The Ringmaster

 

When she came to me, she told me her name was Nancy. But for the big top, she is and always  will be my Juliette. Bathed in blood and balloons. 

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Every October I bring my circus back to town. It always starts as whispers, people wondering  where we will appear. The when is never in question. As the days of September pass into the falling  leaves and growing cold of October, my tent appears, as if out of thin air, cast in white and black.  Smaller tents and vendors soon arrive by the end of the first day, people popping up to take advantage  of the soon to arrive clientele. Their world, outside the tent, was theirs to employ. 

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But the confines of the big tent is something else. No one but me holds sway over the grounds.  Let the fortune tellers and the peddlers have their way outside. In the tent, my vision is law. It has always been that way, until I met her. 

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Her fiery red hair and burning green eyes. I saw myself in her from the very start. That look of  fascination, that deepening of the soul that comes when one falls in love with the smell of a place. The  smell of straw and meat. Of the waxy fabric of the the tent itself. Of popcorn, sweet cotton candy, and  something far more ethereal. Indescribable, but hauntingly lingering in the nose and on the tongue. 

She started off small, as they all do. Simple work, like the cleaning of the stands after the show,  of taking tickets and directing people to their seats. In the early stages, it pays to watch and witness, if  one wishes to get far. Talent alone does not a star make. One has to become a part of things, and the  first step in that is immersion.  

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Pretty soon I placed her where she seemed to most gravitate towards. I told her that growing up, I remembered going to a haunted house and seeing a lady eating liver. The thick smell of it, of meat  heated but not cooked under the stage lights. The putrid smell of the drippings that soaked into the  wood, mixed with a lemony floor cleaner. That image is what I say inspired my work, and that smell is  how one can see who will stay and who will go. She was hesitant at first. Why wouldn't she be? I have  never seen anyone look upon a pile of raw meat, even when assured of its safety, and not feel revulsion. But that is the point, after all. To revolt the patrons. To horrify. To pollute the senses till the veil  between what is the stage and what is real falls apart. 

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“What is it?” she asked. They all, it seems, ask that. 

“Beef,” I said. “think of it like a steak tartar.” 

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She refused the first time, but by the end of the second night she could see the effect it had on  people. She tried the liver. “It's not that bad,” she had said, grimacing a little. But I could see it in her  eyes. She had passed over the threshold, and after that, it is so very hard not to take the plunge. “Do you ever take off that mask?” 

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“Not if I can help it,” I responded simply. 

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By the end of the first week, she was fast becoming as much a part of the show as any other.  After the show she would once again be called Nancy. But it was Juliette who stole the show and so  much more. She had a relish in her eyes, when the people saw her face, blood dribbling off her chin as  she pleasantly munch upon the meat. When they needed a push she would move the plate closer, the  flowery scent of roses in her perfume mixed with the thick smell of iron and fat. She would offer, and  the adults would revolt, but the children, in their young manner, would look on with fascination.  

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She asked many times, in the first couple of weeks, if the meat was truly beef. Lying to her hurt, but we all must lie about the important things, until someone is ready for the truth. After the show she would often linger, questions written upon her brow as she watched her  fellow performers failing to break character, even after the lights were off. Their devotion, I told her, to  the bit. I assured her that I didn't expect that level of devotion from her. The others, I said, were as close to family as I could ever be described as having and she was, after all, an outsider looking in. I saw the  telltale sadness of exclusion. The third step was family.  

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They used to use opium to get people to eat meat for the freak shows. Can you even imagine? Nearing the end of October, I had grown quite fond of her. But a few days till Samhain, she  simply vanished. There was, after all, always rumors. People going missing. Never locals, but the 

drifters and the obscure, seemingly lost to the tent folds. Never enough to keep people from welcoming us back. But I heard from one of the trapeze artists that a local had confronted Juliette with her  suspicions. It hurt me, but I understood why that would frighten her away. 

A few days later she found me, arriving at the tent the morning of our final night. Nothing  should have changed in that time, but I saw it in her eyes. Something in her had shifted, and she  seemed most ready to go back to work.  

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“Welcome back Nancy.” 

“Juliette,” she corrected.

  

We talked little the first few hours, simply allowing her to slip back into character (if she had  ever left at all). I figure it would be another quiet night between us, but when the end of the night came, I saw her waiting for me outside of my ornate wagon. We had met there before, during our first  passing. The tales I could tell of this wagon, and often did. But this was different. I could see it.  She had questions. It was time for answers. 

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I welcomed her inside without a word, and she settled across from me on the old ornate  benches. She looked at me, and she saw me, for perhaps the first time. It is easy to miss the details. It is part of the performance after all. To distract and direct, so that one only sees what I want them to see.  And now, I wanted her to see more. She looked upon my face. 

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“You never take off that mask,” she stated instead of questioned. 

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My face smiled. It always smiled. She saw that there were no seams, that this mask of mine, my clothes, and all parts of me-she saw that they were all of one flesh. She didn't ask me what I was,  though it would have been a fair question. 

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Instead she asked me one more time, though she hardly needed the answer. 

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“Is it really beef?” 

“No,” I said simply. It can be so freeing to say the truth. “It isn't.” 

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She didn't respond. Instead, she reached into her bag and pulled out a small parcel. My interest  had been peaked. “I had to go to my butcher friend,” she said. “It took long, but I got it right.”  I opened up the package, delight written all over my face. Blood sausage. Like in the old lands.  The old times. I looked upon her, and she smiled, giving me permission to taste. I grabbed a knife, and  took a bite. It was spectacular, and I couldn't help but keep eating. I didn't want to insult the chef after  all. I don't know why I didn't notice. Perhaps my enjoyment overwhelmed my sense. But as I began to  feel tired, I couldn't help but smile, both at my hubris, and her cunning. 

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There was dark. And then there was candlelight. My cheek felt wet, and I watched as a line of  blood ran from my arm and towards an IV bag. “Summer job,” she explained. “Working at a blood  bank. I considered going to another circus, but this felt more appropriate. Will take a few more draws  before I will have enough. I am sure you will like the results even more. A personal touch.” 

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I felt heavy, suddenly aware of the thick straps. Used for rigging and the like. Strong stuff. “Figured I should still eat something. All that liver and the like. You'd imagine that by the end of the night I would be more than full, but I simply feel famished,” she said with a dramatic lilt to her  voice. I could see it in her, as the smell arrived to my nose. My cheek was wet. It was bleeding, And as  she turned to look at me, her eyes filled with delight, I could see the joy in her. She was radiant.  Magnificent. A star, born beneath the big top. 

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“Have a taste,” she said, offering up a fine morsel. “Cooked it nice and slow. Was told it was the only way to do it.” 

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I opened my mouth and accepted her bounty, savoring the taste.  

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The flavor was magnificent. A special cut of meat. In beef the meat from the face is valued, as  the cows chew on the cud, creating a tissue that is tough, but under long care, melty and velvety. And  this one, with my long life consuming tough flesh, was exquisite. It had been browned in fresh butter  after being brined in apple cider vinegar. Tart, nutty, and sweet. Truly, it was the taste of Autumn. 

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“Cheek meat,” I said, relishing as her smile brightened at my recognition. “My favorite.” 

She began to hum to herself, and I have never in my eons of life felt more pleasure than in that  moment, as she carefully looked at a diagram from one of my books, and went to work on my arm. She is everything I'd hoped she'd be and more. One who belonged within the walls of the tent. She is my Juliette, consuming her Romeo. 

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And I am so proud.

 

Greetings, boils and ghouls, for a riddle to chill your spine:
A space once for soccer, now for art’s design.
Beneath the shadow of kicks and strikes,
Lies a shop where creativity spikes.
Born from a journey to Maine’s dark shore,
“Made in America,” its spirit to the core.
In a Queen Anne shell, where echoes still roam,
What name does this haunt, now an artist’s home?

What’s the name of this haunt where Love and Ice cream meets in this room?