Aerial Read online

  Seth thought they had a girl-best-friend or girl-next-door kind of vibe. They weren’t hot the way that the snake charmer and the contortionist were hot. Twins were hot, of course. Twins were one thing, though. Conjoined twins were another thing entirely.

  Seth’s interest was piqued.

  He glanced down to read the placard. The conjoined twins were Joanne and Jane. Joanne was supposed to be on the left and Jane on the right, although the placard wished the patrons luck figuring out which was really which, since they regularly switched sides for their own amusement.

  Seth could already tell how they differed from each other. He had twin cousins and had learned several of the tricks to tell twins apart. Then again, he didn’t really need to know which was which.

  It probably wasn’t easy for the twins to compare to the skilled finesse of the contortionist or the snake charmer. However, Seth had to admit they were a legit marvel to him, even just sitting down and looking pretty as a pair of pink roses. Conjoined twins were usually separated at birth. The shared spinal cord must have made the separation impossible.

  How did they go to the bathroom? There didn’t seem to be a good arrangement for that, especially for women. Had they ever had sex? He could think of several dozen men who would probably volunteer for that experiment.

  How did they deal, having another person with them all the time, never able to get away, even during their most private, intimate or gross moments? Seth didn’t know whether he’d be able to handle it.

  He wished he could ask questions, but he was pretty sure they got enough of the same questions day in and day out, and they were probably display only. He erred on the side of silence.

  Still, they’d captured Seth’s eye and his curiosity, from the light shadow of their cleavage to the definition on the lower part of their thighs, their skin’s creamy paleness and their cheery smiles.

  Seth knew what his smile did to women, but the twins’ smiles made anyone just want to smile back. It was all part of the job—smile and be happy at the customer. And Seth thought the twins’ smiles didn’t quite reach their eyes. Had to be hard to smile all afternoon without ceasing.

  The left twin tried, though, when she smiled at him, and the trying was genuine.

  Seth smiled back.

  The left twin’s smile became more sincere.

  Seth liked that he could help a girl like that have a better day, for a few seconds at least. A man usually wanted to use his powers for good.

  Then his smile fell away. The left twin’s smile faltered in confusion.

  He looked down at his feet. A cold stab of irrational betrayal hit his stomach when he realized that he’d been naïve. They might not actually be conjoined twins at all.

  The way the dresses were sewn hid where the twins were conjoined. A circus of any kind was one part real and one part fake. It was hard to fake contortions or giantism, but the Lizard Man could easily be the product of good makeup, and the twins could be ordinary twins with a special girdle contraption that kept them bound together at the back. Or maybe their clothes just held them together, simple as that.

  Seth didn’t know why that annoyed him as much as it did. The circus was under no obligation to disclaim when something was a hoax. The point of a circus was suspension of disbelief, and clearly he’d suspended his when he’d believed that such an innocent smile couldn’t deceive.

  He’d just suspended it too high and hit the ground too hard when he’d realized how easily he could be duped. He didn’t know that the twins were fake—that the conjoined part was fake, since there was no denying that the girls themselves were real—but the fact that they might be made the marvel of them less amazing.

  When he looked up to smile again at the left twin, it was little more than a grin. It wasn’t her fault that he was disappointed. He was angrier at himself than her. She seemed to realize that their momentary connection had been severed, though. Her otherwise smooth brow showed that she was troubled. But he raised his hand to her in goodbye and backed away through the crowd around the twins to find Lars.

  “Hey, compadre. You look like someone just killed Christmas,” Lars said, standing in front of the Fat Man, who was watching a television show on a TV smaller than a breadbox as he ate a bucket of popcorn.

  “I saw the zipper,” Seth said.

  “Okay, you got to give me more than that, Mr. Metaphor.”

  “You know, the way you can tell the Creature from the Black Lagoon is just a man in a rubber costume because of how it moves, and in the really bad B-horrors, you can see the zipper on the monster costumes. For a second, I thought something was real, but now I think they’re more likely well-done fakes, like the Fiji mermaid. Guess I’m just mad that I fell for it.”

  “So you’re the sucker born in your particular minute,” Lars said, messing up Seth’s hair again. “Need any other illusions shattered? You know that reality TV isn’t reality, right?”

  “Fuck you,” Seth said, brushing Lars’ hand off his hair. He smoothed it back, although the natural curl would keep it from ever being perfectly straight.

  “And Jay Z isn’t the leader of the Illuminati. Just saying.”

  Seth punched Lars in the gut—not hard, but Lars doubled over anyway, still laughing.

  “You know if you say ‘orange’ really slow, it sounds like ‘gullible’,’” Lars continued, this time running out of reach.

  Seth ran after him toward the midway. He leaped onto Lars’ back, making Lars stumble, and wrapped his arm around Lars’ neck in a headlock. Since he and Lars were about the same size, Lars fell to his knees, but he was laughing so hard he could barely breathe.

  “I’ll consider giving you back your dignity if you buy me something fried,” Seth said.

  “Your face is fried.”

  “Look at you. Everyone gets to see that I’m stronger, faster and better-looking than you.”

  “Get off, homo. I’ll get you your damn jalapeños.” Lars coughed and tried to get his laughter under control when Seth released him. Lars had used the real magic word.

  “You know I don’t like it when you say that,” Seth said, as he followed Lars into the line.

  “I don’t mean it. You know I don’t mean it.”

  “Then why do you say it? I mean, you play just fine with Luis, no locker-room drama,” Seth said. “So why do you do it?”

  “Because it got you to let go, didn’t it?” Lars said. “I notice you’re quick to point out how it should all be okay and rainbows and parades, but God help you if anyone thinks you’re gay, right?” Lars gave him a pointed look over invisible glasses. “Do we need to have a talk, Seth Brady? You need a little help out of the closet?”

  “You’re the one who keeps insulting gay people. Maybe you’re the closet case.”

  “No fucking way.” Lars pushed the fried jalapeños over the wooden counter to Seth and asked for two drinks.

  “I just don’t like it when you do that,” Seth said.

  “You can’t even say out loud what you don’t like me doing,” Lars replied, stealing one of Seth’s jalapeños.

  “Gay, homo, fag, pansy, sissy—I don’t fucking like it when you call people that. You always get bent out of shape when people use ‘retard’ because your damn stepbrother is autistic, so I’d think you’d be a little more understanding.”

  “That was below the belt, man,” Lars said. He started walking back through the midway.

  “No, I think being called ‘homo’ like it’s a bad thing is below the belt.”

  “If it’s not a bad thing,” Lars mocked, “why is it such a big deal that I called you one?”

  “Because it was meant as a bad thing. Why do I have to explain it to you every fucking time? You’re a grown man who should know better.”

  “And you’re an oversensitive prick who needs to know a joke when he hears one.”

  “Think of how Luis would have felt if he’d walked by while you were ‘just making a joke’. You think it would have been a joke
to him?”

  “I don’t think he would have gone off on me like a girl about it,” Lars shot back.

  “God damn it, Lars, you damn well know better, and I really wish you would fucking stick with me on this. It’s not about me—”

  “Well, it sure sounds like it! All about what makes you feel comfortable, not having your tiny manhood insulted by being called queer. You’re the one who’s all insecure, treating it like it’s insulting.”

  “You’re the one slinging it around to get under my skin, which makes it an insult.”

  “I’ll say. Calling you a homo is definitely an insult to homos everywhere.”

  Seth grabbed Lars’ shirt and reeled back his clenched fist. Lars was the best friend Seth had had since middle school, but goddamn if the man didn’t sometimes make him so freaking mad….

  “Gentlemen, if we could take this increasingly loud and violent fight to a private location, I would very much appreciate it.”

  “What’s it to— Oh.” At first, Seth thought it was just a visitor butting in where it wasn’t his business, but then he saw that the interrupter wasn’t a visitor and that it was his business.

  Seth couldn’t put a finger on why he understood from one look that this man was part of the circus and not just a committed costumer. Probably because most men wouldn’t go topless with those loose cotton trousers. Nor would most men wear that beaded leather belt, coin purse attached, a small golden hoop earring, talismanic necklaces and a dark brass bracelet over his upper arm unless they were dead secure in their masculinity. There was actually a small purple flower in his hair above his left ear.

  Seth had to admit that the man pulled it off, the accessories somehow accentuating his maleness rather than calling it into question the way it might have for him or Lars. Though the man was shorter than both Seth and Lars, Seth bet he never lacked for ladies. Lord Mikhail was the kind of man that men wished they were, but Seth didn’t have to be a girl to understand that the man in front of him was the kind of man with more than just a smile to charm his way.

  He was unobtrusive and quiet standing there. However, Seth abruptly released his grip on Lars’ shirt and took a step away. Lars rolled his eyes, which he always did whenever Seth snapped to attention like a good boy. Seth was also far more likely to call his professors or coaches ‘sir’ than Lars, who preferred being on a first-name basis. But Lars stepped back too and crossed his arms.

  “We’re good,” Lars said, lifting his chin.

  “Yeah. We were just fooling around,” Seth said. “Sorry it got so loud.”

  “I still need to speak with you about the disturbance to my circus,” the man said.

  “Your circus?” Lars asked, staring skeptically at the man’s casual trousers.

  “Yes. Arcanium is my circus.”

  “What are you? Some kind of froo-froo fortune teller?”

  “Among other things,” the man replied.

  “We won’t do it again, sir,” Seth said, interjecting before Lars could stick both feet in his mouth. “Really, we’ll keep our hands to ourselves.”

  The man turned his even, emotionless gaze from Lars to Seth. “Oh, I’m sure you’ll do it again,” the man said. “And you won’t be able to keep your hands to yourselves.”

  Seth’s skin broke out in gooseflesh in spite of the cloudless sky and insistent summer sun.

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Lars asked.

  “Please come with me, gentlemen.” The man beckoned them to follow as he headed to a small tent near the entrance of the midway.

  “Look, we said we were sorry. It’s not like we broke anything and have to pay damages,” Lars said. He glanced uncertainly at Seth. “Can we just go now? We promise we won’t fight anymore.”

  “I don’t want you making promises you can’t keep, Lars,” the man said. “You so accurately called me a fortune teller. It’s time to tell you and your friend your fortune.”

  “We weren’t planning on—” Seth began. He didn’t believe in psychics or mediums and didn’t like wasting his money on them, and Lars thought everything supernatural that stopped short of a church door was blasphemous.

  “Free of charge.”

  “You get what you pay for,” Lars retorted.

  “Yes, you do,” the fortune teller said. “Free means I have no incentive to please.”

  “You heard us using our names,” Lars shot back. “That’s how you knew them.”

  “If you say so. And it wasn’t a request. You will come with me, gentlemen.”

  “Look, man, we didn’t even hurt anyone—”

  Lars cut off midsentence as his and Seth’s legs started walking. They followed the man like little tin soldiers. Seth wanted to call out, either in alarm or anger, let everyone know that something weird was happening, try to convince someone to hold him back to see if he could stop. But his lips were closed, and no amount of effort could pry them open any more than he could make his legs stop moving. He tried to hum his fear through his closed mouth, but not even his own vocal cords obeyed him. Lars’ wide eyes were bright in his dark face when they met Seth’s. He wasn’t making a sound either, so Seth assumed that the same gag order was in effect on him.

  Seth had heard of hypnosis and watched shows where hypnotists claimed to control their subjects, but hypnotists were always adamant that no one could be forced into doing something they didn’t want to do.

  No, no, I don’t want to do this. This isn’t me. He ducked into the fortune teller’s tent after Lars. What the hell have you done to us?

  “I know you’re frightened, gentlemen,” the man said.

  “Frightened?” Lars snapped when the invisible gag on their tongues let them speak again the second the tent flap fell closed. “What I am is fucking furious. What the hell, man?”

  “I expect better from you, Lars, and I will extend that expectation into your service within Arcanium,” the man said.

  “What the f—” Lars shouted, his face twisting with a whirlwind of emotions that didn’t know which should take point.

  “Sit down. Don’t speak.”

  Seth and Lars sat down onto the spindly chairs across from the fortune teller’s crystal ball as though they were marionettes with cut strings. Seth’s hands hung limp between his legs, and Lars’ swung at his sides.

  The tent was nice. There was a fan that kept the air moving cool against their faces, and the incense, something woodsy, smelled good without being too cloying or strong. Seth would have appreciated it under different circumstances.

  ”I would like to continue uninterrupted, because I intend to serve customers today and not cater to your hysterics. This will go more quickly if I explain how things are going to work from now on, so that you will know I do not speak idly.”

  Seth didn’t have much choice. His muscles were totally relaxed—as though he really were having his fortune told for the sheer fun of it because it was just that kind of whimsical weekend, instead of the reality of being a prisoner in his own body. He could look around just enough to see that Lars was once again in the same predicament.

  “Now that I have your attention… My name is Bell Madoc. Most patrons of Arcanium know me only as their fortune teller and occasional illusionist. However, as I have said, Arcanium is my circus, and I am always on the lookout for new talent. You may not have noticed, given that you’ve only enjoyed the marvels of Oddity Row, but I could really use a few more human men in my ring. I’ll admit that I am partial to women, and they are much more likely to express their wishes freely. I think that, animosity aside, two fine, attractive young gentlemen such as yourselves would be an excellent act together.”

  Seth had heard of talent scouting among complete strangers. That’s how some people got discovered and made it into the world of the small and silver screens. But Seth and Lars were soccer players, and this was a traveling circus.

  And usually talent scouts didn’t steal their subjects’ will.

  Seth had no fucking idea what
was going on. Bell’s mild demeanor only made Seth’s anger shift into the terror it had concealed.

  “I wish there was an easier way to bring you into this circus—tender pleas, ego-stroking, offers that you couldn’t refuse. However, my own wishes no longer have power. Your wish, on the other hand, has been made, and I am bound to grant it. As entertaining as it would be to grant your wish and watch you struggle ignorantly through its complications, I have our patrons to consider. Your fear would only agitate them.”

  Bell ceased his pacing before the two young men and clasped his hands behind his back.

  “Now, you mustn’t assign blame to Seth, Lars,” he said, nodding to Seth. “If he hadn’t made his wish, you would have made one later in the day—one that may or may not have had more dire consequences. I won’t tell you what it would have been, because the two of you will have a hard enough time without the added competition of whose wish would have been worse and whose fault it is that you’re here.

  “I knew the moment you entered the circus that you would be good for Arcanium, and I knew you would become a part of it, so I followed you to ensure the outcome. I can hold the blame, because you cannot seek revenge against me the way you can with each other. You cannot run. You cannot fight. You cannot call for help. You cannot hurt my people, and you’ll find that hurting each other only hurts yourselves. All of these things only lead to the particular kind of punishment that our Ringmaster is more than willing to provide.”

  Seth could barely blink or breathe in his own rhythm, much less react or respond to the crazy and confusing things the fortune teller was saying. But as Bell continued to speak, he painted a slightly more complete picture, although he still skirted around the edges. What Seth did understand made cold sweat drip down the back of his neck and under the collar of his shirt. Bell didn’t make much sense, but he was clear, and nothing he said sounded good.

  “Those are the rules, gentlemen. The rest—the nuances of Arcanium when the curtains close and the lights go out—you will understand in time. Now, I have arranged for a place for you to stay while you adjust. I wouldn’t dream of putting the two of you on display and performing for me so soon, not when I can’t trust you not to fail on purpose or scream for help while you still think you can thwart me. I am a patient man. Whether you need six days or six months to accept your fate, I can give you that time.”