The Grand Ballast (28 page)

Finally Bode got the right key and swung the
cage door open. He stepped inside, trying to hold his breath as
smoke burned his nose and throat. He used a smaller attached key to
unlock the yoke. Valen stood unsteadily. Bode offered an arm to
support him, and together they made it down the steps to LJ.

The entire backside of the tent burned into
ragged strips of fabric, and the flames were now devouring the side
panel and the roof. There was no sign of Dee on the high wire, and
the spectators all seemed to have evacuated.

“
Get out,” he called to
Kilroy as he let go of Valen and pulled LJ up again. “Go on. Get
outside.”

Kilroy put his palms up as if to test
whether it was raining. “I might stay a while,” he said, as the
tent crackled and spat around him.

“
Get out of here,” Bode
repeated, gesturing with the gun.

“
What will you do if I
don’t? Shoot me?”

Bode lowered the weapon. “It’s your choice,”
he said. “I left Lein backstage. I don’t know if he’s conscious or
not. At least get him out, and then burn yourself for all I
care.”

He dragged LJ from the tent. Valen staggered
behind them.

Bode saw people running toward town, heard
the approaching sirens. “This way!” He headed in the opposite
direction from the crowd. LJ collapsed suddenly to his knees,
nearly dragging Bode down with him. Valen got on LJ’s other side
and supported him, and together, the three of them headed for the
trees.

INITIATION

Then.

“
Bode. Welcome,” Kilroy
said.

Bode hesitated in the doorway. Signing the
contract had been easy. Standing here was another matter
entirely.

The room was in an old community
center—cinderblock walls covered with gobs of tack, a flagpole
jutting from the wall, a dusty computer cart in one corner. A
semicircle of occupied metal chairs. Faces turned toward Bode as he
walked in—jagged, bony faces; visible hollows and veins. One man
watched Bode approach and made fish-kiss noises at him. Bode took a
seat next to a dark haired woman with a thick, bright red lower lip
that seemed to pour down her chin. Her limbs were long and thin,
her chest bony.

Kilroy made introductions, but no one said
hello to Bode. They just stared. There was something off about all
of them. They seemed not quite human. Bode ignored his nerves and
focused on Kilroy.

Despite his resolve to listen, Bode missed a
great deal of what Kilroy said. There was a rehearsal schedule. A
tentative plan for the Grand Ballast’s first tour. A demonstration,
for Bode’s benefit, of acts the other performers were working
on.

“
And we have a snake!”
Kilroy announced at one point. “Our good friend Mr. Lein has
designed it—Harold. We will incorporate Harold into the snake
charmer’s act starting tomorrow.”

The people in the chairs yipped like
animals.

One man stayed quiet throughout the meeting.
He was tall, with short hair and a distant expression. When he
caught Bode’s eye, he smiled kindly. When called up for a demo, he
fucked the fish-kiss man on the scuffed floor at the front of the
room. Fucked him in a way that startled Bode with its rawness and
its beauty, with its unselfconsciousness. Bode’s skin grew damp as
he watched.

He listened to the groans
and gasps as the pair at the front of the room finished.
That could be me. People will watch, and I won’t
be a ruined thing. I’ll be beautiful. I’ll make them wish they were
fucking me.

At the end of the meeting, Bode signed a
nondisclosure agreement. His signature looked accidental, like a
strand of hair caught on the page.

Kilroy extended a hand and took his wrist
before Bode was done signing. Held him gently until Bode looked up.
His expression was regretful for a moment. Then he smiled. “Bode,”
he whispered. “Thank you.”

Bode looked away. How could those words make
him feel so fucking grateful?

They walked outside as a group. The night
was cold, a few snow flurries in the air. One of the nearby
streetlights was burned out.

Kilroy took them a short
way along the edge of a wood. The others seemed to know where they
were going. They came to a small, gravel-covered rail yard with
shipping containers stacked on either side of the tracks. On one
set of tracks was a five-car train. Dark wooden wagons with
THE GRAND BALLAST
painted
in gold on the sides.

Bode did experience a slight jolt of
anticipation at the sight. Was this really that different from
doing a show at the Little Comet and seeing the costumes and sets
revealed for the first time? Maybe this would, in some strange way,
be a rewarding experience. Just as long as he didn’t think too hard
about what he had to do. What he had to let other people do to
him.

Kilroy gave a guided tour of the train. In
the third car, Bode saw the satin lined coffins where the
performers were to sleep. His breathing became shallow and throat
tightened. He heard glass shattering, saw a wrapped body on a
gurney, clattering toward a waiting ambulance. He had to crouch
there for a little while, hands on his knees, sickness swelling in
him like he’d swallowed poison fog.

Kilroy finished the tour and told the others
he was going to lie down in his private car. He said it was up to
them to introduce themselves formally to Bode. To help Bode feel
welcome.

Bode watched Kilroy retreat into the
darkness of the train’s second car. He drew his coat tighter around
his body. He heard a rustle behind him, and felt a disjointed sort
of fear, as he might in a dream. A sense that all was not well.

A thin hand caught him by the shoulder. Spun
him. He looked into a woman’s dark eyes. The trapeze artist with
the red lips. “Hullo, burriful,” she slurred. “Wanna get to know
us?”

Someone else grabbed the back of his coat.
Bode tried to pull away, but there were hands everywhere now,
plucking and shoving. His coat was pulled from him and tossed
aside.

He ended up kneeling on a patch of rocky
earth, cold grass prickling his hands and knees. Someone tore his
shirt until it hung over one shoulder like a sash. He didn’t
scream. The fish kiss man clouted him in the head.

On his stomach now. Someone stepped on his
back to keep him in place while another performer unhooked his belt
and yanked off his shoes and pants. He grunted.

“
Shh, shh,” the woman said.
“We all been here, angel-y thing.”

Someone shoved his legs apart. “We gotta get
initiated.” A man’s voice. “This’s the easiest way.”

Bode clawed at the ground. A boot came down
on his hand. He stopped moving, and his mouth twisted in a silent
cry.

This is your life now. This is your
debt.

Only the tall, quiet man looked on and made
no effort to participate. Bode focused on that stooped figure as
the others set upon him like dogs.

***

Later, Bode stumbled into Kilroy’s car. He
was shaking too hard to walk properly, and he didn’t know where
else to go. The others had all disappeared into the coffin car, but
Bode hadn’t wanted to follow them. He couldn’t be near that group
ever again. He had to make Kilroy understand that.

A lantern glowed on the wall, throwing an
orange gold light around the room. Kilroy was propped in bed,
reading. Bode leaned in the doorway, trying not to shake.

Kilroy looked up. Took his reading glasses
off. He didn’t seem surprised, but he did look at Bode with an
exaggerated pity that, despite its mocking note, calmed Bode
somewhat. Kilroy leaned forward and squinted at him.

“
Oh, Bode. They can be
ugly, can’t they?”

No greater humiliation
than standing naked before Kilroy with his lip split and dripping
blood, and remembering what he’d told Kilroy the night they’d moved
in together:
“I love you. You make me feel
really, truly alive.”

You stupid, stupid
child.

Another dark drop hit his
naked foot. He looked at the lopsided world from under the swollen
flesh overhanging his right eye. Trembled—the ripple of a grazing
animal’s skin at first, and then harder and harder until he could
barely stand. A series of sobs gathered inside him, straining
against their chains, and then one by one the links snapped, and he
wept openly, center stage in a nearly empty room, one set of eyes
on him.

“
Oh,” Kilroy said again
softly, after several moments. “Come here.” He pulled back the
sheets.

Bode staggered to the bed
and climbed in beside Kilroy. Kilroy covered him and kissed him,
blood reddening Kilroy’s lips. He wiped the split in Bode’s lip
with his thumb. He seemed, for a second, genuinely remorseful.
“It’s all right. It will get easier.”

Bode tensed as Kilroy ran a
hand down his back, stopping just above his ass. At the same time,
one of Kilroy’s knees slid between his legs, and he jerked
back.

“
Shh.” Kilroy stroked the
hollow at the base of his spine. “No more of that tonight,
hmm?”

So he knew. Had known what
the others would do. Bode tucked his head against Kilroy’s throat
as another sob broke loose.

A memory of his first date
with Kilroy—of a childish, clownish elation—sat on top of his
despair, wove itself into it. He wanted to laugh
suddenly.

He jolted again as Kilroy
shifted, his fingers slipping lower. “No,” Bode whispered,
struggling away.

“
Easy. Eassyyyy,” Kilroy
whispered.

Body clutched Kilroy hard.
The bruises on the backs of his thighs throbbed.

Kilroy brushed his fingers
between Bode’s legs again. Bode clenched. He was aware of the room,
of Kilroy. Things didn’t blur the way they did sometimes in dreams.
Even when his mind started to drift, it was yanked sharply back to
the present by the sound of Kilroy’s breath, the rustle of the
sheets.

“
What did they do?” Kilroy
stroked his bruises and sounded so concerned that Bode clung
harder, submerged in an icy hope. Maybe Kilroy hadn’t meant for
this to happen. Hadn’t meant for him to be treated this way. Hands,
and voices. The trapeze artist’s dry, violent laugh.

“
They…”

Kilroy’s fingers pressed
where there was already pain enough to make him wretch, and Bode
curled into himself and heaved. “Oh, they must have done a number,”
Kilroy said.

“
They wouldn’t let me
go.”

“
Bodeee,” Kilroy
sing-songed. He sounded far away. “It’s gonna be a tough debt to
pay.” He pressed harder between Bode’s legs.

Bode caught the edge of
his tongue between his teeth. He dug his fingertips into Kilroy’s
back and watched hope slip into the skin of a bigger, less
conquerable cruelty. “No.” He pressed his nails into the fabric of
Kilroy’s shirt. “
No.
”

“
Don’t be a child. Don’t
be…flimsy.”

I am, though. Have always
been.

“
Be bold. Like your art.”
Kilroy petted him gently. “Think about what the world needs. What
you might give it. Take your pain, Bode, and reimagine
it.”

“
No!” Bode shouted,
twisting as Kilroy started to push inside. He arched his back and
clenched his teeth. Stared at Kilroy.

“
Where’s the man I knew?”
Kilroy murmured.

The pain was sharp as Bode
pushed back against Kilroy’s finger. He breathed made a sound half
snarl, half gasp.

You tricked me. This isn’t
paying a debt. I’ll kill you. Tonight, when you’re fucking
sleeping, I’ll kill you.

Seconds later, the guilt
came. He closed his eyes.

“
I can give you something
to make it easier, if you like,” Kilroy offered calmly.

And even knowing that
whatever Kilroy offered would be crueler still, Bode nodded and
whispered, “Please.”

Kilroy stopped touching
him. With his other hand, he reached into the drawer of his tiny
bed stand and removed a small brass box. Opened it and held out a
round blue pill. “This will help,” Kilroy promised. “Take this and
try to sleep now.”

Bode tried to pick up the
pill, but his hand shook so badly he dropped it on the sheet
between them. Kilroy lifted it and placed it in Bode’s mouth. Bode
swallowed. Gagged almost immediately, but Kilroy rubbed his neck
until the urge to vomit passed.

“
What if I can’t?” Bode
asked frantically. He felt hands on him again. Bracing him, tearing
at him, pinning him. He struggled against the memory. “What if I
can’t do this?”

“
Shh, shh. You can. It’s a
dance. That’s all.”

Bode shivered.
A dance. A dance.

Kilroy got up, and Bode
almost begged him not to go. But he only crossed the room and went
to an old Cadence player. Put on some music and came back to bed.
Bode recognized the intro to
Vehemenzi’s
Waltz
, the suite from his solo at the
Little Comet. The music that had played when he’d first seen Kilroy
in the front row.

“
No.” The word came out of
Bode like a moan as Kilroy climbed under the sheets beside him
again. “No…”

“
Bode. Relax.”

Through the window, Bode
could see snow falling.

Several minutes passed
before he felt anything. Then, a sensation like plummeting. Like a
trapdoor had opened under his feet, and he plunged into a world
where everything around him
fit
together. Walls blurred into floors and doorways
seemed like ragged holes in flimsy paper. His senses jumbled—he
visualized smells and tasted sounds and everything he touched
seemed to flare into a coil of flame and dance with him.