The Circus by Olivia Levez

Author:Olivia Levez
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781786070951
Publisher: Kalmbach Books
Published: 2017-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

Greasepaint

‘It’s easy when you know how,’ Suz tells me, sitting on her haunches like a yogi. ‘C’mon, chin up more.’

We’re in our favourite spot, beneath the palisade, two metres away from sun and shingle and sea.

‘How much longer are you going to be?’ I complain. My skin feels tight from the face paint drying.

‘I am transforming you, from Frog to…Queen of Flames,’ Suz intones. She has her ubiquitous roll-up in the corner of her mouth, and her eyes are squinched up against the sun. She’s in her element, though, I can tell, humming below her breath, dabbing the paint brush into a plastic cup of water from the public showers and mixing it busily. She’s used the tray from a bag of chips as a mixing palette, and it’s sliding with vibrant colours: indigos and greens and magentas.

‘Hold still. Chrissakes, you nonce.’

She spits on the back of her hand and adds a daub of blue glitter.

‘Sorry,’ she says, when I make a face (difficult to move because my face feels like it’s hidden under layers of tightening clay). ‘Forgot you are so precious. You should have got some gold too. Really sets it off, you know, like you’re on fire.’

‘It was too expensive,’ I say, without moving my lips.

Suz rolls her eyes. ‘You don’t mean you actually paid for this little lot. Oh Jesus.’

‘I’m not like you,’ I say primly.

‘Stealing’s not wrong when you’re trying to survive. As long as it’s not actually harming anyone. How do you think I stayed on the streets for so long? By street magic?’ She nods to the almost empty clay pot in front of her latest chalk drawing. There’s a couple of pound coins in there, but all of the rest are coppers. Enough for a coffee, if we’re lucky.

I say nothing as she takes a tiny brush, its tip not much more than a single hair, and draws in some complicated shape by my left eye. Blows on my skin to dry it quickly.

‘All right, all right, I know I haven’t seen my dental hygienist for a year or ten, but no need to flinch. You’re just as bad. Your breath stinks like a dog’s anus.’ She swills in some more blue as she speaks.

‘Bat breath,’ I mutter.

‘Dragon dick.’

‘Bull balls.’

‘Bull balls? What are you like?’ She rocks with laughter, and almost drops her paintbrush. ‘Here, hold still and shut your eyes. I’m going to blow glitter over them.You can hold your breath if you want to,’ she adds.

I feel her blow gently, and something soft sprinkle over my eyelids. When I open them, I seize the mirror she’s holding out to me and stare deep inside. I am transformed.

Where my face used to be, there is a magical creature, half-bird, half-lion, with fierce peacock eyes and a roaring muzzle that she’s caught right in the act of breathing fire. As I tilt my head in the sun, I shimmer like I’ve caught fire.

‘Shall I do your neck too?’ she suggests. She doesn’t say anything, but you can tell she’s pleased by my reaction.

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