While it’s true that most of the people working the midway would just give me a stuffed animal if I asked, that’s not the same. So when we stop in front of a booth where you have to knock wooden milk bottles off a pillar that has giant stuffed cats as its prize, I stop. One, I know that these are the nicest prizes the carnival has to offer. Two, I helped build this setup, and I know how it’s rigged.
Every rube who comes through here tries to hit the bottles. But I’ve balanced these things so that the pyramid is sturdy, and a glancing blow isn’t going to make them tumble. Instead, you have to hit the pillar, and do it so that it looks like you’ve hit the lowest row of bottles, so no one can accuse you of cheating.
I give Gabe my five dollars, and he rolls his eyes and gives me a bucket of softballs. I push my glasses up my nose, take a ball from the bucket, and step back. The night is alive with happy people and the alarm on the strongman game going off. A breeze whips down the alleyway. But I push all of that away, take aim, and let go.
I knock over the bottles on the first try. Again, Gabe rolls his eyes. I kind of want to roll my eyes at myself, but I’m too damn happy at the moment. Emma picks out a cat—a fluffy orange thing that she immediately names Monroe—and we head over to Marcel’s tent.
Gin and Marcel greet us at the entrance to his tent, a brightly striped pink and orange canvas monstrosity. Marcel has been very secretive about his revamped act with Gin, and I have to admit that I’m excited to see it.
“I was hoping you’d come,” he says. “I’ve got two seats saved for you at the front.”
“How did you know I’d need two seats?” I ask.
“Because I’m not stupid, moron.” He parts the flaps and holds it open for the two of us.
The tent is one of the largest we have. A dirt circle marked off by cinder blocks painted in shades of blue and yellow sits in the center, and three rows of bright-red folding chairs ring it. True to his word, there are two seats in the front row with hastily scrawled “reserved” signs on them, in perfect view of his throwing boards.
The place is packed and soon after we’re seated, the lights shining over the chairs are dimmed, making the orangey glow of the center ring all the brighter.
Marcel steps into the circle of light, a stark, dark shape dressed in all black. Orange gilds his cheekbones and highlights the tops of his shoulders and arms. He stands straight and tall but relaxed, the very picture of competence. He extends an arm to Gin and leads her into the light. Visually, she’s the polar opposite of Marcel. The light catches the beads and the sequins on her riding costume and throws off glints like sparks. She moves her long legs and arms with strength and precision, making a fluid, graceful contrast to Marcel’s sharp, controlled movements.
He pulls Gin into his arms to dance, and it’s so personal, so tender, I almost feel guilty for looking. They sway in place for a moment and then he spins her. Their fingers part and she follows the spin until her back is pressed against the throwing board.
The light shifts from orange to bright scarlet. A white spotlight is lit over Gin, leeching all the color from her until she’s glowing silver and blond. She strikes a pose, her arms bent elegantly, and she’s only still for a second before the first knife is lodged into the wood behind her. She moves and has barely settled before another knife quivers beside her. They play at that game for a while until all of Marcel’s small silver knives sit gleaming in the painted wood. The crowd applauds as Gin yanks the blades from the wood and throws them back to Marcel, who catches them neatly.
But before they move to the next part of the act, I catch Marcel shaking his arms out as if to loosen up. Gin strikes another pose, curving sinuously against the board, one arm raised up in the air. Marcel returns the smaller knives to the holster at his waist and picks up knives that are bigger, long blades with heavy, ornate wooden handles. He throws the first knife. He’s so fast that I barely even see him move. The blade quivers in the board less than a centimeter from Gin’s outstretched fingers. The next goes in by her wrist, splintering the wood with its impact. The blades work down the length of her arm, each one so close that if Gin were to take a big breath and exhale, she’d touch them.
In his dark pool of red light, Marcel shakes out his arm again, flexing his fingers wide. Then he lets the next blade fly.
The sound it makes as it hits Gin in the shoulder is a terrible, meaty noise. Someone quicker than me has already run outside to get the clowns to distract the patrons from the sight of the blood pulsing from Gin’s wound. Someone even quicker than that has already begun to scream.
The shriek gets me out of my seat and into Gin’s white circle of light. She tries to pull the knife out of her shoulder, but she knows not to scream. We all know to never let the audience know how bad the mistake is.
Taking the knife out of her seems like the logical thing—we can’t help her until we get her off this board, and we can’t get her off the board until we get the knife out—but I’m petrified of hurting her further. What muscles will I rip by pulling out that blade? Is it nudging up against the bone, ready to crack it? Blood, far more of it than I saw after Whiskey fell, more blood than I’ve ever seen before in my life, pulses out from the wound, and I know that I have to do something.
The clowns have come in and formed a protective circle, shielding the patrons from the worst of it. Some distant part of my mind hears Emma shouting for people to step out of the tent, shooing them from the gruesome sight. Marcel stands at Gin’s other side, paralyzed with shock. He reaches out to grab Gin’s hand, and somehow, underneath all the noise buzzing around us, I can hear him chanting, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
There’s nothing else to do. I take off my flannel shirt and ball it up. “Gin,” I say, glad there’s no tremor in my voice like there is in my heart, “I want you to look at me.”
All she can do is look at the steady spurts of blood gushing from where the metal enters her skin. “It’s my arm, Benjamin, I need my arm, I can’t perform—” Tears she’d held back finally slip free to trail down her cheeks. She pushes at them with bloodied fingertips, leaving streaks of red on her pale skin.
“Gin!” I say. She looks at me, her wide blue-gray eyes full of panic. “I’m going to take it out on three, Gin.” Please let someone else get to us before I get to three, someone who knows what the hell they’re doing. “Ready?” I am so not ready. She nods, though. “Okay. One.” I grip the handle of the blade and ignore the way drying blood has made it sticky. “Two.” She seems like she’s about to look away, but I raise my eyebrows at her, and she holds my gaze. “Three!”