Chapter Ten “Send in the Clowns”

ten

" Send in the Clowns "

Every time I close my eyes and try to drift off to sleep, the balloon ride with Luke snaps me right back into consciousness. If what he said is true, I've been treating Luke Carter like shit for absolutely no reason. Patti LuPone glares down at me from one of my many framed Evita window cards. I whine back at her, "I know, Patti. I know !"

Feeling perplexed, I decide it's time for a check-in with Kiara. I shoot her a text and my phone immediately rings. "Hi, baby boy! What's happening over at Green Acres?"

"Confusion is happening."

Kiara squeals. "Ooh, spill! I've got a nice full glass of malbec and as I sip and sink into the couch, you are going to spill every last juicy bean! Go!"

"So it turns out that this guy I thought was a complete prick, isn't. Turns out I had the wrong idea about him for years. And he took me on a private balloon ride tonight."

"Come again?"

"A hot air balloon ride. There's a big fair here. A fair with an ‘e' on the end of it. It's a thing."

"Okay."

"It gets worse." I pause, and then confess, "We wore matching t-shirts."

Kiara is silent for a moment and then says very gravely, "I'm going to need a list of all the medications you're currently taking."

"And the other day, he ran his fingers through my hair."

More silence from Kiara, then a very worried, "Uh-oh."

"But he's straight, Kiara. At least, I think."

"He's not straight, baby boy. Straight men do not run their fingers through other men's hair."

"Are you sure?"

"Hold up." I hear her call out to Stephen. "Stephen, do straight men ever run their fingers through other men's hair?"

Stephen shouts out adamantly, "Negative!"

"I rest my case."

"Then what is going on?"

"He's gay. Or he's bi. And you have a boyfriend, so you better make sure his fingers don't end up back in your hair. Or anywhere else."

"I do have a boyfriend. A wonderful, gorgeous boyfriend who is going to negotiate Aleister Murphy's Broadway debut."

"So it's true?"

"His latest play already has producers attached."

"You need to get back here and start working on something new. Forget those balloon-riding yokels and return to the big city where you belong! Now, I've got to go, but promise me you'll not take up with any of those farm people behind Chase's back."

"I love and miss you to the Milky Way and back!"

"Ditto, baby boy! Just three more weeks!"

She hangs up and I'm so homesick for Kiara and Chase and Manhattan that I consider just saying screw it all and hopping on a plane back home. But I couldn't do that to the Plainview Players. They'd be devastated and, who knows, maybe they're starting to grow on me. Plus, there's still a critic coming. I just have to stay focused.

I roll over and finally fall into a fitful sleep, but early in the morning there's a panicky banging on my bedroom door. Without waiting for a response, Mom bursts in and frantically yanks the bed sheet off me so fast that it actually makes a muffled snap.

"Mom, what the hell?"

"It's an emergency, Noah. Get up! Get up now!"

I jump to my feet like a dutiful boy scout and pull on the nearest t-shirt. "What's wrong? Is it Dad? Is he okay?"

Mom wags her head, dismissing the idea. "Your dad's fine. You couldn't kill him with a stick!"

I anxiously scan her face. "Then what? Is something on fire? Is the house on fire? You're scaring me!"

It takes me a quick second to realize that she's sizing up my body for some reason. "No, it's Booboo! You have to be Booboo! Luke's downstairs with your costume."

I command my jumbled brain to get back on track. "What the actual fuckity-fuck are you talking about?"

"Booboo! From Britches and Booboo! You know!"

It's finally happened. Nancy Kay Adams has officially lost whatever tiny shred of sanity she had left.

"Mom, it's too early on a Saturday morning to have you committed, so I'm just going back to bed for a couple more hours until the local insane asylum opens for business."

I start to crawl back toward my rumpled bed, when Luke appears behind Mom dressed in ridiculous baggy clown pants, a tattered derby, and scary white kabuki makeup. I stare at him in confusion. "What the hell is John Wayne Gacy doing in my bedroom at this point in time?!?"

Luke sounds like he's trying to remain calm, but there's an urgency to his voice that makes no sense coming from someone wearing a rainbow fright wig. "Kristy Kim's sick, Noah. You're the only one we can think of who will fit into the costume."

I glower at them both. "What?"

Mom gives me an exasperated look. "Noah, you know that Kristy Kim and Luke dress up as Britches and Booboo every year when they do face painting at the Balloon Faire!"

"Why would I know that?" I ask. "Why would I have any of that information?"

"Well, you have it now. And the kids go crazy for them. But Kristy Kim's sick, so you have to be Booboo!"

Luke holds up a flouncy crinoline-lined dress covered with brightly colored buttons and bows. "You're, what, five foot eight? A hundred and fifty-five pounds? A hundred and sixty?"

"Stop trying to guess my weight like I'm some sort of prize pig!" I self-consciously wrap the bed sheet around my waist, wondering if I've put on a few extra pounds. With nothing but Mom's nursing home food to eat, I'm doubtful.

"Can you both get out of here? I am not dressing up like Bop Bop!"

"Booboo!" they correct me in unison.

"I can't be a clown. Clowns terrify children. And I can't do funny voices!"

Before I can stop them, they're pulling me out of bed and yanking the scratchy dress over my head.

"I'm not doing this. I'm not dressing up like a female clown. As a cis white male, it would be offensive of me to co-opt someone else's gender identity."

"It's for charity, Noah! Just paint some stars and moons on the kids' cheeks and you'll raise a couple of bucks for the hospital."

Mom dusts me from head to toe with glitter spray. As I choke on the fumes, I try one last-ditch effort to stop the madness.

"I am not leaving this bedroom dressed like this! I only have a tiny amount of dignity left and I intend to cling to it!"

And a half an hour later, I'm doing my gay Jerry Lewis voice while painting butterflies on a seemingly endless row of children's faces. I only stop once to whip out my phone with the full intention of sending Chase a selfie of me dressed as the bastard love child of Ronald McDonald and the girl from the Wendy's fast food logo. But when I see myself, I quickly reconsider. The image of me in carrot-colored braids and falsies is a definite boner killer. I return my phone to my dainty clown lady purse.

I start feeling bizarrely jealous of Luke, who's getting a much bigger reaction from the kids. I chalk it up to the fact that he not only has a water-squirting boutonniere, but also a motorized spinning bowtie.

"It's not fair that you get all the fun props. Where's my gimmick?" I complain to Luke as he impressively transforms a twelve-year-old boy's face into a werewolf.

"You wanna borrow my flower? Just don't shoot water at little girls. They don't like it and they'll tell their moms. And you don't want the moms after you. They're relentless."

I consider it, then huff, "No, I've just decided that Booboo isn't that kind of a girl. She relies on her buoyant personality and natural moxie. She doesn't need cheap gags."

Luke laughs. "So Booboo believes in self-reliance?"

"Oh, definitely. She even put herself through clown college."

"Impressive. What was her major?"

"She has a doctorate in balloon animals."

I take a moment to admire Luke's handiwork. "You really know how to transform a face. How did you get roped into this gig?"

"Well, I was on the stage crew for Godspell a couple of years ago. They needed someone to paint the cast's faces and they drafted me. Pastor Ed and Kristy Kim came to see the show and that night Britches and Booboo were born."

Pretty soon, Luke and I are pounding out face paintings like we're trying to fill a very ambitious quota. I've just graduated from stars and moons to very rudimentary unicorns when I hear a brassy voice ring out, "Well, look at Mr. Fancy Pants who said he was too good for the Balloon Faire now!"

To my complete humiliation, it's Jackie McNew staring at me in my clown drag while she chomps on a half-eaten funnel cake. She elbows her sister in triumph. "See, Julia! I told you he'd come around!" They share a laugh, both of their faces plastered in powdered sugar. "Hey, Noah! What would all your fancy Broadway friends think if they saw you dressed up like a lady clown?"

She inspects the cheek of the little girl I'm working on. "You call that a unicorn? It looks like a horse with a cancerous growth sticking out of its forehead."

The little girl immediately looks panic-stricken.

"Nice, Jackie. You think you could do better?"

"I know I could." Jackie grabs a washcloth from our worktable and rubs my handiwork away without a second thought. "Let Aunt Jackie draw you a real unicorn. A healthy one with rainbows and crap!"

I'm about to protest, but I catch Luke out of the corner of my eye. He's gone white as a ghost, which is saying a lot since he's wearing clown makeup. He notices me staring. "I've gotta go."

Before I can say anything, Luke yanks off his rainbow wig and is making a beeline for the park's welcome center. I quickly turn to the McNew twins. "You two think you could cover for us?"

Jackie shoos me away. "Julia and I got this. You should stick to writing anyway, because you sure don't know shit about unicorns."

"Agreed," I say and then head off after Luke.

I quickly search the welcome center, which is crowded with people hawking a never-ending procession of hot-air balloon–themed souvenirs. There's everything from refrigerator magnets to automated baby crib mobiles for sale. But no Luke.

I finally find him behind the building washing his makeup off with a garden hose. Relieved, I yank my Pippi Longstocking wig off and patiently wait my turn. Luke silently hands me the hose and goes to sit on the ground while I finish washing what's left of Booboo from my face. The white clown makeup swirls into the mud at my feet.

I cautiously sit down next to Luke and sense him trembling beside me. He refuses to look at me and seems only interested in the blinding blue sky above us. Every once in a while random people walk by and give us curious looks.

And even though I know that I look like a freak with makeup still smudged around the edges of my face, I feel the need to support Luke. I can't just sit here in silence. The guy who has a smile for everyone in town looks dangerously close to crumbling.

"So…are you okay?"

"Yep," Luke answers a little too quickly and then reconsiders. "Well, no, actually. I think…I think I saw my dad back there."

"Oh. I…here? Does he live around here or something?"

Luke's expression goes grim and I'm not sure if I should push the issue. But I can't stop myself. Like a clumsy doctor trying exploratory surgery, I ask as carefully as possible, "So…when did you last see him?"

Silence.

I quickly add, "I mean, you don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."

Luke sighs and continues to stare off into the slowly ambling clouds for a couple of seconds. "You want the whole shebang?"

"I want whatever you want to tell me. The whole shebang. The half shebang. The travel-sized shebang…" My voice trails off as I realize that I sound like a babbling moron.

Surprisingly, words start coming out of Luke like hot lava, picking up steam as he speaks. "I guess I was six, maybe seven when he left. I don't remember much about him really. Just that he was mean as shit. And it got worse as the days would grind on. He'd just be sort of grumpy in the morning, but he was usually too hungover to make much of a stink. But then he'd get to drinking and bit by bit, hour by hour, he'd get more agitated. More mad at the world. By nighttime he was downright fucking terrifying. So I remember just being scared of him. Scared for myself and for Mom. And Mom, man, the shit she put up with. The way she would run around like his freakin' servant, walking on eggshells the whole time. I guess we both were. And the booze turned to drugs and from what I can remember it got really bad. He would just wipe the floor with Mom and there was nothing I could do. I couldn't even cry, because that would make him even angrier. And then one day, he was gone. Took our station wagon, drained the checking account and left. And even though Mom was crushed, it was the happiest day of my life."

Luke pauses, slightly self-conscious. A car backfires somewhere close by, scaring several blue jays from a tree. We watch them beat a wing-flapping retreat.

I try to think of something positive to say.

"I'm sure your mom had to feel a little relieved that he was gone, right?"

"Nope. A few years later, I heard her talking to my grandma and I realized that she was still missing Dad. She asked over the phone, ‘How could Luke and me be so easy to leave?' Well, that just destroyed me. I mean, why in hell would she want a guy like that back in her life? Mom was kind of a mess after that. She wasn't really thinking straight. And the whole town has never let her forget any of the bad choices she made. I guess that's made me pretty protective of her. Maybe overprotective."

Luke pauses and I struggle to find something to say. Nothing seems appropriate. "Is this the first time you've seen him? Since he left, I mean."

"Oh, no. When I was a sophomore in high school, I did some digging around on the internet. I found out he was working at a John Deere dealership over in Mt. Vernon. Remarried to some woman named Jillian who had a ten-year-old son, Matt. So I looked up their address and I don't know what possessed me, but I drove to his house. And there he was, clean and sober, playing basketball with little Matty in the driveway. And Jillian is sitting on the porch, watching with a mug of coffee and smiling. And it just struck me, you know? He was able to get clean and sober for them, but not for Mom and me. I guess we just weren't worth the effort. I guess we were easy to leave, after all."

More silence.

"Jesus, Luke. I'm so sorry. That is some fucked-up shit," I finally say.

"I just wasn't prepared to see him again. He's probably here with his shiny new family playing horseshoes or eating corndogs. And Mom and me, well, we're just some faded memory that he doesn't give a fuck about anymore."

Feeling completely incompetent, I reach up to put a consoling hand on Luke's shoulder. But before I can, he quickly jumps to his feet. His voice is strangely cold and all business. "Thanks for helping today. I'm sure the McNew girls have things under control. So you don't have to hang around anymore."

And with that Luke is walking toward the parking lot and all I can do is helplessly watch him go. An unfamiliar urgency comes over me and I quickly stand up and call after him.

"Luke! Wait!"

But he doesn't wait. And for reasons that make absolutely no sense, I feel like I'm losing something with each step he takes.