Circus Excite (22 page)

The climb started at a small square steepled church, rising to a peak that overlooked the city. They moved up steep sloped steps towards where a Grecian folly stood in black silhouette against the orange night sky, forbidding and strange at the same time. As Julia climbed, she listened to the traffic noise receding, and found she was longing for a chance to sit somewhere quiet to calm her confused thoughts. The others seemed to share her desire, as they walked in silence towards the top of the hill. There was no noise apart from their breathing, growing heavier as they pulled themselves upwards over the grassy slope.

Reaching the ruined, half-built monument with its tall stone pillars, all four of them came to a halt to take in the view of the glittering lights of Edinburgh below. Joe crouched beside the wall and rummaged in his rucksack, eventually pulling out a flask and a bottle of whisky.

‘Tea for you, Julia. Hot and sweet.' He winked at her as he poured a cupful into the lid of the flask and passed it to her. ‘
Uisgue beatha
for the rest of us.' He produced a blanket from the rucksack and spread it over the ground, sitting back with a sigh of relief.

‘Some climb,' Henri remarked, accepting the bottle of whisky and unscrewing the lid. ‘Worth it when you get there.' He tipped his head back and took an elegant swig from the bottle, smacking his lips at the taste.

‘Take a seat down here now, ladies,' Joe said, patting the ground beside him. ‘It's time for a little history lesson, I think. Sylvie, you'll be shocked to hear your slave-girl is considering running off with the ballet.'

‘Is that true?' Sylvie turned her round, cat-like eyes on Julia, who sipped her tea and shrugged awkwardly. She hadn't anticipated Sylvie's reaction.

‘Is it something to do with the poison-pen rubbish in
The Stage
?' Sylvie demanded, obviously growing angry. She was wearing a long mackintosh over her jeans, and she buried her hands deep in the pockets now, leaning her head back against the stone and sighing noisily.

‘That small-minded little prick. I should never have let him get involved.'

‘Involved with what? You know this man?' Now it was Julia's turn to react incredulously.

‘An old tutor of mine, a ballet director. And a vicious, jealous man with more ambition than talent.'

‘You studied ballet?'

‘At the Rep. Four years of sheer hell, and the worst part was fending off that dirty bastard.' Sylvie was almost spitting. ‘He had an ego the size of Europe, and promised the best parts to any girl who'd let him in her bed. I never agreed, but it only spurred him on. He pursued me even after I'd left.'

Julia recognised the story from her earlier encounter with Martin Woods, and the correlation made her uncomfortable.

‘What happened?'

‘I met Robert, fell in love with the circus. I went to a show one night in Fitzrovia, a tiny dark little basement. You were there, remember, Henri?'

Henri nodded, smiling quietly.

‘It was a revelation. Just a few acts, no stage, nothing in the way of a budget. But I felt like I'd discovered some strange heaven. There was a burlesque act, Rachel stripping. Henri, knife throwing. Rachel was about your age, then, Julia. Robert did the most amazing magic, disappeared a girl in front of the whole room, and the way he did it . . .'

Sylvie trailed off into a reverie, taking a sip of whisky and laughing softly to herself.

‘I'd never been so turned on in my life. After the show, I had to meet them all. I wanted to be part of it.'

‘You were gasping for a shag, if I remember right,' Joe broke in, the humour in his voice apparent. ‘Practically panting. We were very happy to have you begging us to let you get involved.'

Sylvie gave him a wicked smile and blew him a kiss.

‘My tutor was furious, though. I dropped out of the Rep the next day. Spent it in bed with Joe, in fact, discovering ways to practise contortion.'

Julia was pleasantly surprised to find she wasn't even slightly jealous of Sylvie's admission. Her relationship with Joe was warm and fun, but she didn't harbour any deep longing for him. She couldn't, while she was so fixated on Robert. Besides, she had also had the pleasure of exploring Sylvie's charms; she wasn't in any position to get possessive.

‘He found out what I was doing, turned up one night at the club and caused a scene.'

‘Called us all perverts. Even used the word “satanic” if I'm remembering it right,' Henri mused.

‘I didn't object to being called a pervert. Just when the bastard started threatening to close us down, it really turned ugly,' Joe said.

Sylvie nodded. ‘He's a powerful man, unfortunately. Friends with the local councillors, the arts board. He was in a position to threaten us, no bluffing. But Robert stepped in.'

Joe and Henri were both laughing now; it was obviously a favourite shared story. Sylvie turned to Julia with a twinkle in her eye.

‘You know when Robert gets that idea in his head, he seems to turn into some kind of mesmerist. The whole place was watching, and he just walked up to the man and plucked a pair of lady's knickers from his breast
pocket, as though they'd been there all the time. Asked if that was what he'd been looking for, only the young lady would prefer it if she could have them back.' Sylvie was laughing too now. ‘He humiliated the old bastard in front of everyone, including a local journalist. It was a classic moment, and I loved him for it. Only since then, the man's taken every chance he can to sabotage Robert's work.'

Julia listened, transfixed. She felt a mix of relief and anger at the man who'd set out to ruin the circus because of some ancient vendetta. Robert believed in his principles, she realised, and would stand up for one of his performers rather than stay in the safety of the shadows, even if it jeopardised his career. She considered him with new respect. The more she found out about Robert the more curious she felt, and the more she wanted him, to explore his body and mind.

The four fell silent now, each lost in their own thoughts, watching the lights below them sparkle like a box of jewels spilled over the night. They sipped at the whisky and listened to the wind blowing around the top of the hill, noticing the sky was starting to lighten slightly in the East, over the grey sea that lay in the distance.

Julia had not slept in many hours and her head ached from the afternoon's drinking spree, but she felt a sense of lightness, as though the hours on the hill had refreshed her somehow.

‘It's strange, but I'm feeling a hell of a lot better than I ought to,' she remarked sleepily to her companions.

‘Must be the powers of Calton,' Henri replied. ‘There's ancient festivals staged up here in the spring, pagan rituals and torchlight processions.'

‘Beltane,' Joe nodded. ‘A celebration of sex, the union of the goddess and the god. They go a little wild, I'm told.'

The image of a pagan carnival delighted Julia, as she pictured people fornicating under the shadow of such an imposing monument. She imagined the rituals intertwined with sex: a fascinating, explosive and beautiful pageant acted out on the hillside. A celebration of sex. Like the circus.

Fuck the hypocrites, Julia thought suddenly. Fuck the sleazy directors and bitter theatre critics. In Circus Excite, she could explore her own fantasies and desires. She didn't have to submit to the furtive lechery of the director to win a starring role. The circus revolved around sex with honest and open fascination. Nobody's desires were taboo, and nothing was reviled. They lived according to their own beliefs, not a hidden mess of snobbery and twisted transactions. It seemed suddenly as though she had made exactly the right choice, and Julia felt herself abuzz with a new optimism.

‘Will the review do us any damage, do you think?' she asked, a note of anxiety still lingering in her mind.

Joe shrugged.

‘It's a risky business, babe. No telling what might happen. All you can do is put on the best show possible and ignore the bad press.' He looked at Julia, his tanned face indistinct in the early morning gloom. ‘You'll need to find that inner diva again, Julia, and give her a chance to shine. Unless, of course, you're still running off to be a ballerina?'

Julia sipped at the whisky and felt it warming her inside. A growing, dizzying sense of anticipation was building within her. She felt reckless, as though she could leap off the crest of the hill and soar over the city.

‘Sylvie, come here and show me that back flip again,' she said, struggling to her feet.

She shrugged off Joe's jacket and let the chill of the air turn her skin to goosebumps, slapping her arms to warm up. She still wore her basque underneath, and the
tight lacing and the cold stimulated her to move fast. She held out her hand to Sylvie, cajoling her to join her.

Together they started practising the acrobatics she had been learning. Julia felt her muscles start to warm up as they played around, balancing carefully on each other's backs and leaning forward into sideways splits. She hadn't realised Sylvie's flexibility had come from a childhood of studying ballet, but it all made sense as she watched Sylvie move gracefully from one position to the next. Admiring the petite, sleek figure of the other girl, Julia remembered with a warm flush their amorous encounter, and the feel of Sylvie's small firm breasts in her hands. Since then, she'd found Sylvie even more stimulating to work with, and the moments in their routine where she wound her body round the other girl's or leant to kiss her had become a pleasure. As they moved through a little routine of acrobatic poses and moves, Julia felt again the playful attraction between them, and realised that Sylvie was enjoying the rough and tumble as much as she was.

Behind them, Joe and Henri were calling out encouragement, and Julia realised their audience was not entirely oblivious to the girls' flirtation.

‘Come on and join in, you couple of voyeurs,' she called out teasingly, as she let Sylvie's arms wrap gently around her waist and hold her as she leant into a deep back stretch, Julia bending backwards till her fingertips brushed against the dew-soaked grass.

In a moment, Henri and Joe were standing beside them, and they started to dance. Waltzing playfully over the grass in a swaying parody of a foxtrot, Julia gave in to the excitement that she felt running through her veins. As she was passed from Joe to Henri, brushing against Sylvie as they swapped partners, Julia noticed a russet flash in the corner of her eye. She turned to see a red setter running eagerly through the grass, followed
by a bleary-eyed man in his forties, yawning in the dawn light.

Seized by a mischievous idea, she pulled away from Henri and motioned for the others to look downhill.

‘How about we put on a little show for the early bird?' she called, eyes bright and face flushed from the exertion of dancing. The others turned to see the lone dog-walker wandering slowly uphill towards them, hands stuffed in pockets and eyes to the ground. A silent idea passed between them and immediately Sylvie started wriggling out of her warm clothes. Within a minute she was stripped to her underwear, so that her appearance matched Julia's – both girls displaying a shocking amount of flesh, their bodies glowing white in the half-light of dawn. Fighting to suppress wild fits of laughter, the girls whispered a few ideas to each other, quickly agreeing a sequence of steps. The thought of treating some unsuspecting man to a display of Circus Excite was so daringly reckless that Julia felt dizzy. She could feel the cold pinching her nipples into stiff peaks that stood proudly against the wired fabric of the corset, and seeing Sylvie in her see-through bra and French knickers, she felt herself thrill with the desire to shock, along with an undeniable arousal at the thought of dancing with Sylvie for pleasure, not work.

Behind her, Joe and Henri were grinning, both complicit in the act that Julia and Sylvie were planning. They removed their jackets and stood bare-chested, Joe rubbing his hands together for warmth.

‘Come here and let me warm my hands on you, babe,' he growled to Julia, who moved close to him so she could drape herself over him. Sylvie and Henri adopted the same position, and the four of them waited as the unsuspecting man approached slowly along the path.

‘Now, girls, if he should suffer a heart attack you're to be held responsible,' murmured Joe, as they watched
the man reach the brow of the hill and look vaguely around him for the dog. When his eyes alighted on the motionless tableau under the folly, he froze. Exactly what he thought as he stared at the four half-naked sprites was a mystery, but it was certain that they had his full attention.

Without a word, Julia started to move. Using Joe's stock-still body as a prop to work against, she started winding around him, bucking her hips in time to a silent rhythm, noting Sylvie as she mirrored the same movements around Henri.

The man watched, entranced, as the two girls climbed over the bodies of their male partners. His dog lead hung, forgotten, from his hand, the red setter abandoned to roam over the hill. Julia felt with pleasure the bulge in Joe's trousers as he stood, arms folded, and let Julia rub herself against him, letting the friction warm her cold flesh as she shivered and worked her way down towards his ankles.

It was an improvised routine, the girls using every trick they knew and dancing with a fresh playful attitude that might have delighted their one-man audience. Julia couldn't tell, she was concentrating on synchronising her movements with Sylvie and trying to anticipate what Joe might prompt her to do. It was hard to concentrate, too, while she was in a state of half-arousal, distracted by Joe's unyielding flesh and the swelling of his erection as she brushed against him, aware at the same time that Sylvie was eliciting a similar response from Henri, teasing him by pressing her breasts against his arms, standing in front of him and spreading her legs wide before folding serenely in half, face down.