow metal dump truck to show and tell. He knew the names of all the parts—the oscillating hitch and the drive shaft.
That’s what I think about as I see him get his face smashed in.
He pukes, and the man turns to Kyle.
“We don’t want any trouble,” he says, equal parts scared and defiant.
“Then get the fuck out.”
Asshole #1 looks like he wants to argue, but Kyle slaps him on the back of his head. It’s enough to snap the fight out of him because he goes to lift their groaning friend.
The man doesn’t turn to watch them go. He speaks quietly, which is somehow more menacing. “If I see you on circus grounds again, we’re going to have a problem.”
Kyle sends me a dark look promising retribution.
Then he’s gone.
I stagger to my feet, waving away the stranger when he moves to support me. I don’t need anyone to support me. I look after myself.
Travis is in worse shape, anyway. He took a beating, and he looks half drunk on the adrenaline. He scrambles up, using the sleeve of his T-shirt to swipe at the white paint on his face. It only serves to spread it around.
The rainbow-colored wig has fallen to the ground a few feet away from the red nose. They were trying to make him into a clown. It makes my blood boil, not that Travis wants my sympathy.
His eyes are bloodshot from the strain of the fight, and maybe from the sting of the white paint, too.
“Vaseline,” the stranger says. “Lots of it.”
Travis gives him a scathing look. “Fuck off.” He looks at me next. “Both of you. I don’t need you to fucking babysit me. Next time you hear something, stay the fuck away.”
Then he’s vaulting over the chain link fence and landing hard on the other side. Up and running until he disappears from view. He probably won’t stop until he reaches home. A good ten miles away.
What the fuck was he doing at the circus anyway? Dumb question. Everyone came here.
Even this man, this stranger. No, he must work here. He sounded proprietary when he said, If I see you on circus grounds again, we’re going to have a problem.
A rush of far-away screams heralds the high point in some unseen ride.
It fades away, leaving only the suggestion of bright music.
There’s a realization any woman would have—that I’m alone in a secluded place with a strange man. That he could try something. That I might end up fighting him.
Tension sweeps through my body.
By contrast, he looks relaxed as he bends to pick up the dust-covered wig and puffy red nose. He puts his back to me as he does.
It’s different than before.
With Kyle, it meant that he didn’t see him as a real threat. With me, it’s saying that he’s not a threat to me. This is a man who speaks volumes with every movement of his lean body.
That doesn’t mean I believe him.
Men lie with their bodies just as easily as with their mouths.
“Friends of yours?” he asks, opening a door on the trailer that I now see says, Props and Costumes. He tosses in the wig and nose, along with a large tube of white face paint.
“Something like that.”
Friends wouldn’t leave me in an alley with a strange man, but then we stopped being friends a long time ago.
Travis and Kyle and I were like the three musketeers. We swam and played and fought until it was way past our bedtimes, but we didn’t care. Neither did our parents.
Then I got breasts, and Travis got awkward.
Kyle got mean.
The man turns to face me, and for the first time, I get a good look at him. Green eyes that seem almost otherworldly. Emerald eyes. Bright jewels in a weather-roughened face. I don’t know whether it’s the adrenaline or the rush of the circus, but he looks like the most handsome man I’ve ever seen. Powerful. Fearless. It starts a low beat of anticipation in my belly.
“So, do you… work here?”
“The circus doesn’t run itself.”
There’s something strange in his voice. Almost as if he’s saying the circus does run itself. Even though of course it doesn’t. There were countless people I passed on the way in. Performers with stilts and fire. People selling tickets and concessions. The man who collected money in exchange for red plastic rings.
I saw them, but they looked more like circus fixtures. Part of the scenery rather than real people. Now as I study this man, with his left cheek dimpled and his brown hair blown from the breeze—it makes me wonder why someone would choose this life. Why wander around from abandoned farm to abandoned farm? From derelict city to the next?
What must he think about Kyle and his henchmen? About Travis?
About me?
It doesn’t matter. “What do you do here? Besides chase away assholes?”
“A little bit of everything. But chasing away the assholes is an important part.” He shakes out his hand, which I can’t help but notice is large and strong. “His face was like a concrete slab.”
I brush the dust off my legs, feeling awkward. “Well, thanks, I guess. If it hurt your hand, I probably wouldn’t have gotten very far against him.”
He lifts one pale eyebrow, not mentioning that I was about two seconds from passing out when he found me. I wouldn’t even have gotten a punch in.
“What’s your name?”
He pauses, considering.
“Is it a state secret?”
His lips quirk. “Something like that,” he says, repeating my own words back to me. “I’m Logan. And you?”
I hesitate, as though my name is something precious. Even though it’s not. “I’m Sienna. And I should probably go find my friend before she loses her entire life’s savings to the ring toss. Unless the eviction notice applied to me as well.”
“Nope. Just them.”
“Speaking of the ring toss, is that white box with the new phone empty?”
“Of course.”
“Hah! I knew it.”
“We keep the real stuff locked up. The boxes get stolen, even though they’re high up and watched. I hate to be the one to disillusion what is so clearly an innocent mind, but there are unscrupulous people out there.”
“Doesn’t matter if you guys keep the prizes on hand. It’s not like anyone wins them.”
“Happens about once a week.”
“Really?”
Green eyes rake me in a slow, interested sweep. “You’re young to be skeptical.”
“They only call it skepticism when it’s wrong.”
“What do they call it when it’s right?”
“Fortune telling.”
He grins, and it’s like a sunbeam through dark, stormy clouds. Enough to make my heart miss a beat. “In that case, I wouldn’t mind showing you around the place. A little behind-the-scenes tour. Assuming your friend could do without you for a little longer.”