Two of Cups P. I (Brendon/Ryan; Jon/Spencer)
Title: Two of Cups, Part One
Author: Mokuyoubi
Pairing: Brendon/Ryan, Jon/Spencer, other bandom
Word Count: Pretty much 31,000
Rating: NC-17
Summary: The circus is coming to town.
AN: This was supposed to be a little thing, like saying, hey, bandom, hi, can I come play, and then it turned into…this…monstrosity. Thanks to charl16 for the suggestions and special thanks to sparkfrost for her helpful beta.
I.
“I want to go to the carnival,” Jon said. Oh, that was all anyone at school had been talking about all week. Brendon wanted to go, too, but it was entirely out of the question. “After school, maybe?” Jon prompted in the silence.
“I can’t after school.” Brendon frowned and didn’t look at Jon. “I have Seminary after school, and if I skip, Sister Carter will ask my mother if I missed because I was sick, and then I’ll get in trouble with my parents and I won’t get the prize for perfect attendance for this year.”
Jon chose wisely not to comment. “After Seminary?”
“I have Mutual.”
“Mutual what?” Jon asked in vague wonder.
Brendon blushed. He hated trying to explain these things to people outside of the church. They always thought he was weird. He’d only been in Las Vegas for a month, and already he’d been shunned by the majority of the school. The only people who even spoke to him were the other members of the church, but they were uptight and kind of mean, so Brendon didn’t spend a lot of time with them outside of Seminary and church. Only, Jon wasn’t Mormon, but he was really nice and even though he thought Mormons were weird, he didn’t treat Brendon any differently.
“Why don’t you just skip it?” Jon asked, when Brendon didn’t answer.
Jon’s family didn’t go to church, and most of the townspeople liked to think they were progressive to have their very own atheists, but Brendon’s parents forbade him from speaking to Jon. Still, talking to him was one thing-sneaking off to go to the carnival was another thing entirely, and skipping Mutual to go? The mere thought made Brendon’s heart flutter in panic.
As if he could read Brendon’s thoughts, Jon shrugged. “We could go after. Bill and Mike say it gets even better at night.”
Bill and Mike were Jon’s older brothers, and if possible, they were even cooler than Jon. They went to the gambling clubs, and played instruments and gambled and went out with girls who danced on the Pair-o-Dice stage.
Brendon really, really wanted to go to the carnival. He’d been excited to move to Las Vegas, having heard all the stories about it. He knew his parents would be upset if they knew his enthusiasm wasn’t so much about spreading the word the prophet as it was about seeing the big city.
And now there was a carnival, with gypsies and dancers and a snake tamer and the exotic fortune-teller, and Brendon wanted to see it so badly he could almost taste it.
“I’m really not allowed,” was what Brendon said.
“Do you ever do anything your parents don’t want you to do?” Jon didn’t sound mean when he asked it. He just sounded kinda awed, like he didn’t know someone like Brendon could exist, who obeyed every rule, all the time.
Brendon was scandalised. His expression was enough of an answer, apparently, because Jon muttered something about Brendon being unbelievable under his breath. It was kinda strange and really neat that even though they’d only known each other a month, Jon seemed to know him really well. Brendon had never had a best friend before, but he thought maybe this was what it felt like.
Jon looked disappointed, but he wasn’t the sort to pressure someone into doing something that made them uncomfortable. Only, maybe Brendon wanted to be pressured a little.
“Well, Mutual is over at 8:30. And my parents are usually in bed by 9:30.”
“Yeah?” Jon said. He was hesitant, like he didn’t know what to make of that, but there was a little smile tugging at his lips.
“My room is at the other end of the house from them,” Brendon went on.
Jon’s face lit up in a bright smile that Brendon was helpless but to answer with his own. “Ten sounds like the perfect time,” Jon said.
The carnival was lit up like daylight when they arrived. The Ferris wheel was running and the merry-go-round was playing a lively tune and the games along the main strip were in full swing. The man taking admissions at the front gate gave Brendon a speculative look when he took his quarter and dime. He didn’t look much older than Brendon, but he was dressed in a red velvet jacket and a shiny black top hat and had a grin like a shark. “Enjoy,” he said.
There were too many things to see. Brendon just stood there for a minute, trying to take it all in. Jon grabbed his sleeve and tugged him along. “Come on, let’s check out the Ten-in-One.”
Apparently, the tent closed at eight, and after all the children were gone, it opened again at nine with new shows. Brendon peered around cautiously, but he didn’t see anyone from the church. Of course he was probably the only one who’d break the rules, but it didn’t make him any less paranoid.
It cost another quarter to get inside, and it was crowded full of men and smelled like sweat and alcohol. Jon and Brendon pushed in and found a place to the side of the stage and toward the back. Brendon was so sick with nervousness he wasn’t even sure he could have fun.
The announcer was a tall, slender man with a slick suit and an even slicker smile. When he spoke, his voice was velvety smooth and captivating. He breezed through the routines, somehow managing to create a sense of excitement despite his expression of barely reserved boredom.
There was a skeletally thin man who twisted himself into improbable and painful looking knots. There were three men covered all over their arms, necks and torsos with colourful, intricate tattoos. There was a man who could bend steel and lifted a bench with the three tattooed men sitting on it.
Brendon was plenty interested enough by all of this, but as the acts progressed (a bearded lady, a man who ate needles and nails, a woman with webbed hands and feet), the crowd became restless and began to mutter.
“What is it?” Brendon muttered to Jon.
“The blow-off,” Jon answered back, grinning wryly. Brendon didn’t know what that meant, but from Jon’s tone of voice, he could tell it was something of which his parents would definitely not approve. “The kootch dance.”
Brendon felt his eyes go wide. And sure enough, before either of them could say another word, the mystic, who’d entertained the crowd by guessing what people had in their pockets, left the stage and the announcer knelt at the edge, a grin lighting up his face.
“And now, gentlemen, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…” Appreciative murmurs went through the crowd. “Please welcome the lovely Greta, the ravishing Victoria and the exotic Maja as they perform for you their burlesque…” He swept off the stage, a curtain lifted, and there they stood.
Some of the girls at school like to wear skirts that showed off ankles and calves, and sometimes when he went into town there were women who wore sleeveless dresses. The desert of Nevada was hot, and no amount of prudery was going to compete with that. But this…
Greta was dressed the most conservatively in a pair of silk shorts and a matching camisole. Victoria had a black corset laced tight and a little skirt that barely maintained her modesty, and wore heels that made her legs look long and dangerous. Maja wore a plunging bustier and long, sheer pants that left little to the imagination. The announcer started up a record and as the sultry music began to play, the women began to dance.
Brendon couldn’t look. It wasn’t that they weren’t beautiful, because…wow, they were. But it felt wrong, like he was taking advantage of them somehow. All the guys were catcalling and saying horrible things, demanding that the girls undress.
He shot a look at Jon, who at least wasn’t shouting along with them, but he didn’t seem particularly upset by it. He didn’t even notice when Brendon slipped out the side of the tent into the fresh night air.
On a stage off to the side there was a vaguely foreign looking man performing a writhing dance with a hissing cobra slung over his shoulders. Another man with hair bigger and curlier than Brendon had ever seen, swallowed fire and sprayed it the air, lighting the night up bright.
Just beyond, tucked almost out of sight behind the Ten-in-One, was a tent more mended patchwork than the original canvas. There was a hand-painted sign propped outside, fancy cursive and winding roses with crimson letters and gold leafing around the edges, promising a glimpse at what the future held.
Inside the open flap of the tent stood the fortune-teller. The girls inside the Ten-in-One had been beautiful, and all that bare skin was certainly meant to be tantalising, but they had nothing on her.
She had short, frosted blonde hair like something out of the thirties, sculpted into wild curls that framed her face and fell into her eyes. And her eyes. Certainly it was just because of the firelight, but they shone amber and were lined in thick kohl. And her mouth…it was glossy pink and full, and smirking at him like she knew something he didn’t.
He couldn’t see her too well in the shadows, but then she stepped fully out of the tent. Layer after layer of skirt swirled around her bare feet, and he could see, then, when she dropped her crossed arms, that the lace-up top didn’t hide the gentle swell of a woman’s breast.
The thin frame was without curves.
Brendon blinked in surprise, or confusion, or both, he didn’t know, and he couldn’t help but stare.
“Can we help you?” he-he, Brendon couldn’t believe-asked.
“The little boy looks lost,” said another man, who Brendon hadn’t noticed before, so enthralled had he been. He was crouched outside the tent with a cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth. His greasy black hair obscured his features, but Brendon could see enough to think he looked a little scary.
“What’s the matter?” the fortune-teller asked.
“I just, the girls,” Brendon sputtered and gestured with his hands, only he didn’t even know what the gesture was supposed to convey.
The fortune-teller’s smirk widened. “Not man enough to handle them?”
Brendon wanted to be insulted, really, but the guy was right. Of course, his ego was still stung, because this was coming from a guy who looked his age and was wearing a dress and makeup.
“I just don’t think it’s very nice to stare at them, like that, and shout all those horrible things.”
“See, that’s exactly what I’ve been saying all this time,” the guy with the cigarette said, and he sounded excited. He flipped back his hair and smiled at Brendon, and if it hadn’t been so creepy looking, Brendon might have smiled back. “We say we care about them, yet night after night we allow them to go out on that stage and bare themselves before a bunch of raunchy pigs. How can we just stand by and help perpetuate the semiotic subjugation of our lady friends?”
“They’re getting paid for it,” the fortune-teller said, in a reasonable sort of way.
“And what, precisely, does it say about our society that three such talented, intelligent young women such as they can’t find any other way to support themselves?” the man argued.
“Jesus, Gerard. Are you going on about that shit again?” One of the tattooed guys from the show came from the line of sleeping tents in the back, towelling wet hair. “I think,” he drawled, “that you’re the one perpetuating the semiotic whatever-ever, myself.”
Gerard’s jaw dropped and he took a deep breath like he was gearing up for another speech, but the tattoo guy cut him off. “I mean, you’re totally ignoring the fact that they like dancing. If you’re going to go on about equal rights and women’s suffrage and all that, you have to come to terms with the fact that it is totally their right to allow themselves to be objectified.”
Gerard didn’t know what to make of that, and just sat there looking bewildered, mouth opening and closing. The fortune-teller laughed, and Brendon felt something in his stomach drop. His entire face lit up when he laughed, and Brendon could see the inside of his mouth, the rows of perfect, pearl like teeth.
“I never thought I’d live to see the day Gerard was rendered speechless. Frank, I was wrong when I said we didn’t need another tattooed freak. I take it all back.”
“Come on, Gerard,” Frank said. He tugged at Gerard’s arm and the man got to his feet, grumbling under his breath. “You said you’d show me that makeup thing for the next show.”
The two of them ambled off together, Gerard babbling to Frank about misunderstanding the situation and his propensity for abusing false syllogisms. Frank seemed very amused about it all.
“So,” the fortune-teller said. He put his hands on his hips and it drew Brendon’s attention to the fine arch of his back. “Have you come to have your future read to you?”
“I…” Brendon’s sister always teased him about getting tongue-tied when he was nervous or excited. He forced himself to look away from the other boy and stared at his feet. His shoes were covered in dust. He was never going to get them clean. What if his mother noticed? “I’m really not allowed.”
“Huh. But you are allowed to watch the burlesque?” Without looking, Brendon could see the mocking expression the tone indicated.
“I didn’t watch them,” Brendon said, and felt his cheeks burning in shame and something else.
“My cards are only dangerous when they tell the truth,” he said. His voice went soft and low when he said it. Brendon looked up, and when had that guy got so close? Now he could see the delicate, swirling patterns drawn in black around his eyes that made them even more exotic. “Are you afraid to hear what they have to say?”
Brendon had broken so many rules tonight he didn’t even want to think about what would happen to him if his parents found out. But if had his future read, he’d be doing more than breaking his parents’ rules. Heresy was a big deal. He’d known two girls back in Ogden who’d had disciplinary actions taken against them for playing with a witch’s board.
“I’ve got to go,” Brendon said, and hurried off to find Jon.
II.
Somehow Jon had misplaced Brendon. He was tiny, sure, but he was also probably the most energetic person Jon had ever met in his life, and that meant he could usually pick Brendon out of a crowd pretty easily. Only in the past five minutes, Brendon had entirely disappeared without Jon noticing at all.
The girls had just finished their second number and were still mostly clothed, but Jon knew what was coming. His brothers had been talking about it ever since the carnival came to town. Some of the clubs in Vegas had strip shows, but none of them ever got entirely naked, drawing the line at doffing their underwear.
Apparently, the girls at the carnival had no such compunctions. Jon was, he had to admit, curious, but he was more worried about Brendon wandering around the carnival by himself. He had this horrible habit of believing the best of everyone and, that, mixed with his natural curiosity seemed like a bad combination when Jon thought about the barkers and gamers outside looking for a gullible mark.
In the half-hour they’d been in the tent, the number of people at the fair seemed to have doubled. A large group was gathering outside waiting for the next show to begin, no doubt intrigued by the sounds they heard coming from within. Jon pushed through the crowd, glancing all around, but Brendon was nowhere to be seen.
He wandered around the area, looking for something that might have caught Brendon’s attention. He’d mentioned wanting to go on some of the rides, but the Ferris wheel was occupied solely by young couples desirous of a few minutes alone together in the dark, and the merry-go-round had been shut down for the evening.
Jon checked the food tent and all the loudest and most garish games, and following those he found himself outside the carnival proper. There were a bunch of roustabouts sitting around a fire and drinking, and they didn’t pay him any attention.
He turned to head back, but his gaze caught on a sliver of light coming from the open flap of a tent just behind the Ten-in-One. There was a vision of pale skin out of the corner of his eye and he didn’t mean to look, really. It was one thing to watch girls who got paid to dance and take off their clothes, but something really different to spy on one in the privacy of her room, but, well, he just couldn’t help it.
She was seated at a vanity, but it was angled so he couldn’t see her reflection, only her back turned to him. That was enough. She was wearing only small black panties trimmed in pink lace, like in the pictures his brothers had of girls from France. Her back was a bare expanse of creamy white skin, the line of her spine graceful and tantalising. Jon could almost taste it beneath his tongue, thought about tracing the freckles that sprinkled over her shoulders.
And her hips…Jon thought that if maybe she’d been on stage, he would have paid a lot more to see it, and Brendon could just stay lost, because, those hips.
He must have made a sound, or something, because she jumped and scrambled for the wrapper lying over the vanity top and pulled it around herself protectively. She looked over her shoulder at him, glaring fiercely, and Jon didn’t know someone could look so angry and inviting at the same time. Her eyes were the brightest blue he’d ever seen, and if looks could kill, he would be dead, but it would be so worth it.
She didn’t say anything, but got up from the seat and he saw a flash of white thigh before the wrapper fell around her, draping to hide all that smooth skin and all those delicious curves. She stormed over to the tent flap and tugged it closed with a snap of canvas, and Jon fell desperately in love.
“There you are!” Brendon said. He sounded relieved and out of breath. “Can we go?”
“What’s wrong?” Jon asked. He tried to focus on the worried expression Brendon wore, rather than remembering the way her hair had fallen, shiny and smooth over her shoulder.
“I just wanna go home,” Brendon said. He had his arms crossed over his stomach, like he did sometimes when the kids at school made fun of him for being Mormon, or when the Mormon kids lectured him about not being Mormon enough. Jon didn’t question it, pushed the girl to the back of his mind, and drove Brendon home.
III.
Brendon couldn’t stop thinking about the fortune-teller. He had trouble sleeping, and when he finally did, he dreamt about him. He didn’t hear a thing that Matthew, Kara, and his mother said at breakfast and he showed up late to school because he was so caught up in his daydreams that he hadn’t paid any attention to where he was going and walked several blocks past the school building. He even got yelled at in English and threatened with a paddling in math class, and he usually was the very best student.
Jon said to him at lunch, “you want to go back, don’t you” and Brendon said, wide-eyed and breathless, “yes.”
He ate dinner in silence and his mother thought he was sick. She wasn’t far off. His stomach was twisted in so many knots he was worried that if he tried to eat anything it would come right back up. He did all his homework and waited for the house to go quiet and the lights to be put out.
By the time ten came around, Brendon was beginning to doubt the wisdom of agreeing to go with Jon, when a tap came on his window. When Jon saw Brendon, he laughed.
“What are you wearing?”
Brendon checked himself in the looking glass. He’d put on his Sunday clothing and slicked back his hair. If Jon asked why, he wouldn’t have an answer, only that he’d thought about the fortune-teller’s smirk, and nothing in his wardrobe seemed appropriate.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“You know people don’t get dressed up to go to the carnival,” Jon said.
“It’s all I had clean,” Brendon lied, but Jon didn’t call him on it, and Brendon was once again so, so thankful to have Jon as a friend.
There were different shows going on, and some of the same. The announcer from the Ten-in-One was now dressed half as a man, half as a woman, and pulled it off surprisingly well. He was singing on the stage that had held the snake charmer the night before. The three tattooed men were playing instruments along to his singing, and Brendon thought it sounded rather nice, though he thought that he could sing it better.
“Oh, hey,” Jon said, “I didn’t see that last night.” Brendon followed his line of sight and it was inevitable, really, Jon looking at the fortune-teller’s tent. “You wanna check it out? Could be fun.”
Brendon really, really wanted to check it out. Maybe if he just went with Jon, and Jon had his fortune told, it wouldn’t be so bad. As long he didn’t get his fortune read, he wasn’t really doing anything wrong, right? Even though he knew he was lying to himself, he couldn’t stop his mouth from moving, voicing his agreement.
The boy was standing in the mouth of the tent again, and he watched Brendon as he and Jon approached the tent. He wasn’t wearing the same get-up as the night before, which was both a relief and disappointing. The line of the skirts had looked really nice on him, but they also made Brendon think horrible things. Tonight the guy was wearing nice slacks, a paisley button down shirt and a purple vest, and had a fancy shawl draped over his shoulders.
“Welcome back,” he greeted. He had one hand on his hip and a deck of tarot cards in the other that he was managing to shuffle one handed. “Change your mind?”
Brendon shook his head so hard it felt like he pulled something in his neck. Jon gave him that look he did whenever Brendon did a Mormon thing. “This is my friend, Jon Walker. He wants to have his fortune told.”
The boy smiled. A real smile, not the smirk he’d had last night. It wasn’t any nicer than his smirk. “Nice to meet you, Jon,” He said. He extended a hand and Brendon was shocked to feel a surge of jealousy when Jon took it.
“I’m, I’m Brendon,” Brendon said quickly, blushing. “Brendon Urie.”
“Brendon,” the boy said, but he didn’t offer his hand. “Come inside, gentlemen.” He turned and went into the tent, holding up the flap for them to pass through.
The space looked larger inside than from without. There was a small cot to the side covered in brightly coloured, sumptuous fabrics and a wardrobe stood open with more of the skirts like the one he’d worn last night, as well as several other outfits like the one he wore now. There was a pile of books by the bed and a guitar. In the centre of the space was a small round table covered in candles, and two chairs, one on either side. He took one and gestured for Jon to take the other. Brendon, nervous and feeling voyeuristic, stood in the shadows near the entrance.
“What would you like to know?” the boy asked.
Jon shrugged a little helplessly, like he hadn’t thought that far ahead. Brendon bit his tongue against the flood of questions he wanted to pose. The fortune-teller poked the inside of his cheek with his tongue.
“Precision is more difficult the more open ended your question.” Then he placed the deck in front of Jon. “Cut.”
The cards were laid out in a T shape with a line of four cards alongside. He flipped them all and looked at them for a long time before his face lit up a little, like he had been reading a familiar book, only to find the ending had changed on him. He looked up at Jon with a little secretive smile tucked into the corner of his lips.
“This card represents you,” he said, and tapped his nail against the card at the centre of the cross. Brendon wanted to edge forward to see better, but fear made him stand still. “This is a good omen. Positive energy, healing, happiness, contentment, self-acceptance and trust.”
Brendon wasn’t going to say that the cards were real, or anything, but that certainly sounded like Jon. All the anxious, nervous energy he felt went dead around Jon, who just effused a sort of calmness, and he’d never seen Jon without a gentle smile on his face.
The boy moved onto the next card. “This is your situation, Judgement. It is indicative of upheaval and great change, the arrival of a new current. You will be presented with an opportunity to not only change your situation, but to expand your horizons. It is blocked by the ten of disks, but this suggests that you have completed an important cycle and have come to the realisation that the accumulation of wealth is no longer a necessity for happiness. So it seems as though what would normally be blocking the situation is actually aiding your progress.” He looked amused and pleasantly surprised by this reading, though Jon himself didn’t look surprised, only contemplative.
His brow furrowed at the next card as he studied it. “This…” he tapped his finger against the ace of disks, “these are the obvious influences in your life, need for monetary and material shelter and protection, only…” he shrugged, “only your crossing card suggests you are already moving beyond this, to the less obvious influences, those below the surface, the ace of wands-creative potential and self-realisation. Using this to come to the root of your natural ability while realising that you cannot blindly force you own desires upon others and upon reality.”
Brendon didn’t think that Jon would ever be the sort to press his own desires on someone else. He wouldn’t have even made Brendon go to the carnival if he hadn’t wanted to. But Jon was nodding his head like it made sense.
They went through the next few cards-the king of wands as Jon’s past influences of impulse, pride and resistance to change, and the Devil (Brendon had flinched when the boy said the word) as future influences of individuality, selfishness, obsession with personal desire. Brendon was growing nervous now. He liked Jon an awful lot, and didn’t like the sound of his future being ruled by the Devil.
As if he sensed this, the boy stopped in his reading to look at Brendon. “This isn’t the Devil of your Christian mythology,” he said dismissively. “Nor is the Death card literal death. These cards are representative of archetypes, you see.” That was all he said for Brendon, returning his attention to the cards.
“The five of swords is how your current mental place. You are too passive about your own fate. You have allowed yourself to become a victim.”
Then he smiled, fast and bright, and looked at Brendon again, “you’re an Aries, aren’t you?” Brendon shook his head uncertainly. “When’s your birthday?”
“Um, April. April twelfth,” Brendon said. He looked at Jon, who shrugged at him.
“Yes,” the boy said. “Aries. This,” he said, to Jon, indicating the queen of wands, “Is how others perceive you. You are steadfast, wilful, but balanced. Reliable, but strong enough to be independent.” He flicked his gaze at Brendon then back to Jon. “You should trust those close to you.”
“This place is usually representative of one’s fears, but you, Jon Walker, you are too positive a person for fears, hmm? These can only be your hopes, I suppose. There is creative collaboration, cooperation, and learning to rely on others. Letting someone else share your burdens a while. Which brings us the final card. This is where you will end, if you continue on your current path, and of course, you have the ability to change it. Though,” he gave Jon a sly smile, “I’m not sure why you would want to.”
“Oh,” Jon challenged, smiling back. Brendon didn’t like all this smiling, like they knew something he didn’t, like they knew each other, and had for a long time.
“Well, let’s just say it is far more positive a reading than I have given in a long time. There is a new relationship, or perhaps multiple relationships, with openness, listening and mutual learning. You will be exposed to new and diverse ideas and be able to partake of them without prejudice.” He gave Brendon another quick glance. Brendon wished he knew what it meant.
Brendon wanted to just dismiss it all as a game, say it wasn’t real. But if that was true, why did the church forbid it? The fortune-teller wore a playful, knowing smile, like he saw the whole future lain out before him, but only provided teasing glimpses for others. Brendon wanted so much to know what his cards held.
“So, altogether,” Jon said slowly.
“Ah,” the boy said, and nodded. “Altogether. Well, all these trump cards,” his fingers danced over the cards, “These are people in your life. The placement and readings seem to indicate they are mostly new to you, but very important. One in particular. They all have something to offer, and these things will all bring you to this place,” he indicated the ending card, “only if you let them.”
Jon was pleased with the reading and tipped extra. “Thank-you” the boy said, with a dangerous smile. “You should visit the yellow tent near the elephant ride. The show promises to be quite entertaining this evening, and I don’t think your friend has the stomach for another trip to the Ten-in-One.” He and Jon shared an amused expression that made Brendon bristle. He wished that Gerard guy was around to defend him.
“Thanks,” Jon said, and hesitated before he stood. “One of those cards you?”
The boy’s eyes were mysterious in the gloom of the tent, and he didn’t give an answer directly. “Should one of them be?” He and Jon looked at each other so long Brendon felt like he was intruding on something and he both wanted to leave them to it and step between them all at the same time.
Then Jon smiled and the fortune-teller nodded graciously and Jon left the tent. Brendon moved to follow, going slow, wanting to be stopped. He wasn’t let down. “If you should change your mind,” the boy murmured. The invitation was left unfinished and open.
Brendon had to ask, because it had been bothering him since they’d first met. “What’s your name?”
The answering bemused expression said it wasn’t a question he was often asked. “I’m Ryan,” he said.
“Ryan,” Brendon breathed, and he hadn’t meant to say it like that, knew it was wrong by the way Ryan’s eyes went wide.
“Brendon,” Jon called, and thankful for the excuse, Brendon scurried out with a wave of goodbye over his shoulder.
It turned out the yellow tent was just behind where the snake tamer had performed, and where there now was a band. A group was waiting to be let in for the next show, and Brendon took the opportunity to ask Jon about the reading. “Do you believe that stuff?” he asked.
Jon had the same easy expression he always had, a relaxed grin on his face. “I don’t know. He seemed to know what he was talking about.” He put a hand on Brendon’s shoulder. “You don’t need to worry about my eternal soul, Brendon,” he said, and his voice was mocking, but in a nice way.
Brendon’s shoulders slumped. “I’m more worried about my own right now,” he admitted.
“Hey,” Jon said, and let his hand slid up Brendon’s neck, around his back, til he was kinda holding him with one arm. “Hey, listen, Brendon, I’m not going to tell you what you should believe, or anything, but you’re just about the nicest, most selfless person I’ve ever met. And if your god would damn you just for doing something that makes you happy, and doesn’t hurt anyone, then, well, sounds like the kind of god I’m glad I don’t believe in.”
It shouldn’t have made Brendon feel happy, to hear someone talk like that about God, but he couldn’t help it. It was Jon. He leaned his head on Jon’s arm and smiled. “Well, Ryan was definitely right about you, anyway.”
“Ryan,” Jon repeated.
“Ryan, the fortune-teller,” Brendon explained, and pulled out of Jon’s embrace. “What he said about you. It was right.”
Jon gave him a look. “Maybe you should have Ryan read your fortune,” he suggested. Brendon was saved from having to explain his reticence by the flap of the tent opening. The crowd began to file in and Brendon felt through his pockets for the correct change to get in.
IV.
It was the girl from the night before, and Jon could only stare unabashedly. She was dressed in a costume that brought to mind a harem girl, but more modest, in loose, flowing trousers and a knotted vest over a tight shirt, all in shades of rose and gold. It made it difficult to see her figure very clearly, but she looked elegant and regal. Her hair fell in shiny soft waves around her face, in her eyes. He wanted to run his hands through it, push it back to see that vibrant blue again.
She swept onto the stage like she owned it. In either hand she held a sword. The music started and she began a dance, twirling the swords deftly around her. They sung in the air, but even as quickly as she moved, as close as she kept the swords to her body and each other, there was never the sound of steel on steel, nor any torn flesh. She ended to thunderous applause.
“Wow,” Brendon said, “she’s…wow.” He was staring at her like he’d never seen a girl before. Jon nodded in dumb agreement.
“Come on, let’s get closer,” Jon urged. Brendon let Jon drag him through the crowd ‘til they were pressed close to the stage.
A new song began to play and her hips swung in time to the tempo. He remembered with a start the white skin against delicate lace, imagined his hands on her, pulling close and tight, putting to use all the advice his brothers had given him about women.
Suddenly, she stumbled a little and her fierce glare fell on Jon. A blush spread high and fast over her cheeks. She looked away quickly, but the expression and redness lingered. Then, leaning back slightly, she tipped her head, opened her jaw, and lifted the narrower of the swords high above her head.
Brendon stopped breathing beside him and grabbed his arms. “She’s not,” he said, but before he could finish, she’d begun sliding the sword down her throat. “Oh my god!” Brendon sounded horrified. Jon wanted to echo the sentiment, but not out of horror. There was something very erotic about watching the length of the sword disappear past her lips.
The crowd hooted and cheered and egged her on, and soon enough, the hilt of the sword rested against her lips and she lifted the other sword. “I can’t watch,” Brendon moaned, and put his face into Jon’s shoulder.
After the show, the crowd left for bigger and better things (the kootch show at the Ten-in-One, no doubt), but Jon didn’t fight to beat the crush for the door. Instead, he grabbed Brendon’s wrist, making him stay by the stage. The dancer was just off-stage, wiping the blades down with a rag and oil before wrapping them and storing them. Jon liked watching it. She made even something so mundane look elegant. He thought about what his fortune had told him, and hoped it had something to do with her. He couldn’t stop looking.
Brendon looked at her, then at Jon, and seemed to come to some sort of a decision. He wrenched his wrist free and went over to the side of the stage and said, “Hey, that show was really awesome.”
The girl blinked and flipped her hair out of her eyes. She looked at Brendon like he was speaking a foreign language, then glanced at Jon. She looked back down at her swords. “Thanks.” Her voice was low and soft, barely above a whisper.
“Yeah, I couldn’t watch when you added the second sword. Don’t you ever get scared you’re going to hurt yourself? How long have you been doing? Did you have to train forever? Can you do more than two swords?” Brendon asked it all with his normal wide-eyed enthusiasm, but Jon knew him pretty well, even after only a few weeks, and there was something strange about it.
For a long moment she stared at him in wonder. “Um. It doesn’t hurt if you do it right,” she said, like she didn’t know where to begin with the questions she’d been asked.
“Oh, but, how do you do it?”
“You have to…” She stopped and squinted at him. “You know, most people don’t want to know how it works.”
Brendon’s shoulders fell a little. “Well, yeah. I just…I’ve never seen anything like this place. Last night, there was this guy who could stand on his head. Like, with his feet! And this other guy had all these really poisonous snakes and he was just dancing with them, like he wasn’t scared at all. And Jon just had his fortune read by Ryan, and I don’t really believe in that stuff, but it seemed really good. So…” Brendon trailed off and shrugged. “So, I just want to know more.”
“You had your fortune read?” she asked. She didn’t look at Jon directly, just in his general direction. She was blushing again.
“Yeah, it was…it was neat,” Jon agreed.
“Ryan is very good at what he does,” she agreed.
“So are you,” Jon said.
Brendon smiled at Jon where the girl couldn’t see it. “I’m just gonna go check out the candy booth,” he said to the air, and slipped out.
Jon really, really loved Brendon. A lot. He slid closer along the stage as she focused hard on her swords. “I wanted to say I was sorry about last night,” he started. He wasn’t sure he wanted to bring that up. Like, maybe it had been dark enough she didn’t recognise him, and anyway, she was talking to him instead of shouting at him, so maybe that was a start, but still, he didn’t feel right not apologising.
“You certainly aren’t the only man to come from the Ten-in-One expecting something more,” she said coolly. “But we aren’t that kind of circus. Pete doesn’t mind the girls getting a little extra work on the side, but generally the performers aren’t interested.” Jon got the point.
“I’m…I didn’t mean it like that, honestly. I was,” he sighed and rubbed his chin. “I was looking for my friend, and I didn’t mean to end up back there, and I’m sorry, it’s just,” do you know you have the most amazing hips I’ve ever seen is what he didn’t say. “I didn’t mean to look. But I’m not sorry I did.”
She stopped polishing the sword and her hand tightened on the hilt. She had nice hands, too, long and delicate and soft looking, but he could see the callus on her thumb from where she handled the swords. He imagined them on his skin, the slight catch of hardened skin. She cleared her throat.
“Well, I’m so pleased to have provided you with the free show, but…” She stood and swung the sword experimentally, maybe to show him what she could do. It looked fancy and had the potential to cause a fair amount of damage. Jon wasn’t so much scared as turned on. “I have other, actual paying performances for which to prepare, so please excuse me.” She bent and gathered her other swords and stormed off the stage.
Jon found Brendon just outside the tent with a piece of cotton candy bigger than his head and a matching grin. He didn’t say anything, just waited for Jon. “I’m working on it,” Jon said with confidence.
V.
“You read a guy’s cards tonight?” Spencer asked, sitting down heavily on his cot.
Ryan hummed tiredly. He was lying on his side facing away. “Read lots of guys’ cards tonight,” he said. There was something playful in his voice. He rolled over to look at Spencer. “Why?”
Spencer glared at him. “There’s this guy. Who thinks I’m a girl.”
Ryan laughed, rolling around a little. “Oh, it’s even better than I thought.”
“So you told him something?” Spencer prompted.
“I just told him what the cards told me,” Ryan said, in that infuriating way he had, when he talked about his craft. Spencer knew him pretty well though, and he dug his knuckles painfully into Ryan’s side. “Ow, ouch,” Ryan cried, and punched him in the arm. “I didn’t say anything specifically. But I can’t help what I saw.” He shrugged.
“Play with other people all you want, Ross, but leave me out of it,” Spencer told him in a dangerous voice. Ryan didn’t read Spencer’s cards. He didn’t really need to, just like Spencer didn’t need to listen to Ryan’s thoughts. They knew one another well enough without. He didn’t like the idea of Ryan seeing him in someone else’s cards.
“I liked him,” Ryan said speculatively. His laughing had mostly subsided and he scooted closer to Spencer. Spencer relaxed and lay down, staring hard at the ceiling. “What’s wrong with him?”
“He was spying on me last night. And he thinks I’m a girl,” Spencer said fiercely. That set Ryan off again. Spencer sighed. It was ridiculous. He wasn’t the first guy who’d tried to get into Spencer’s pants, but he was the first one who’d managed to get past his mental barriers and, well…so Spencer might have liked what he’d seen, when he’d caught the glimpses of what Jon had wanted to do with him. Right up to the point where it involved a vagina. He scowled and pushed his face into Ryan’s neck.
Ryan rolled over and put his arm around Spencer’s waist, still laughing a little. “He has a very open mind,” he said reasonably.
“Don’t you have your own tent?” Spencer grumbled. He didn’t want to think about that guy anymore. It didn’t matter that he had a stupid smile or nice hair, or that the mind behind those dirty thoughts actually seemed like a mind Spencer wouldn’t mind getting to know. What mattered was that he thought Spencer was a girl, and there was a difference between being open minded and readily dropping all sorts of social and psychological preconceptions about gender and sexuality when he realised that Spencer was very much not a girl.
“I like yours better,” Ryan said, nose scrunched up. “Yours comes with a Spencer.” Spencer didn’t put up a fight. His bed was a lot bigger, and besides, Ryan invaded enough that he knew it was no use. Ryan usually got his way when it came to Spencer.
“Did you meet his friend?” Ryan asked, when Spencer said nothing.
“You mean the little one with the huge eyes who talks a mile a minute?” Spencer asked, remembering the baffled helplessness he’d felt as he’d been bombarded with questions.
Ryan nodded. “Sounds right. What’d you think?”
“A fucking mess,” Spencer said honestly.
“So you looked?” Ryan prompted. He sounded hesitant so Spencer looked at him. He was toying with some loose fringe at the edge of the blanket, a gesture of nervousness. Interesting. Not for the first time in their friendship, or even the first time that day, Spencer was tempted to look inside Ryan, but he held it in check. He didn’t do it to people he cared about. Hell, he didn’t do it to most people, period.
“I couldn’t help it, he…” Spencer shook his head, and he still couldn’t figure it out. “He just. He put it all out there, I didn’t even have to try, just open up a little, and there it all was. Didn’t you see it in your cards?”
Ryan shifted, rolled away again to face the wall. “He didn’t want them read. Or, well, he did, but he wouldn’t let me read them.” He sighed. “I don’t get it.”
But he wanted to read them, Spencer could tell. Usually Ryan didn’t care. He did it for his job, because it was what he could do, and when their friends asked, he was happy to oblige. But Ryan didn’t usually want for a person, in particular, to have their cards read. It meant he wanted to know about this guy. And that was interesting.
Spencer turned down the lamp until the flame went out and then settled down under the blankets. It had been warm a few hours ago, but with the sun gone, the heat had vanished and the desert was cold. Spencer had been used to it, years ago before he and Ryan had left with the circus and he’d been prepared, taking extra blankets and sheets from his chest. Ryan had brought his own blanket along too, and Spencer was thankful for the press of Ryan’s body to his and the heat that grew between them. He tried to think about that, and Ryan’s problems rather than the guy-Jon, with soft brown eyes and the image of lips against skin-and his own problems. It didn’t really work.
VI.
Jon’s dad owned an automobile and electronics store in town called Walker and Sons. Jon explained that was because the original had been called Walker and Sons, and had originally been run by his grandpa but was now owned by his uncle, and that was the reason he didn’t live in Chicago anymore. He didn’t know why his parents had picked Nevada, and he’d never asked. Besides, he liked it here.
Sometimes, when Jon didn’t have a lot of schoolwork to do, he worked at Walker and Sons during the afternoons and on weekends. Both his brothers had gone to work for their father after finishing high school, but Jon confided in Brendon that as much as he liked having some spending money, he had no intention of staying after he got his diploma.
“Small potatoes, man,” he said, though when Brendon asked what Jon did want to do, Jon would just shrug. That was pretty much how Brendon felt, too. Of course he was expected to go on his mission straight out of school, but after that? Marriage, of course, and children, but how would he support his family?
Jon’s dad was sympathetic to Brendon’s Mormon plight and didn’t even mind when Jon blew off customers to hang out with Brendon in the back room. Brendon got, like, the best grades in school, and he never missed Seminary, so his parents didn’t give him a hard time if he didn’t come straight home every day. In fact, they probably didn’t notice, too busy fawning over Matthew’s accomplishments, or working on making sure Kara got married off to someone nice.
So sometimes, on weekends, even though it was forbidden, Brendon did his homework at Walker and Sons and then Jon’s dad and brothers would take them out to dinner and shakes at the diner on the corner.
Tonight Mike and Bill had dates, and Jon’s dad was kept late with paperwork, but he gave them a few dollars from the safe and told them to have fun. Brendon liked the diner because it was safe. All the cool kids who made fun of him preferred the drive in and the diner closer to it, across town. All the Mormon kids never went out on dates, and when they went out as groups it was usually to do something really boring, and never in a place that played rock and roll music on the jukebox. So the only people that came to this diner were the families, which meant no one bothered Brendon.
They sat in a booth in the corner, well out of sight of the street, and ordered their favourites, and Jon got up and put some change in the jukebox. Brendon hadn’t known a lot about music before he met Jon. He still didn’t, but he was learning. Jon even said that over Christmas break he’d starting teaching Brendon on his guitar. Sometimes Jon would take extra long when he gave Brendon a drive home so they could listen to the radio.
The new Chuck Berry song started up and for a minute Brendon just listened to the music, closing his eyes and breathing it in. He hadn’t known what he’d been missing until Jon had played the first Chuck Berry song for him, and then Johnny Cash, and then followed it up with the Big Bopper and Brendon had pretty much been sold on the first note, but he didn’t want Jon to stop.
“I think I’m not sure I believe in God,” Brendon said, under the cover of the guitar solo. He expected wide eyes, maybe a little choking and protestations, but of course, this was Jon.
Jon blinked and looked up from where he was sipping his shake. After a minute he leaned back in his seat. “Huh.”
“Yeah,” Brendon agreed. He wanted to get frosted over it all, but Jon was so calm about he, he couldn’t muster the energy. “My parents and everyone at church keep talking about my mission and, well, at first I was excited, you know? Its like a rite of passage, like, suddenly I’m an adult when I go on my mission. Only then I started thinking about what I would tell other people, how I’d explain my faith, you know, so that they’d want to share it, and I…I was just embarrassed about it.”
Brendon really wanted Jon to say something, like he understood, but Jon hadn’t ever believed in God in the first place. “What are you going to tell your parents?” he asked.
Brendon shrugged uncomfortably. “I hadn’t gotten as far as telling them in my mind,” he admitted. “I can’t even sneak out to the carnival without feeling really guilty. How can I tell them I’m having a crisis of faith? And besides, it isn’t like I could just stop going to church, or something. That isn’t how it works.” He didn’t feel like going into explanations about the registry and disciplinary actions, and potentially being sent away to a special hospital to get fixed.
“The thing is, I’m not sure, really. I mean, I get angry listening about the word of the prophet, and I wonder how can anyone believe it, and I think the rules are so stupid, and how am I supposed to believe in something I can’t see? But then, when I’m in bed, I can’t stop saying my prayers, and thinking about how much trouble I’m going to be in for thinking what I do, how I’m never going to be worthy of the celestial kingdom, and…”
Jon just looked at him with that soft, open, understanding expression. Brendon couldn’t help but go on. “And the other night, I was…I believed what Ryan told you, and I wanted so badly to have him read my cards, too. I wanted to know all about them. I looked in the library the other day, but there wasn’t anything on them.” He would have gone on, but the waitress came over with their food and he fell into silence until she left.
“If your parents totally flip out, you know my ma and pop will take you in,” Jon told him casually, like it wasn’t anything. Brendon blushed and focused on his food so he wouldn’t make a fool out of himself by blubbering all over Jon.
The bell above the door rang and Brendon just looked up for something to do other than look at Jon, and there were several of the carnies, including Ryan, and the girl Jon had his eye on.
“Jon,” he hissed, and Jon looked over, and then his eyes did go comically wide. Brendon couldn’t laugh. He was too busy looking at Ryan, who was wearing tight blue jeans and a tight tank top, kinda like the greasers, only it looked really nice on Ryan, who was skinnier even than Brendon, but with wiry muscles.
Ryan, as if sensing the attention, looked over at them and his eyes lit up when the fell on Brendon. He leaned into the girl and whispered something before sauntering towards them. His hips swayed more than most of the girls at school, and Brendon was mesmerized. That was the part he couldn’t say to Jon, because no matter how understanding Jon was, he couldn’t explain this.
“Jon,” he said first, though his gaze was fixed on Brendon, “Brendon,” he added, more slowly. “We keep running into each other.”
Brendon didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to react that that smooth voice, layered with suggestion, and he was saved by Gerard, who came ambling up to them with his arm over Greta’s shoulder. Gerard’s hair looked cleaner and he was dressed casually, and Greta was all covered up and wholesome looking in a plain black and white dress with capped sleeves and a skirt that came past her knees. She didn’t look anything at all like a girl who took off her clothes for a living. “This,” Gerard said excitedly, “is the guy I was telling you about.”
Greta and Ryan both rolled their eyes. “Brendon,” Ryan supplied.
Gerard, apparently, didn’t have any decent social skills, because he slid into the booth next to Jon without invitation or warning. “Brendon,” he said, and looked at Jon.
“Jon,” Jon supplied.
“Gerard.” Gerard smiled and nodded in greeting, and then addressed Brendon, “you should tell Greta what you said the other night.”
Greta sighed and put a hand on her hip. “Lay off it, Gee,” Frank said. He and the rest of the carnies seemed to take their cue from Ryan and were claiming the tables and booths around Jon and Brendon.
“What’d you say the other night?” Jon asked Brendon.
Most of the new arrivals were chatting amongst themselves or looking through the menu, but a few of them were watching Brendon curiously for the answer. He flushed at all the attention. “I just…I didn’t think…” he trailed off and stared at the tabletop. “I didn’t think it was right, the way all the guys were behaving at the kootch show.”
“Oooh,” cried a voice, and Brendon looked to see it was the announcer. He bumped his shoulder into the snake charmer and the two of them shared a grin. Brendon didn’t know what to make of that.
“Don’t pay any attention to them,” Gerard said dismissively. “They’re just bitter that no one will pay them to take of their clothes.” He smirked at them and they made some rather obscene gestures in return.
Ryan grimaced and said, “don’t make me sit next to them,” to Brendon, and their table was the only one not full. Brendon tried not to smile and scooted over enough for both Ryan and the girl to have a seat.
VII.
So, Jon wasn’t expecting a bunch of circus folk to be boring, but he’d never have imagined they were so cool, either. Gerard made a comment about one of the songs Jon had played on the jukebox, and then the two of them, along with Frank, the tattooed guy (well, one of them), and Pete, the owner of the circus, spent the next hour talking non-stop. First it was about different artists they liked, and songs and records and stuff, but then they started talking about their own music.
Every once in a while Jon looked over at her, and she was just watching them-Brendon and Ryan had got drawn into a conversation with William and Gabriel, and despite Ryan’s protestations that they were awful, they seemed to be getting along pretty well. All the other tables were full of lively chatter, and surely she could have moved, or whatever, but she just sat there and watched, and okay, Jon found it a little bit of a turn on.
She was dressed in the toreador pants that were so popular with the Teddy Boys’ girlfriends. There were tight and showed off her nice calves and accentuated the curve of her hips. She had a button up sweater on over a tight camisole, like it wasn’t ridiculously hot outside, which gave a hint at her figure, but still left a lot to the imagination.
Jon could tell she didn’t have a lot up front like the kootch girls, but he didn’t even remotely care. She had a twist to her lips like she wanted to look angry but couldn’t quite pull it off, and her hips. Jon could go on about those hips. And he liked girls who thought they were better than him. They were usually right, but that wouldn’t stop him from trying.
“Don’t you have a show tonight?” Jon asked, when most of the rest of the customers had left and the waitress was giving them pointed looks.
Pete waved a dismissive hand. “There are a lot of us,” he said, and grinned.
“Pete attracts the social rejects,” Frank explained. He put an arm around Pete’s shoulder. Pete smiled, like the words didn’t even remotely sting. Jon thought these people were, quite possibly, even cooler than his brothers. By a lot.
“We take turns,” Gerard explained, pushing back his hair for the hundredth time. “We mostly share what we make, anyway, but we take turns.”
“That’s cool,” Jon said, and he knew he wanted to say something else, but he didn’t know what it was. Please let me come with you, maybe, but less desperate and awkward.
Pete narrowed his eyes at Jon. “Your friend, is he cool?” He jerked his head in Brendon’s direction. Brendon was staring at Ryan like he’d hung the moon, and Ryan and William were bickering loudly over something. Pete’s eyes went soft, like his question had already been answered, but Jon said, “yeah,” anyway.
Pete looked at Patrick, who’d been setting across the booth from him the whole night and had barely said a word, but watched Pete a lot like the girl was watching Jon, and that was…well…huh, interesting. Patrick gave a little nod of his head and Pete turned back to Jon. “Wanna see something really neat?” Pete asked, and his words made something in Jon’s spine thrill.
Brendon and Ryan had stopped talking and were watching them. “Really?” Ryan asked. There was this series of looks, between Ryan and Pete, Ryan and the girl, Pete and Patrick, and then the girl shrugged and looked uneasily at Jon.
“Oh, really,” Pete said intensely.
Brendon almost bounced in his seat. “Are we doing something?” Jon tried to feel bad that Brendon had gone from religious crisis a couple of hours ago to eager to break the rules, but he looked so much happier.
“Show us something really neat,” Jon said.
Part Two
Author: Mokuyoubi
Pairing: Brendon/Ryan, Jon/Spencer, other bandom
Word Count: Pretty much 31,000
Rating: NC-17
Summary: The circus is coming to town.
AN: This was supposed to be a little thing, like saying, hey, bandom, hi, can I come play, and then it turned into…this…monstrosity. Thanks to charl16 for the suggestions and special thanks to sparkfrost for her helpful beta.
I.
“I want to go to the carnival,” Jon said. Oh, that was all anyone at school had been talking about all week. Brendon wanted to go, too, but it was entirely out of the question. “After school, maybe?” Jon prompted in the silence.
“I can’t after school.” Brendon frowned and didn’t look at Jon. “I have Seminary after school, and if I skip, Sister Carter will ask my mother if I missed because I was sick, and then I’ll get in trouble with my parents and I won’t get the prize for perfect attendance for this year.”
Jon chose wisely not to comment. “After Seminary?”
“I have Mutual.”
“Mutual what?” Jon asked in vague wonder.
Brendon blushed. He hated trying to explain these things to people outside of the church. They always thought he was weird. He’d only been in Las Vegas for a month, and already he’d been shunned by the majority of the school. The only people who even spoke to him were the other members of the church, but they were uptight and kind of mean, so Brendon didn’t spend a lot of time with them outside of Seminary and church. Only, Jon wasn’t Mormon, but he was really nice and even though he thought Mormons were weird, he didn’t treat Brendon any differently.
“Why don’t you just skip it?” Jon asked, when Brendon didn’t answer.
Jon’s family didn’t go to church, and most of the townspeople liked to think they were progressive to have their very own atheists, but Brendon’s parents forbade him from speaking to Jon. Still, talking to him was one thing-sneaking off to go to the carnival was another thing entirely, and skipping Mutual to go? The mere thought made Brendon’s heart flutter in panic.
As if he could read Brendon’s thoughts, Jon shrugged. “We could go after. Bill and Mike say it gets even better at night.”
Bill and Mike were Jon’s older brothers, and if possible, they were even cooler than Jon. They went to the gambling clubs, and played instruments and gambled and went out with girls who danced on the Pair-o-Dice stage.
Brendon really, really wanted to go to the carnival. He’d been excited to move to Las Vegas, having heard all the stories about it. He knew his parents would be upset if they knew his enthusiasm wasn’t so much about spreading the word the prophet as it was about seeing the big city.
And now there was a carnival, with gypsies and dancers and a snake tamer and the exotic fortune-teller, and Brendon wanted to see it so badly he could almost taste it.
“I’m really not allowed,” was what Brendon said.
“Do you ever do anything your parents don’t want you to do?” Jon didn’t sound mean when he asked it. He just sounded kinda awed, like he didn’t know someone like Brendon could exist, who obeyed every rule, all the time.
Brendon was scandalised. His expression was enough of an answer, apparently, because Jon muttered something about Brendon being unbelievable under his breath. It was kinda strange and really neat that even though they’d only known each other a month, Jon seemed to know him really well. Brendon had never had a best friend before, but he thought maybe this was what it felt like.
Jon looked disappointed, but he wasn’t the sort to pressure someone into doing something that made them uncomfortable. Only, maybe Brendon wanted to be pressured a little.
“Well, Mutual is over at 8:30. And my parents are usually in bed by 9:30.”
“Yeah?” Jon said. He was hesitant, like he didn’t know what to make of that, but there was a little smile tugging at his lips.
“My room is at the other end of the house from them,” Brendon went on.
Jon’s face lit up in a bright smile that Brendon was helpless but to answer with his own. “Ten sounds like the perfect time,” Jon said.
The carnival was lit up like daylight when they arrived. The Ferris wheel was running and the merry-go-round was playing a lively tune and the games along the main strip were in full swing. The man taking admissions at the front gate gave Brendon a speculative look when he took his quarter and dime. He didn’t look much older than Brendon, but he was dressed in a red velvet jacket and a shiny black top hat and had a grin like a shark. “Enjoy,” he said.
There were too many things to see. Brendon just stood there for a minute, trying to take it all in. Jon grabbed his sleeve and tugged him along. “Come on, let’s check out the Ten-in-One.”
Apparently, the tent closed at eight, and after all the children were gone, it opened again at nine with new shows. Brendon peered around cautiously, but he didn’t see anyone from the church. Of course he was probably the only one who’d break the rules, but it didn’t make him any less paranoid.
It cost another quarter to get inside, and it was crowded full of men and smelled like sweat and alcohol. Jon and Brendon pushed in and found a place to the side of the stage and toward the back. Brendon was so sick with nervousness he wasn’t even sure he could have fun.
The announcer was a tall, slender man with a slick suit and an even slicker smile. When he spoke, his voice was velvety smooth and captivating. He breezed through the routines, somehow managing to create a sense of excitement despite his expression of barely reserved boredom.
There was a skeletally thin man who twisted himself into improbable and painful looking knots. There were three men covered all over their arms, necks and torsos with colourful, intricate tattoos. There was a man who could bend steel and lifted a bench with the three tattooed men sitting on it.
Brendon was plenty interested enough by all of this, but as the acts progressed (a bearded lady, a man who ate needles and nails, a woman with webbed hands and feet), the crowd became restless and began to mutter.
“What is it?” Brendon muttered to Jon.
“The blow-off,” Jon answered back, grinning wryly. Brendon didn’t know what that meant, but from Jon’s tone of voice, he could tell it was something of which his parents would definitely not approve. “The kootch dance.”
Brendon felt his eyes go wide. And sure enough, before either of them could say another word, the mystic, who’d entertained the crowd by guessing what people had in their pockets, left the stage and the announcer knelt at the edge, a grin lighting up his face.
“And now, gentlemen, the moment you’ve all been waiting for…” Appreciative murmurs went through the crowd. “Please welcome the lovely Greta, the ravishing Victoria and the exotic Maja as they perform for you their burlesque…” He swept off the stage, a curtain lifted, and there they stood.
Some of the girls at school like to wear skirts that showed off ankles and calves, and sometimes when he went into town there were women who wore sleeveless dresses. The desert of Nevada was hot, and no amount of prudery was going to compete with that. But this…
Greta was dressed the most conservatively in a pair of silk shorts and a matching camisole. Victoria had a black corset laced tight and a little skirt that barely maintained her modesty, and wore heels that made her legs look long and dangerous. Maja wore a plunging bustier and long, sheer pants that left little to the imagination. The announcer started up a record and as the sultry music began to play, the women began to dance.
Brendon couldn’t look. It wasn’t that they weren’t beautiful, because…wow, they were. But it felt wrong, like he was taking advantage of them somehow. All the guys were catcalling and saying horrible things, demanding that the girls undress.
He shot a look at Jon, who at least wasn’t shouting along with them, but he didn’t seem particularly upset by it. He didn’t even notice when Brendon slipped out the side of the tent into the fresh night air.
On a stage off to the side there was a vaguely foreign looking man performing a writhing dance with a hissing cobra slung over his shoulders. Another man with hair bigger and curlier than Brendon had ever seen, swallowed fire and sprayed it the air, lighting the night up bright.
Just beyond, tucked almost out of sight behind the Ten-in-One, was a tent more mended patchwork than the original canvas. There was a hand-painted sign propped outside, fancy cursive and winding roses with crimson letters and gold leafing around the edges, promising a glimpse at what the future held.
Inside the open flap of the tent stood the fortune-teller. The girls inside the Ten-in-One had been beautiful, and all that bare skin was certainly meant to be tantalising, but they had nothing on her.
She had short, frosted blonde hair like something out of the thirties, sculpted into wild curls that framed her face and fell into her eyes. And her eyes. Certainly it was just because of the firelight, but they shone amber and were lined in thick kohl. And her mouth…it was glossy pink and full, and smirking at him like she knew something he didn’t.
He couldn’t see her too well in the shadows, but then she stepped fully out of the tent. Layer after layer of skirt swirled around her bare feet, and he could see, then, when she dropped her crossed arms, that the lace-up top didn’t hide the gentle swell of a woman’s breast.
The thin frame was without curves.
Brendon blinked in surprise, or confusion, or both, he didn’t know, and he couldn’t help but stare.
“Can we help you?” he-he, Brendon couldn’t believe-asked.
“The little boy looks lost,” said another man, who Brendon hadn’t noticed before, so enthralled had he been. He was crouched outside the tent with a cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth. His greasy black hair obscured his features, but Brendon could see enough to think he looked a little scary.
“What’s the matter?” the fortune-teller asked.
“I just, the girls,” Brendon sputtered and gestured with his hands, only he didn’t even know what the gesture was supposed to convey.
The fortune-teller’s smirk widened. “Not man enough to handle them?”
Brendon wanted to be insulted, really, but the guy was right. Of course, his ego was still stung, because this was coming from a guy who looked his age and was wearing a dress and makeup.
“I just don’t think it’s very nice to stare at them, like that, and shout all those horrible things.”
“See, that’s exactly what I’ve been saying all this time,” the guy with the cigarette said, and he sounded excited. He flipped back his hair and smiled at Brendon, and if it hadn’t been so creepy looking, Brendon might have smiled back. “We say we care about them, yet night after night we allow them to go out on that stage and bare themselves before a bunch of raunchy pigs. How can we just stand by and help perpetuate the semiotic subjugation of our lady friends?”
“They’re getting paid for it,” the fortune-teller said, in a reasonable sort of way.
“And what, precisely, does it say about our society that three such talented, intelligent young women such as they can’t find any other way to support themselves?” the man argued.
“Jesus, Gerard. Are you going on about that shit again?” One of the tattooed guys from the show came from the line of sleeping tents in the back, towelling wet hair. “I think,” he drawled, “that you’re the one perpetuating the semiotic whatever-ever, myself.”
Gerard’s jaw dropped and he took a deep breath like he was gearing up for another speech, but the tattoo guy cut him off. “I mean, you’re totally ignoring the fact that they like dancing. If you’re going to go on about equal rights and women’s suffrage and all that, you have to come to terms with the fact that it is totally their right to allow themselves to be objectified.”
Gerard didn’t know what to make of that, and just sat there looking bewildered, mouth opening and closing. The fortune-teller laughed, and Brendon felt something in his stomach drop. His entire face lit up when he laughed, and Brendon could see the inside of his mouth, the rows of perfect, pearl like teeth.
“I never thought I’d live to see the day Gerard was rendered speechless. Frank, I was wrong when I said we didn’t need another tattooed freak. I take it all back.”
“Come on, Gerard,” Frank said. He tugged at Gerard’s arm and the man got to his feet, grumbling under his breath. “You said you’d show me that makeup thing for the next show.”
The two of them ambled off together, Gerard babbling to Frank about misunderstanding the situation and his propensity for abusing false syllogisms. Frank seemed very amused about it all.
“So,” the fortune-teller said. He put his hands on his hips and it drew Brendon’s attention to the fine arch of his back. “Have you come to have your future read to you?”
“I…” Brendon’s sister always teased him about getting tongue-tied when he was nervous or excited. He forced himself to look away from the other boy and stared at his feet. His shoes were covered in dust. He was never going to get them clean. What if his mother noticed? “I’m really not allowed.”
“Huh. But you are allowed to watch the burlesque?” Without looking, Brendon could see the mocking expression the tone indicated.
“I didn’t watch them,” Brendon said, and felt his cheeks burning in shame and something else.
“My cards are only dangerous when they tell the truth,” he said. His voice went soft and low when he said it. Brendon looked up, and when had that guy got so close? Now he could see the delicate, swirling patterns drawn in black around his eyes that made them even more exotic. “Are you afraid to hear what they have to say?”
Brendon had broken so many rules tonight he didn’t even want to think about what would happen to him if his parents found out. But if had his future read, he’d be doing more than breaking his parents’ rules. Heresy was a big deal. He’d known two girls back in Ogden who’d had disciplinary actions taken against them for playing with a witch’s board.
“I’ve got to go,” Brendon said, and hurried off to find Jon.
II.
Somehow Jon had misplaced Brendon. He was tiny, sure, but he was also probably the most energetic person Jon had ever met in his life, and that meant he could usually pick Brendon out of a crowd pretty easily. Only in the past five minutes, Brendon had entirely disappeared without Jon noticing at all.
The girls had just finished their second number and were still mostly clothed, but Jon knew what was coming. His brothers had been talking about it ever since the carnival came to town. Some of the clubs in Vegas had strip shows, but none of them ever got entirely naked, drawing the line at doffing their underwear.
Apparently, the girls at the carnival had no such compunctions. Jon was, he had to admit, curious, but he was more worried about Brendon wandering around the carnival by himself. He had this horrible habit of believing the best of everyone and, that, mixed with his natural curiosity seemed like a bad combination when Jon thought about the barkers and gamers outside looking for a gullible mark.
In the half-hour they’d been in the tent, the number of people at the fair seemed to have doubled. A large group was gathering outside waiting for the next show to begin, no doubt intrigued by the sounds they heard coming from within. Jon pushed through the crowd, glancing all around, but Brendon was nowhere to be seen.
He wandered around the area, looking for something that might have caught Brendon’s attention. He’d mentioned wanting to go on some of the rides, but the Ferris wheel was occupied solely by young couples desirous of a few minutes alone together in the dark, and the merry-go-round had been shut down for the evening.
Jon checked the food tent and all the loudest and most garish games, and following those he found himself outside the carnival proper. There were a bunch of roustabouts sitting around a fire and drinking, and they didn’t pay him any attention.
He turned to head back, but his gaze caught on a sliver of light coming from the open flap of a tent just behind the Ten-in-One. There was a vision of pale skin out of the corner of his eye and he didn’t mean to look, really. It was one thing to watch girls who got paid to dance and take off their clothes, but something really different to spy on one in the privacy of her room, but, well, he just couldn’t help it.
She was seated at a vanity, but it was angled so he couldn’t see her reflection, only her back turned to him. That was enough. She was wearing only small black panties trimmed in pink lace, like in the pictures his brothers had of girls from France. Her back was a bare expanse of creamy white skin, the line of her spine graceful and tantalising. Jon could almost taste it beneath his tongue, thought about tracing the freckles that sprinkled over her shoulders.
And her hips…Jon thought that if maybe she’d been on stage, he would have paid a lot more to see it, and Brendon could just stay lost, because, those hips.
He must have made a sound, or something, because she jumped and scrambled for the wrapper lying over the vanity top and pulled it around herself protectively. She looked over her shoulder at him, glaring fiercely, and Jon didn’t know someone could look so angry and inviting at the same time. Her eyes were the brightest blue he’d ever seen, and if looks could kill, he would be dead, but it would be so worth it.
She didn’t say anything, but got up from the seat and he saw a flash of white thigh before the wrapper fell around her, draping to hide all that smooth skin and all those delicious curves. She stormed over to the tent flap and tugged it closed with a snap of canvas, and Jon fell desperately in love.
“There you are!” Brendon said. He sounded relieved and out of breath. “Can we go?”
“What’s wrong?” Jon asked. He tried to focus on the worried expression Brendon wore, rather than remembering the way her hair had fallen, shiny and smooth over her shoulder.
“I just wanna go home,” Brendon said. He had his arms crossed over his stomach, like he did sometimes when the kids at school made fun of him for being Mormon, or when the Mormon kids lectured him about not being Mormon enough. Jon didn’t question it, pushed the girl to the back of his mind, and drove Brendon home.
III.
Brendon couldn’t stop thinking about the fortune-teller. He had trouble sleeping, and when he finally did, he dreamt about him. He didn’t hear a thing that Matthew, Kara, and his mother said at breakfast and he showed up late to school because he was so caught up in his daydreams that he hadn’t paid any attention to where he was going and walked several blocks past the school building. He even got yelled at in English and threatened with a paddling in math class, and he usually was the very best student.
Jon said to him at lunch, “you want to go back, don’t you” and Brendon said, wide-eyed and breathless, “yes.”
He ate dinner in silence and his mother thought he was sick. She wasn’t far off. His stomach was twisted in so many knots he was worried that if he tried to eat anything it would come right back up. He did all his homework and waited for the house to go quiet and the lights to be put out.
By the time ten came around, Brendon was beginning to doubt the wisdom of agreeing to go with Jon, when a tap came on his window. When Jon saw Brendon, he laughed.
“What are you wearing?”
Brendon checked himself in the looking glass. He’d put on his Sunday clothing and slicked back his hair. If Jon asked why, he wouldn’t have an answer, only that he’d thought about the fortune-teller’s smirk, and nothing in his wardrobe seemed appropriate.
“What’s wrong with it?”
“You know people don’t get dressed up to go to the carnival,” Jon said.
“It’s all I had clean,” Brendon lied, but Jon didn’t call him on it, and Brendon was once again so, so thankful to have Jon as a friend.
There were different shows going on, and some of the same. The announcer from the Ten-in-One was now dressed half as a man, half as a woman, and pulled it off surprisingly well. He was singing on the stage that had held the snake charmer the night before. The three tattooed men were playing instruments along to his singing, and Brendon thought it sounded rather nice, though he thought that he could sing it better.
“Oh, hey,” Jon said, “I didn’t see that last night.” Brendon followed his line of sight and it was inevitable, really, Jon looking at the fortune-teller’s tent. “You wanna check it out? Could be fun.”
Brendon really, really wanted to check it out. Maybe if he just went with Jon, and Jon had his fortune told, it wouldn’t be so bad. As long he didn’t get his fortune read, he wasn’t really doing anything wrong, right? Even though he knew he was lying to himself, he couldn’t stop his mouth from moving, voicing his agreement.
The boy was standing in the mouth of the tent again, and he watched Brendon as he and Jon approached the tent. He wasn’t wearing the same get-up as the night before, which was both a relief and disappointing. The line of the skirts had looked really nice on him, but they also made Brendon think horrible things. Tonight the guy was wearing nice slacks, a paisley button down shirt and a purple vest, and had a fancy shawl draped over his shoulders.
“Welcome back,” he greeted. He had one hand on his hip and a deck of tarot cards in the other that he was managing to shuffle one handed. “Change your mind?”
Brendon shook his head so hard it felt like he pulled something in his neck. Jon gave him that look he did whenever Brendon did a Mormon thing. “This is my friend, Jon Walker. He wants to have his fortune told.”
The boy smiled. A real smile, not the smirk he’d had last night. It wasn’t any nicer than his smirk. “Nice to meet you, Jon,” He said. He extended a hand and Brendon was shocked to feel a surge of jealousy when Jon took it.
“I’m, I’m Brendon,” Brendon said quickly, blushing. “Brendon Urie.”
“Brendon,” the boy said, but he didn’t offer his hand. “Come inside, gentlemen.” He turned and went into the tent, holding up the flap for them to pass through.
The space looked larger inside than from without. There was a small cot to the side covered in brightly coloured, sumptuous fabrics and a wardrobe stood open with more of the skirts like the one he’d worn last night, as well as several other outfits like the one he wore now. There was a pile of books by the bed and a guitar. In the centre of the space was a small round table covered in candles, and two chairs, one on either side. He took one and gestured for Jon to take the other. Brendon, nervous and feeling voyeuristic, stood in the shadows near the entrance.
“What would you like to know?” the boy asked.
Jon shrugged a little helplessly, like he hadn’t thought that far ahead. Brendon bit his tongue against the flood of questions he wanted to pose. The fortune-teller poked the inside of his cheek with his tongue.
“Precision is more difficult the more open ended your question.” Then he placed the deck in front of Jon. “Cut.”
The cards were laid out in a T shape with a line of four cards alongside. He flipped them all and looked at them for a long time before his face lit up a little, like he had been reading a familiar book, only to find the ending had changed on him. He looked up at Jon with a little secretive smile tucked into the corner of his lips.
“This card represents you,” he said, and tapped his nail against the card at the centre of the cross. Brendon wanted to edge forward to see better, but fear made him stand still. “This is a good omen. Positive energy, healing, happiness, contentment, self-acceptance and trust.”
Brendon wasn’t going to say that the cards were real, or anything, but that certainly sounded like Jon. All the anxious, nervous energy he felt went dead around Jon, who just effused a sort of calmness, and he’d never seen Jon without a gentle smile on his face.
The boy moved onto the next card. “This is your situation, Judgement. It is indicative of upheaval and great change, the arrival of a new current. You will be presented with an opportunity to not only change your situation, but to expand your horizons. It is blocked by the ten of disks, but this suggests that you have completed an important cycle and have come to the realisation that the accumulation of wealth is no longer a necessity for happiness. So it seems as though what would normally be blocking the situation is actually aiding your progress.” He looked amused and pleasantly surprised by this reading, though Jon himself didn’t look surprised, only contemplative.
His brow furrowed at the next card as he studied it. “This…” he tapped his finger against the ace of disks, “these are the obvious influences in your life, need for monetary and material shelter and protection, only…” he shrugged, “only your crossing card suggests you are already moving beyond this, to the less obvious influences, those below the surface, the ace of wands-creative potential and self-realisation. Using this to come to the root of your natural ability while realising that you cannot blindly force you own desires upon others and upon reality.”
Brendon didn’t think that Jon would ever be the sort to press his own desires on someone else. He wouldn’t have even made Brendon go to the carnival if he hadn’t wanted to. But Jon was nodding his head like it made sense.
They went through the next few cards-the king of wands as Jon’s past influences of impulse, pride and resistance to change, and the Devil (Brendon had flinched when the boy said the word) as future influences of individuality, selfishness, obsession with personal desire. Brendon was growing nervous now. He liked Jon an awful lot, and didn’t like the sound of his future being ruled by the Devil.
As if he sensed this, the boy stopped in his reading to look at Brendon. “This isn’t the Devil of your Christian mythology,” he said dismissively. “Nor is the Death card literal death. These cards are representative of archetypes, you see.” That was all he said for Brendon, returning his attention to the cards.
“The five of swords is how your current mental place. You are too passive about your own fate. You have allowed yourself to become a victim.”
Then he smiled, fast and bright, and looked at Brendon again, “you’re an Aries, aren’t you?” Brendon shook his head uncertainly. “When’s your birthday?”
“Um, April. April twelfth,” Brendon said. He looked at Jon, who shrugged at him.
“Yes,” the boy said. “Aries. This,” he said, to Jon, indicating the queen of wands, “Is how others perceive you. You are steadfast, wilful, but balanced. Reliable, but strong enough to be independent.” He flicked his gaze at Brendon then back to Jon. “You should trust those close to you.”
“This place is usually representative of one’s fears, but you, Jon Walker, you are too positive a person for fears, hmm? These can only be your hopes, I suppose. There is creative collaboration, cooperation, and learning to rely on others. Letting someone else share your burdens a while. Which brings us the final card. This is where you will end, if you continue on your current path, and of course, you have the ability to change it. Though,” he gave Jon a sly smile, “I’m not sure why you would want to.”
“Oh,” Jon challenged, smiling back. Brendon didn’t like all this smiling, like they knew something he didn’t, like they knew each other, and had for a long time.
“Well, let’s just say it is far more positive a reading than I have given in a long time. There is a new relationship, or perhaps multiple relationships, with openness, listening and mutual learning. You will be exposed to new and diverse ideas and be able to partake of them without prejudice.” He gave Brendon another quick glance. Brendon wished he knew what it meant.
Brendon wanted to just dismiss it all as a game, say it wasn’t real. But if that was true, why did the church forbid it? The fortune-teller wore a playful, knowing smile, like he saw the whole future lain out before him, but only provided teasing glimpses for others. Brendon wanted so much to know what his cards held.
“So, altogether,” Jon said slowly.
“Ah,” the boy said, and nodded. “Altogether. Well, all these trump cards,” his fingers danced over the cards, “These are people in your life. The placement and readings seem to indicate they are mostly new to you, but very important. One in particular. They all have something to offer, and these things will all bring you to this place,” he indicated the ending card, “only if you let them.”
Jon was pleased with the reading and tipped extra. “Thank-you” the boy said, with a dangerous smile. “You should visit the yellow tent near the elephant ride. The show promises to be quite entertaining this evening, and I don’t think your friend has the stomach for another trip to the Ten-in-One.” He and Jon shared an amused expression that made Brendon bristle. He wished that Gerard guy was around to defend him.
“Thanks,” Jon said, and hesitated before he stood. “One of those cards you?”
The boy’s eyes were mysterious in the gloom of the tent, and he didn’t give an answer directly. “Should one of them be?” He and Jon looked at each other so long Brendon felt like he was intruding on something and he both wanted to leave them to it and step between them all at the same time.
Then Jon smiled and the fortune-teller nodded graciously and Jon left the tent. Brendon moved to follow, going slow, wanting to be stopped. He wasn’t let down. “If you should change your mind,” the boy murmured. The invitation was left unfinished and open.
Brendon had to ask, because it had been bothering him since they’d first met. “What’s your name?”
The answering bemused expression said it wasn’t a question he was often asked. “I’m Ryan,” he said.
“Ryan,” Brendon breathed, and he hadn’t meant to say it like that, knew it was wrong by the way Ryan’s eyes went wide.
“Brendon,” Jon called, and thankful for the excuse, Brendon scurried out with a wave of goodbye over his shoulder.
It turned out the yellow tent was just behind where the snake tamer had performed, and where there now was a band. A group was waiting to be let in for the next show, and Brendon took the opportunity to ask Jon about the reading. “Do you believe that stuff?” he asked.
Jon had the same easy expression he always had, a relaxed grin on his face. “I don’t know. He seemed to know what he was talking about.” He put a hand on Brendon’s shoulder. “You don’t need to worry about my eternal soul, Brendon,” he said, and his voice was mocking, but in a nice way.
Brendon’s shoulders slumped. “I’m more worried about my own right now,” he admitted.
“Hey,” Jon said, and let his hand slid up Brendon’s neck, around his back, til he was kinda holding him with one arm. “Hey, listen, Brendon, I’m not going to tell you what you should believe, or anything, but you’re just about the nicest, most selfless person I’ve ever met. And if your god would damn you just for doing something that makes you happy, and doesn’t hurt anyone, then, well, sounds like the kind of god I’m glad I don’t believe in.”
It shouldn’t have made Brendon feel happy, to hear someone talk like that about God, but he couldn’t help it. It was Jon. He leaned his head on Jon’s arm and smiled. “Well, Ryan was definitely right about you, anyway.”
“Ryan,” Jon repeated.
“Ryan, the fortune-teller,” Brendon explained, and pulled out of Jon’s embrace. “What he said about you. It was right.”
Jon gave him a look. “Maybe you should have Ryan read your fortune,” he suggested. Brendon was saved from having to explain his reticence by the flap of the tent opening. The crowd began to file in and Brendon felt through his pockets for the correct change to get in.
IV.
It was the girl from the night before, and Jon could only stare unabashedly. She was dressed in a costume that brought to mind a harem girl, but more modest, in loose, flowing trousers and a knotted vest over a tight shirt, all in shades of rose and gold. It made it difficult to see her figure very clearly, but she looked elegant and regal. Her hair fell in shiny soft waves around her face, in her eyes. He wanted to run his hands through it, push it back to see that vibrant blue again.
She swept onto the stage like she owned it. In either hand she held a sword. The music started and she began a dance, twirling the swords deftly around her. They sung in the air, but even as quickly as she moved, as close as she kept the swords to her body and each other, there was never the sound of steel on steel, nor any torn flesh. She ended to thunderous applause.
“Wow,” Brendon said, “she’s…wow.” He was staring at her like he’d never seen a girl before. Jon nodded in dumb agreement.
“Come on, let’s get closer,” Jon urged. Brendon let Jon drag him through the crowd ‘til they were pressed close to the stage.
A new song began to play and her hips swung in time to the tempo. He remembered with a start the white skin against delicate lace, imagined his hands on her, pulling close and tight, putting to use all the advice his brothers had given him about women.
Suddenly, she stumbled a little and her fierce glare fell on Jon. A blush spread high and fast over her cheeks. She looked away quickly, but the expression and redness lingered. Then, leaning back slightly, she tipped her head, opened her jaw, and lifted the narrower of the swords high above her head.
Brendon stopped breathing beside him and grabbed his arms. “She’s not,” he said, but before he could finish, she’d begun sliding the sword down her throat. “Oh my god!” Brendon sounded horrified. Jon wanted to echo the sentiment, but not out of horror. There was something very erotic about watching the length of the sword disappear past her lips.
The crowd hooted and cheered and egged her on, and soon enough, the hilt of the sword rested against her lips and she lifted the other sword. “I can’t watch,” Brendon moaned, and put his face into Jon’s shoulder.
After the show, the crowd left for bigger and better things (the kootch show at the Ten-in-One, no doubt), but Jon didn’t fight to beat the crush for the door. Instead, he grabbed Brendon’s wrist, making him stay by the stage. The dancer was just off-stage, wiping the blades down with a rag and oil before wrapping them and storing them. Jon liked watching it. She made even something so mundane look elegant. He thought about what his fortune had told him, and hoped it had something to do with her. He couldn’t stop looking.
Brendon looked at her, then at Jon, and seemed to come to some sort of a decision. He wrenched his wrist free and went over to the side of the stage and said, “Hey, that show was really awesome.”
The girl blinked and flipped her hair out of her eyes. She looked at Brendon like he was speaking a foreign language, then glanced at Jon. She looked back down at her swords. “Thanks.” Her voice was low and soft, barely above a whisper.
“Yeah, I couldn’t watch when you added the second sword. Don’t you ever get scared you’re going to hurt yourself? How long have you been doing? Did you have to train forever? Can you do more than two swords?” Brendon asked it all with his normal wide-eyed enthusiasm, but Jon knew him pretty well, even after only a few weeks, and there was something strange about it.
For a long moment she stared at him in wonder. “Um. It doesn’t hurt if you do it right,” she said, like she didn’t know where to begin with the questions she’d been asked.
“Oh, but, how do you do it?”
“You have to…” She stopped and squinted at him. “You know, most people don’t want to know how it works.”
Brendon’s shoulders fell a little. “Well, yeah. I just…I’ve never seen anything like this place. Last night, there was this guy who could stand on his head. Like, with his feet! And this other guy had all these really poisonous snakes and he was just dancing with them, like he wasn’t scared at all. And Jon just had his fortune read by Ryan, and I don’t really believe in that stuff, but it seemed really good. So…” Brendon trailed off and shrugged. “So, I just want to know more.”
“You had your fortune read?” she asked. She didn’t look at Jon directly, just in his general direction. She was blushing again.
“Yeah, it was…it was neat,” Jon agreed.
“Ryan is very good at what he does,” she agreed.
“So are you,” Jon said.
Brendon smiled at Jon where the girl couldn’t see it. “I’m just gonna go check out the candy booth,” he said to the air, and slipped out.
Jon really, really loved Brendon. A lot. He slid closer along the stage as she focused hard on her swords. “I wanted to say I was sorry about last night,” he started. He wasn’t sure he wanted to bring that up. Like, maybe it had been dark enough she didn’t recognise him, and anyway, she was talking to him instead of shouting at him, so maybe that was a start, but still, he didn’t feel right not apologising.
“You certainly aren’t the only man to come from the Ten-in-One expecting something more,” she said coolly. “But we aren’t that kind of circus. Pete doesn’t mind the girls getting a little extra work on the side, but generally the performers aren’t interested.” Jon got the point.
“I’m…I didn’t mean it like that, honestly. I was,” he sighed and rubbed his chin. “I was looking for my friend, and I didn’t mean to end up back there, and I’m sorry, it’s just,” do you know you have the most amazing hips I’ve ever seen is what he didn’t say. “I didn’t mean to look. But I’m not sorry I did.”
She stopped polishing the sword and her hand tightened on the hilt. She had nice hands, too, long and delicate and soft looking, but he could see the callus on her thumb from where she handled the swords. He imagined them on his skin, the slight catch of hardened skin. She cleared her throat.
“Well, I’m so pleased to have provided you with the free show, but…” She stood and swung the sword experimentally, maybe to show him what she could do. It looked fancy and had the potential to cause a fair amount of damage. Jon wasn’t so much scared as turned on. “I have other, actual paying performances for which to prepare, so please excuse me.” She bent and gathered her other swords and stormed off the stage.
Jon found Brendon just outside the tent with a piece of cotton candy bigger than his head and a matching grin. He didn’t say anything, just waited for Jon. “I’m working on it,” Jon said with confidence.
V.
“You read a guy’s cards tonight?” Spencer asked, sitting down heavily on his cot.
Ryan hummed tiredly. He was lying on his side facing away. “Read lots of guys’ cards tonight,” he said. There was something playful in his voice. He rolled over to look at Spencer. “Why?”
Spencer glared at him. “There’s this guy. Who thinks I’m a girl.”
Ryan laughed, rolling around a little. “Oh, it’s even better than I thought.”
“So you told him something?” Spencer prompted.
“I just told him what the cards told me,” Ryan said, in that infuriating way he had, when he talked about his craft. Spencer knew him pretty well though, and he dug his knuckles painfully into Ryan’s side. “Ow, ouch,” Ryan cried, and punched him in the arm. “I didn’t say anything specifically. But I can’t help what I saw.” He shrugged.
“Play with other people all you want, Ross, but leave me out of it,” Spencer told him in a dangerous voice. Ryan didn’t read Spencer’s cards. He didn’t really need to, just like Spencer didn’t need to listen to Ryan’s thoughts. They knew one another well enough without. He didn’t like the idea of Ryan seeing him in someone else’s cards.
“I liked him,” Ryan said speculatively. His laughing had mostly subsided and he scooted closer to Spencer. Spencer relaxed and lay down, staring hard at the ceiling. “What’s wrong with him?”
“He was spying on me last night. And he thinks I’m a girl,” Spencer said fiercely. That set Ryan off again. Spencer sighed. It was ridiculous. He wasn’t the first guy who’d tried to get into Spencer’s pants, but he was the first one who’d managed to get past his mental barriers and, well…so Spencer might have liked what he’d seen, when he’d caught the glimpses of what Jon had wanted to do with him. Right up to the point where it involved a vagina. He scowled and pushed his face into Ryan’s neck.
Ryan rolled over and put his arm around Spencer’s waist, still laughing a little. “He has a very open mind,” he said reasonably.
“Don’t you have your own tent?” Spencer grumbled. He didn’t want to think about that guy anymore. It didn’t matter that he had a stupid smile or nice hair, or that the mind behind those dirty thoughts actually seemed like a mind Spencer wouldn’t mind getting to know. What mattered was that he thought Spencer was a girl, and there was a difference between being open minded and readily dropping all sorts of social and psychological preconceptions about gender and sexuality when he realised that Spencer was very much not a girl.
“I like yours better,” Ryan said, nose scrunched up. “Yours comes with a Spencer.” Spencer didn’t put up a fight. His bed was a lot bigger, and besides, Ryan invaded enough that he knew it was no use. Ryan usually got his way when it came to Spencer.
“Did you meet his friend?” Ryan asked, when Spencer said nothing.
“You mean the little one with the huge eyes who talks a mile a minute?” Spencer asked, remembering the baffled helplessness he’d felt as he’d been bombarded with questions.
Ryan nodded. “Sounds right. What’d you think?”
“A fucking mess,” Spencer said honestly.
“So you looked?” Ryan prompted. He sounded hesitant so Spencer looked at him. He was toying with some loose fringe at the edge of the blanket, a gesture of nervousness. Interesting. Not for the first time in their friendship, or even the first time that day, Spencer was tempted to look inside Ryan, but he held it in check. He didn’t do it to people he cared about. Hell, he didn’t do it to most people, period.
“I couldn’t help it, he…” Spencer shook his head, and he still couldn’t figure it out. “He just. He put it all out there, I didn’t even have to try, just open up a little, and there it all was. Didn’t you see it in your cards?”
Ryan shifted, rolled away again to face the wall. “He didn’t want them read. Or, well, he did, but he wouldn’t let me read them.” He sighed. “I don’t get it.”
But he wanted to read them, Spencer could tell. Usually Ryan didn’t care. He did it for his job, because it was what he could do, and when their friends asked, he was happy to oblige. But Ryan didn’t usually want for a person, in particular, to have their cards read. It meant he wanted to know about this guy. And that was interesting.
Spencer turned down the lamp until the flame went out and then settled down under the blankets. It had been warm a few hours ago, but with the sun gone, the heat had vanished and the desert was cold. Spencer had been used to it, years ago before he and Ryan had left with the circus and he’d been prepared, taking extra blankets and sheets from his chest. Ryan had brought his own blanket along too, and Spencer was thankful for the press of Ryan’s body to his and the heat that grew between them. He tried to think about that, and Ryan’s problems rather than the guy-Jon, with soft brown eyes and the image of lips against skin-and his own problems. It didn’t really work.
VI.
Jon’s dad owned an automobile and electronics store in town called Walker and Sons. Jon explained that was because the original had been called Walker and Sons, and had originally been run by his grandpa but was now owned by his uncle, and that was the reason he didn’t live in Chicago anymore. He didn’t know why his parents had picked Nevada, and he’d never asked. Besides, he liked it here.
Sometimes, when Jon didn’t have a lot of schoolwork to do, he worked at Walker and Sons during the afternoons and on weekends. Both his brothers had gone to work for their father after finishing high school, but Jon confided in Brendon that as much as he liked having some spending money, he had no intention of staying after he got his diploma.
“Small potatoes, man,” he said, though when Brendon asked what Jon did want to do, Jon would just shrug. That was pretty much how Brendon felt, too. Of course he was expected to go on his mission straight out of school, but after that? Marriage, of course, and children, but how would he support his family?
Jon’s dad was sympathetic to Brendon’s Mormon plight and didn’t even mind when Jon blew off customers to hang out with Brendon in the back room. Brendon got, like, the best grades in school, and he never missed Seminary, so his parents didn’t give him a hard time if he didn’t come straight home every day. In fact, they probably didn’t notice, too busy fawning over Matthew’s accomplishments, or working on making sure Kara got married off to someone nice.
So sometimes, on weekends, even though it was forbidden, Brendon did his homework at Walker and Sons and then Jon’s dad and brothers would take them out to dinner and shakes at the diner on the corner.
Tonight Mike and Bill had dates, and Jon’s dad was kept late with paperwork, but he gave them a few dollars from the safe and told them to have fun. Brendon liked the diner because it was safe. All the cool kids who made fun of him preferred the drive in and the diner closer to it, across town. All the Mormon kids never went out on dates, and when they went out as groups it was usually to do something really boring, and never in a place that played rock and roll music on the jukebox. So the only people that came to this diner were the families, which meant no one bothered Brendon.
They sat in a booth in the corner, well out of sight of the street, and ordered their favourites, and Jon got up and put some change in the jukebox. Brendon hadn’t known a lot about music before he met Jon. He still didn’t, but he was learning. Jon even said that over Christmas break he’d starting teaching Brendon on his guitar. Sometimes Jon would take extra long when he gave Brendon a drive home so they could listen to the radio.
The new Chuck Berry song started up and for a minute Brendon just listened to the music, closing his eyes and breathing it in. He hadn’t known what he’d been missing until Jon had played the first Chuck Berry song for him, and then Johnny Cash, and then followed it up with the Big Bopper and Brendon had pretty much been sold on the first note, but he didn’t want Jon to stop.
“I think I’m not sure I believe in God,” Brendon said, under the cover of the guitar solo. He expected wide eyes, maybe a little choking and protestations, but of course, this was Jon.
Jon blinked and looked up from where he was sipping his shake. After a minute he leaned back in his seat. “Huh.”
“Yeah,” Brendon agreed. He wanted to get frosted over it all, but Jon was so calm about he, he couldn’t muster the energy. “My parents and everyone at church keep talking about my mission and, well, at first I was excited, you know? Its like a rite of passage, like, suddenly I’m an adult when I go on my mission. Only then I started thinking about what I would tell other people, how I’d explain my faith, you know, so that they’d want to share it, and I…I was just embarrassed about it.”
Brendon really wanted Jon to say something, like he understood, but Jon hadn’t ever believed in God in the first place. “What are you going to tell your parents?” he asked.
Brendon shrugged uncomfortably. “I hadn’t gotten as far as telling them in my mind,” he admitted. “I can’t even sneak out to the carnival without feeling really guilty. How can I tell them I’m having a crisis of faith? And besides, it isn’t like I could just stop going to church, or something. That isn’t how it works.” He didn’t feel like going into explanations about the registry and disciplinary actions, and potentially being sent away to a special hospital to get fixed.
“The thing is, I’m not sure, really. I mean, I get angry listening about the word of the prophet, and I wonder how can anyone believe it, and I think the rules are so stupid, and how am I supposed to believe in something I can’t see? But then, when I’m in bed, I can’t stop saying my prayers, and thinking about how much trouble I’m going to be in for thinking what I do, how I’m never going to be worthy of the celestial kingdom, and…”
Jon just looked at him with that soft, open, understanding expression. Brendon couldn’t help but go on. “And the other night, I was…I believed what Ryan told you, and I wanted so badly to have him read my cards, too. I wanted to know all about them. I looked in the library the other day, but there wasn’t anything on them.” He would have gone on, but the waitress came over with their food and he fell into silence until she left.
“If your parents totally flip out, you know my ma and pop will take you in,” Jon told him casually, like it wasn’t anything. Brendon blushed and focused on his food so he wouldn’t make a fool out of himself by blubbering all over Jon.
The bell above the door rang and Brendon just looked up for something to do other than look at Jon, and there were several of the carnies, including Ryan, and the girl Jon had his eye on.
“Jon,” he hissed, and Jon looked over, and then his eyes did go comically wide. Brendon couldn’t laugh. He was too busy looking at Ryan, who was wearing tight blue jeans and a tight tank top, kinda like the greasers, only it looked really nice on Ryan, who was skinnier even than Brendon, but with wiry muscles.
Ryan, as if sensing the attention, looked over at them and his eyes lit up when the fell on Brendon. He leaned into the girl and whispered something before sauntering towards them. His hips swayed more than most of the girls at school, and Brendon was mesmerized. That was the part he couldn’t say to Jon, because no matter how understanding Jon was, he couldn’t explain this.
“Jon,” he said first, though his gaze was fixed on Brendon, “Brendon,” he added, more slowly. “We keep running into each other.”
Brendon didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to react that that smooth voice, layered with suggestion, and he was saved by Gerard, who came ambling up to them with his arm over Greta’s shoulder. Gerard’s hair looked cleaner and he was dressed casually, and Greta was all covered up and wholesome looking in a plain black and white dress with capped sleeves and a skirt that came past her knees. She didn’t look anything at all like a girl who took off her clothes for a living. “This,” Gerard said excitedly, “is the guy I was telling you about.”
Greta and Ryan both rolled their eyes. “Brendon,” Ryan supplied.
Gerard, apparently, didn’t have any decent social skills, because he slid into the booth next to Jon without invitation or warning. “Brendon,” he said, and looked at Jon.
“Jon,” Jon supplied.
“Gerard.” Gerard smiled and nodded in greeting, and then addressed Brendon, “you should tell Greta what you said the other night.”
Greta sighed and put a hand on her hip. “Lay off it, Gee,” Frank said. He and the rest of the carnies seemed to take their cue from Ryan and were claiming the tables and booths around Jon and Brendon.
“What’d you say the other night?” Jon asked Brendon.
Most of the new arrivals were chatting amongst themselves or looking through the menu, but a few of them were watching Brendon curiously for the answer. He flushed at all the attention. “I just…I didn’t think…” he trailed off and stared at the tabletop. “I didn’t think it was right, the way all the guys were behaving at the kootch show.”
“Oooh,” cried a voice, and Brendon looked to see it was the announcer. He bumped his shoulder into the snake charmer and the two of them shared a grin. Brendon didn’t know what to make of that.
“Don’t pay any attention to them,” Gerard said dismissively. “They’re just bitter that no one will pay them to take of their clothes.” He smirked at them and they made some rather obscene gestures in return.
Ryan grimaced and said, “don’t make me sit next to them,” to Brendon, and their table was the only one not full. Brendon tried not to smile and scooted over enough for both Ryan and the girl to have a seat.
VII.
So, Jon wasn’t expecting a bunch of circus folk to be boring, but he’d never have imagined they were so cool, either. Gerard made a comment about one of the songs Jon had played on the jukebox, and then the two of them, along with Frank, the tattooed guy (well, one of them), and Pete, the owner of the circus, spent the next hour talking non-stop. First it was about different artists they liked, and songs and records and stuff, but then they started talking about their own music.
Every once in a while Jon looked over at her, and she was just watching them-Brendon and Ryan had got drawn into a conversation with William and Gabriel, and despite Ryan’s protestations that they were awful, they seemed to be getting along pretty well. All the other tables were full of lively chatter, and surely she could have moved, or whatever, but she just sat there and watched, and okay, Jon found it a little bit of a turn on.
She was dressed in the toreador pants that were so popular with the Teddy Boys’ girlfriends. There were tight and showed off her nice calves and accentuated the curve of her hips. She had a button up sweater on over a tight camisole, like it wasn’t ridiculously hot outside, which gave a hint at her figure, but still left a lot to the imagination.
Jon could tell she didn’t have a lot up front like the kootch girls, but he didn’t even remotely care. She had a twist to her lips like she wanted to look angry but couldn’t quite pull it off, and her hips. Jon could go on about those hips. And he liked girls who thought they were better than him. They were usually right, but that wouldn’t stop him from trying.
“Don’t you have a show tonight?” Jon asked, when most of the rest of the customers had left and the waitress was giving them pointed looks.
Pete waved a dismissive hand. “There are a lot of us,” he said, and grinned.
“Pete attracts the social rejects,” Frank explained. He put an arm around Pete’s shoulder. Pete smiled, like the words didn’t even remotely sting. Jon thought these people were, quite possibly, even cooler than his brothers. By a lot.
“We take turns,” Gerard explained, pushing back his hair for the hundredth time. “We mostly share what we make, anyway, but we take turns.”
“That’s cool,” Jon said, and he knew he wanted to say something else, but he didn’t know what it was. Please let me come with you, maybe, but less desperate and awkward.
Pete narrowed his eyes at Jon. “Your friend, is he cool?” He jerked his head in Brendon’s direction. Brendon was staring at Ryan like he’d hung the moon, and Ryan and William were bickering loudly over something. Pete’s eyes went soft, like his question had already been answered, but Jon said, “yeah,” anyway.
Pete looked at Patrick, who’d been setting across the booth from him the whole night and had barely said a word, but watched Pete a lot like the girl was watching Jon, and that was…well…huh, interesting. Patrick gave a little nod of his head and Pete turned back to Jon. “Wanna see something really neat?” Pete asked, and his words made something in Jon’s spine thrill.
Brendon and Ryan had stopped talking and were watching them. “Really?” Ryan asked. There was this series of looks, between Ryan and Pete, Ryan and the girl, Pete and Patrick, and then the girl shrugged and looked uneasily at Jon.
“Oh, really,” Pete said intensely.
Brendon almost bounced in his seat. “Are we doing something?” Jon tried to feel bad that Brendon had gone from religious crisis a couple of hours ago to eager to break the rules, but he looked so much happier.
“Show us something really neat,” Jon said.
Part Two