"So hey," James was saying. "The circus is in town." He was leaning, casually, up against the frame of the door, shoulders lax, a cigarette tucked into the corner of his mouth. He reached up to hold it between his fingers, taking a slow and even drag--- deep breath in, and then out, through the nose. Whorls of smoke rose up in pale grey clouds around his face.
Matteo, glancing up, thought it made him look otherworldly. The devil you summoned who wore a pinstriped suit and smiled toothily at you before it made you sign a contract to bargain something away--- your name, your firstborn, fifteen years of your life. James wasn't that; James was just James. But he was in law, so maybe the comparison wasn't entirely unfounded.
Matty wondered if he could paint that. He began at once to scribble in his sketchbook, fast and loose. A dark, amorphous piece composed itself in one corner before he quickly scratched it out. He just wasn't feeling it.
By now, James had cottoned onto the fact that Matty wasn't paying attention. "
Hey," he said. "Earth to space case. Did you hear me?"
"You said the circus," replied Matty. "Which circus? Cirque du Soleil?"
"Do we look like we can afford to go to Cirque du Soleil?" said James, arching a brow. He motioned to their apartment, which didn't even have two rooms unless you were counting the bathroom. Any illusion of separated spaces was achieved through strategic positioning of shelves and couches, most of which were mismatched and clearly second-hand. Some looked old and beat-up enough to be third- or fourth-hand. It was hard to tell what from what at junk sales, and the sellers were usually a little desperate, just as poor, and eager to tell you whatever you wanted to hear to make the sale.
"Good point," said Matty. "Which circus then?"
James shrugged. "Don't know. Thought we'd maybe go check it out. It looked big enough, and you're in a slump anyway, right? Come out and have some fun. Maybe seeing a clown on a tightrope will get those creative juices flowing."
Matty, who had never seen circuses or clowns outside references to them in children's shows from ten years back, tried to imagine it. Ronald McDonald and the Joker got out of a tiny car, and one smacked the other in the face with a pie.
Matty frowned.
James misinterpreted his expression and sighed. "Okay, fine. I don't want to write my paper, and I'm using this as a convenient excuse. But hey, it's still worth a shot, right? Not like you're getting anything done here either."
Matty glanced down at his sketchbook, filled with crossed out composition sketches. "Alright," he said. James was right. It wasn't like he
had anything better to do. Even if he didn't think clowns would help.
"Great." James grinned, grinding out the butt of his cigarette in the ash tray on top of the shoe closet. "It's settled then. Let's get dinner, and then we'll go."
James complained about his coworkers the whole walk down. He worked in one of those uptown clothing stores in a mall fifty minutes away. It didn't pay nearly as well as you'd expect, given what it cost to shop there. They'd hired him on because he looked good wearing what they sold. Everyone working the floor was underpaid and young and miserable, and everyone in management was a prune-faced asshole who had never had to clean a toilet in their life, to hear him tell it.
Matty was only half listening. As soon as the tents came into sight, he felt his pulse quicken unaccountably. It was as if the fluttering of the fabric promised the anticipation of something, though he couldn't have said what it was.
He hadn't expected the big tent to be black. Maybe that was the childhood cartoons lying to him. Somehow he thought it would be more... colorful. Tacky, maybe.
Maybe all circuses had modernized with the times. Maybe everything was a 'du Soleil' and not a 'Big Bozo's Wacky Fun Time' now.
As they drew up to the edge of the circus proper, Matty could see other tents, these more vibrant than the big one in the center, though still not kitschy enough to match the expectations he'd had in mind. Which was probably a good thing. There was already a line outside the ticketing booth, though mercifully for the both of them, it moved quickly.
That was when he saw the flowers. For the briefest of moments, that sense of excitement turned into a thrill of fear shooting down his spine, coiling into something almost like dread in the pit of his gut. But the moment passed, and then the woman in the booth was speaking to them.
"Oh," said Matty awkwardly, a beat too slow.
James wasn't the least distracted, striding forward with a smile. "Admission for two," he said. He wasn't dressed up at all, but he could half sell the idea that he was somebody just from the way he carried himself. James never stalled uncomfortably in front of the counter at a fast food place while the line behind him stared daggers at his back. Times like this, Matty was all too happy to let him do the talking.