All the Broken Things (30 page)

Emily had come back out of the house with the drinks. “What are you scared of, Bo?” she said.

“Nothing,” he said, but thought this: when the man in the boathold had let him free, and he’d gone up to the deck, his mother had tried to shield his eyes, to turn him away, but in the end, by her frantic attempts to try to protect him, she had drawn attention to the fact that off in the distance sharks were feasting on something. There
were plumes of blood. “What is that?” he asked his mother, and she told him to hush. But she was holding her belly, crying. And by this he knew it was his father’s corpse.

Bo watched the wind unsettle the surface of the swimming pool. He blinked. He said, “I’m afraid of sharks.”

Emily looked at the pool and laughed. She said, “Okay.”

“You should come to the Ex,” he said. “Give me some lessons.”

“Okay, okay. I will.” Emily’s face screwed up. “I heard about your mum, Bo. Father Bart said a mass.”

Bo looked away.

“It’s shitty.”

“Yeah.”

Emily nodded, stared at the pool too. “If you ever need a place to stay,” she said, “my mother takes in any odd stray, you know.”

“No,” Bo said.

“It’s not pity,” she said. “It’s that I like you.”

In the end, Bo did not go through the park on the way back, but skirted it, not wanting to see Soldier Man.

B
O SNAPPED THE WHIP
and let the crowd think his bear was cowed by it. The little whip was a prop and nothing more. He never struck Bear with it. Bo was alone with
Bear onstage. Mino had ducked out early. “You’re fine, anyway,” he had said. “I just stand there. It’s boring.”

He didn’t need Mino. Bear did everything he asked her to. The trick, Bo was learning, was to guide her sightlines with the whip so she didn’t get interested in anything else.
We do it so, we do it so
, so any worry the animal felt fell away. Bear didn’t like to change direction.

It was the part in the performance when he sang. Bo modulated between a polka and a lament—the main body of the song was upbeat and fast and the refrain pulled down and in. He pumped a toy accordion along to the song and stomped his foot as Bear danced. She hopped about in the fast bits and swayed mournfully in the slow.

“Ooh-la-la,” Bo called out, when Bear stuck her butt out.

Bo kept his eyes on the space between the whip and Bear’s nose, as she followed it, turning in her tutu. People clapped to the beat of her steps. When Bo was done he kept her moving in a circular fashion toward the trike, which was the focus of their finale. He climbed on the back of it, after she’d settled in, and held an umbrella over her, as she spun them around the little stage for a turn before jumping off. He picked up the accordion again, and played fast, then slower and slower.

Bear was just running out of steam when a yelp of recognition made Bo look over at the crowd. And there, gaping at him, were Ernie and Peter. They were both taller than he remembered. Bo jammed the accordion
faster, and Bear sensed him faltering—she dropped to the floor and waited for him to remember his place.

And then, he looked up and saw them jostling one another, sharing a joke. On him? The thought was enough to pull him so far out of the show he might never get back. Bear looked to him for guidance. Bo had none. His left hand let the squeeze-box fall—it made a sighing squeak as it landed.

“Show’s over,” he announced. Bear pulled up onto her back legs, trying to figure out what was wrong. This egged on the crowd.

“What the hell?” shouted someone. “Keep playing.”

“Do something, kid.”

Bo breathed deep and stayed calm for the bear, and she felt that, sat down and waited, head swinging from Bo to the people, and then she sank to the floor and stretched out for a rest.

“Rip-off,” a kid in the crowd yelled.

“Check out the midget show next door,” said Bo, pointing.

He watched the disgruntled crowd disperse, until all that was left were the two boys from his school.

“Hey, Chink,” said Ernie, and all Bo could do was smile a little. It had been a lifetime. They stood opposite each other, just staring.

And then Peter cocked his chin over at the bear. “Where’d you get him?”

“Her. She’s a she.”

“Yeah, but where?”

“My boss.”

“You coming back to school?”

Bo hadn’t given that any thought. School was some far-off story that his character had exited. He shook his head. “Dunno,” he said.

Ernie said, “We missed you this summer,” and they all had a good laugh at that.

“Yeah,” said Peter, eyes shifting. “Emily told us you were here. We came to watch you wrestle bears. When is that?”

“In an hour and a half,” said Bo. He wanted to say it was fakery, but didn’t. “I can get you in.”

They had been hoping for this, he saw. Ernie and Peter nodded.

“Can you hang out?” said Peter, gesturing at Bear.

“Sure,” Bo said. “What’s your plan?”

“We thought we’d get you behind the Bandshell and beat the shit out of you,” Ernie said—but he was joking, Bo saw.

Bo was stronger than he had ever been. No one would be beating anything out of him. “I have to get the bear home so she can rest before the fight. Then, I can take an hour or so.”

He muzzled Bear, tugged at her lead. She hopped down off the stage. He turned to head out the ten-in-one
entrance, but the boys wanted to see the Blow-Off so they parted the sea of gawkers, Bear in the lead, and went out the exit.

A huddle of people pressed up to the Airstream. They were so intent they did not notice Bear and so did not move. Ernie and Peter waited at the margins of the crowd for a time and then began to holler for a turn, people shushing, pointing to the sign that asked for quiet. In the end, the boys pissed off so many people that it took longer for them to find a spot in the front of the window and for that dark window to reveal its horror.

Its horror, Bo quickly saw, was Orange.

He could see that she did not know she was being watched. She lay on a bed that had been outfitted like a pond—with a green-blue coverlet and a few cloth lily pads, never mind that toads were land creatures. A couple of fake trees stood in the kitchenette. No expense had been spared to outfit her space, he saw. A tiara had been fitted to her head. She wore a green costume that had been rigged to look amphibious. Her feet were vaguely flippered anyway. Orange rolled onto her belly and used her stumpy hands to flip pages in a picture book.

He watched her shut her book and rock to standing, then lunge-walk to the little kitchen. She opened a fridge and took out a juice bottle that was already opened for her. She was so normal in her behaviour, it was a wonder to Bo why anyone would want to watch her, but then he
was used to her bulging eyes and the unnatural bend of her frame, the pressed-back, distorted head, and her warped everything. The fury rising in Bo’s throat was only exacerbated by the groans of pity and shock from the people around him. Bo couldn’t move, or speak.

“What’s the matter, Bo?” It was Peter.

Bo tried to talk, but he couldn’t. His eyes wouldn’t leave her.

“She’s just a fucking retard. Come on,” Ernie prodded him. “Let’s go.”

“Watch it,” Bo said, at last.

“What the hell? Let’s go.” Again Ernie jostled him.

Orange sat splay-legged on the bed. She cocked the bottle and guzzled, rocking a bit like she might begin to hop if she felt up to it. People laughed, pointed. Bo looked to Bear, where she had slumped down. He signalled to her to growl. She looked a bit surprised at this, but began to rumble. The earth under them vibrated with it, and the crowd around the Airstream awakened and turned.

“Bear!” someone yelled, and then there was screaming, and running, and then there were just the three of them—Ernie, Peter and Bo, plus Bear, and Orange, who had set the bottle down and was flipping pages again.

“Wow,” said Peter, nodding to the bear.

But Ernie was a smartass. “What’s the big deal, Bo?” Ernie waved to Orange. “You got a crush or something?” and Bo, furious, was on him.

Peter tried to pull them apart, but failing, stepped back to watch. People coming out of the ten-in-one formed a crowd around them, and Bear, too, gawked, as Bo threw and pinned Ernie.

“Stop,” Ernie kept pleading, and, “It’s no big deal.”

At last, Bo had spent himself. He had a knee on Ernie’s chest and was heaving, his anger giving way to tears.

“She’s my sister,” he said, the awfulness of it gushing out of him. Bo stood and tried the Airstream door but it was locked. He would have kicked and bashed to get in but he didn’t want to scare Orange. He turned back to Ernie and Peter. “Toad Girl is my sister.”

“Jesus,” said Ernie. “Jesus Christ on a stick.” He held his hands up then and said simply, “Cool, man.”

B
O HAD ONLY FORTY-FIVE MINUTES
to get himself to the ring, not enough time to hang out with Ernie and Peter. Still, they followed Bo as he led Bear down Princes’ Boulevard to the carnie tent village. They told him they would wait for him, when the security guard held them back from entering. Bo left them there and went to his tent, where he linked Bear’s leash to her cage, giving her the choice to go in or stay out. She did both, before curling over onto her back and falling asleep.

Bo’s deepest impulse was to find Max and kill him. He sat on the bed to think, to let the vision of his sister degraded in that display slide away. He rocked a bit, staring at the tent floor.

“There you are.” Max’s shoes glittered as if they never touched the earth; the piped legs of his trousers were pressed to a razor-sharp seam. Max wagged a finger at him.

It struck Bo that Max was not handsome at all, but pretty. His eyebrows arched perfectly over his wide-set, grey eyes. Slight, tall, exquisite, and furious with Bo for walking out of the ten-in-one and upsetting paying customers in front of the Blow-Off. “You do that again, I’ll fire you, my boy. You’ll never see that bear again, except in a zoo, or being struck by the whip of the trainer I hire to replace you—or stuffed! After all I’ve done for your family—”

Bo sucked in a thin long whistle to wake Bear as he rose from the bed. He was so mad he was shaking. “My sister,” he managed.

“What about your sister?” Max protested. “She’s happy.”

“She’s not.”

“How would you know?” Max said. “You, who hides in the forest when things get tough. You, who—”

“You took them away from me,” Bo yelled. “And Orange. She’s not—” and here Bo floundered for the right word. “She’s not—
yours
.”

Max grinned the grin of a man who knows he has
won. “The law is on my side, Bo. To be precise, according to the law,
son
, you are also mine.” Max waited a breath to let this sink in, and then turned and walked out.

Bo signalled Bear to lunge and snarl, but the leash held her back and her attack was more comic than frightening.

W
HEN
B
O RE-EMERGED
from the tight corridors between the caravans and tents with Bear, Ernie and Peter whooped, delighted in their new alliance, the way boys’ friendships can turn on a dime.

Bo pointed southwest at the back of the Arena. “Meet me there,” he called, but they preferred to follow along the other side of the fence that secured the carnies’ homes.