The Electric Woman: A Memoir in Death-Defying Acts(52)

“I am sure I’ll never see them again,” my grandmother tells me on the phone. “There is my beautiful daughter, and I’m sure I’ve just said goodbye.”

Do you see a hankie waving from the window?

Are their hands outstretched toward those they are leaving behind?

No. Their eyes are focused straight ahead. We can only make out the shadows of the backs of their heads.

*

I slip out the backstage door when everyone is off taking showers or calling people at home. I want to feel the anonymity of walking through a big city, anonymity I thought I could have as I walked the fairgrounds, until I realized I was in sparkles and a bustier. In this darkness, maybe I have a chance. I don’t want anyone to see my face while I swallow the fact that my parents are gone. They’ve been on a train taking them across the country for about twelve hours, not entirely too late to convince them to change plans and go home. But I don’t call them.

Lights remain on in a few of the joints being scrubbed down, but most of the fairground is covered in shadow. Where is the moon? There were nights the moon shone on all the sleepy people of the darkened world but curled up her light over the fairground like a woman stepping over a puddle, keeping what should be dark, dark.

I walk past a bounce house and a table covered by tubes of incense. Through the glow of a single streetlamp on the next midway I can make out the top of a small barn. I love all the animals here. Their small noises all night, their dirt smell.

There is a group of young sheep in a pen outside the barn. I can hear some activity on the other side, farmers or 4-H kids hosing out a pen maybe. For a minute, before they are corralled back inside, I can stand beside the sheep, alone, peaceful, and if I crouch low to where one is eating, I can just hear its sweet jaw grinding that hay. But then I hear the low whir of a motor.

I turn around, and barely visible is a golf cart with two men inside. The golf cart is a common fairground device for getting through small aisles quickly, usually reserved for bosses, so I expect this is just two bosses doing late-night checks on their joints.

“Come here,” a voice says, and I can make out an arm beckoning me over. It occurs to me that if there is someone here who owns the sheep, maybe I am doing something bad to them, disturbing their peace in a moment when prizewinning sheep need peace.

I am not remembering that when you are approached by a mountain lion, the first thing to do is stop moving, face the cat, and make yourself as big as possible. You make the lion believe you are not such an easy target.

I walk over to the golf cart. As I get closer, I can make out something reflective on their chests.

“Nice night,” one of them says, staring at me.

“It is,” I say.

“What are you doing out here?” the other asks.

Metal badges. They are cops.

“I work at the sideshow. I was just going for a walk,” I say.

“All alone?” the driver says. He is young, midtwenties maybe, with a smooth, fat face and crooked teeth.

“My show is right there,” I say, pointing down the midway. “There are lots of people inside.”

“So what do you do for the show?” the driver asks as the passenger’s walkie-talkie buzzes and he picks it up to listen. I want to hear what reports might be coming through, but I also have the sense that I need to pay careful attention to the driver, who is paying careful attention to me. I regret that I am still wearing my shorts and cowboy boots, even though I’d put a long-sleeve button-up over the top of my costume. “I’m a bally girl,” I say. “I eat fire, charm snakes, escape from chains, that sort of thing.”

“Well, well!” the driver exclaims, smiling. “What sort of chains?”

“Handcuffs,” I say, reluctantly. As my eyes adjust to the dark I can better see his face. His smile makes his cheeks stand out like two glistening lollipop heads.

“They aren’t real,” I add. “The handcuffs.”

“Are you sure, now?” he says.

“They’re called Siberian handcuffs. They’re—”

“Because I’ve got some right here,” he says, patting his handcuffs on the side of his belt, “and I’d really love to see you in these.”

I laugh in my best good-natured way, trying to channel a polite Ohio girl, someone who would remind the cop of his sister or wife, someone he wouldn’t want to either arrest or make sex jokes to, whichever is happening here.

“Well, I’m quite sure that’s beyond my skill set,” I say, smiling and intoning my voice in a way that I hope implies I am exiting the conversation, but he interrupts my goodbye.

“No, really, try these out,” he says, a little louder. “Wait, we’ll make it even better. I’ll lock you up, and then throw you in the trunk of our car out in the parking lot,” he says. “That way, you’ll have to escape twice.” He laughs hard and loud. “Come over here,” he says, and his voice changes, drops a register. “Really. Tell me your secret. I’m not kidding, little girl. Come on over here and I’ll lock you right up.”

His partner is still fiddling with his radio, not paying attention to us. This, suddenly, in the few weeks I’ve been with the sideshow, is the most scared I’ve been of another person.

“It’s getting late. I’ve got to get back,” I say. “How would you like your daughter to be alone on the dark fairgrounds with a cop joking about locking her up and leaving her inside the trunk of a car?” I don’t say. Without waiting to hear their response, I turn to go.