It’s the last day of february and the last day of flash fiction february at the dictionary project. Thanks for joining us this month and please enjoy our final piece by Alison McCabe.
mezair n. Dressage. a movement in which the horse makes a series of short jumps forward while standing on its hind legs.
Airs Above the Ground
Mr. Moore carries his belly in front of him as he heads for Sam. His shirt swells like a young cheek around a lollipop and, if the gray beard and heavy walk didn’t make his sex so obvious, you might ask when the baby was due. He stops directly in front of Sam so the distance between them is close and Sam can smell honey-roasted peanuts on his breath.
“Negotiations in ten,” Mr. Moore says. “You’ll want to get the drip going.”
Sam nods, as always, and follows Mr. Moore across the midway into the tent.
The sword swallower wants decaf. Sam waits for the coffee to brew and looks her way. Her hair is black and the longest he has seen. Her skin is so white it is almost blue. Her fingernails are short, bubblegum pink. She licks her lips with her tongue, split down the middle; each tip is pierced, as are her eyebrows, nose, the dimples of her cheeks, and other places, Sam guesses. On her collarbone is a tiny red apple tattoo and, below it, in script, Eve. Of course it’s unsurprising. Nothing much surprises Sam anymore. They all stand out in the exact same way.
Everyone sits around the table with Mr. Moore at the head. From what Sam can tell, a thin gentleman with an uneven smile is in charge of their crew because he does most of the talking. He talks fast, like everything is dire, and not one word, not even a syllable, can wait. The others don’t seem interested in the conversation. A large woman stands in the corner opposite Sam because the chairs are too small to support the weight of her frame. She is the biggest Sam has ever seen, though he isn’t convinced that customers would be satisfied after dishing out to view such a hefty display. It’s an old act that worked back when Jumbo was just an elephant and not the go-to size for a tub of popcorn, or a corn dog/fried pickle combo. He thinks he would like to remind Mr. Moore that practically everyone is fat these days, so really it’s nothing special, but he doesn’t want to offend the man, thickset as he is. He guesses Mr. Moore can’t afford another misstep; the paint is starting to peel on the welcome sign, and one more failed investment might be enough to topple the whole thing down.
Sam walks over to where Mr. Moore sits. “I’d drive a hard bargain with this one,” Sam whispers into his knobby ear—the one part of the man that’s small, baby-like even. On the lobe are short, blonde hairs.
“I’ll have sugar with mine, Sam,” Mr. Moore says.
“What I’m saying is we need to be cautious.”
Mr. Moore swats Sam away. The back of his hand brushes Sam’s chin. “I know what I need to be,” he says. “We don’t need to be anything.” He coughs into the top of his fist, smiles at the thin man, their spokesman. “Excuse me,” Mr. Moore says. “Now how many freaks you got?”
“You mean real ones?”
Mr. Moore nods.
“We have Sparky.” The thin man puts his hand on the shoulder of the body beside him. It’s so covered with hair you’d have trouble finding the person beneath or even the creases in his face. Except for small blue shorts, the man is exposed. “Rest assured, he rides a horse too, dressage and everything. You want capriole? You got it. You want levade? Mezair? Because you know how it is nowadays putting someone like Sparky on display with no other selling point. Everybody’s gone sensitive.”
“And the others?”
“They all got selling points. We swallow swords, eat light-bulbs, read frickin’ minds.”
“I mean where are they?”
“You’re looking at them.”
“That’s it?”
“They’re outstanding, really.”
Excluding the two businessmen, there is only the sword swallower, the large woman, Sparky, and a young man with thick, black eyebrows in an orange turban. Sam brings them coffee, already poured into mugs. He makes two trips because they are too hot to cradle in his arms all at once.
“You salaried?” Mr. Moore asks.
“Work off commission.” The thin man pauses. “Barbara gets double, though. We all agreed.” He looks up at the fat lady.
“Double?” Mr. Moore widens his eyes. “Christ, what for?”
The thin man stares at Mr. Moore and shakes his head. “We decided. We all just agreed.” He takes a pen out of his shirt pocket, scribbles something down and passes it to Mr. Moore, under the table. Sam hovers beside him. getting stomach stapled, it says. has to happen soon.
Mr. Moore crumples the napkin and glances up at Barbara. Her cheeks and neck turn red. He lowers his head and sighs. “Okay,” he says. “Thing is you haven’t got enough for an entire act. We need our ten in one.”
“Those have been dead for God knows how long. Nobody knows what to expect anymore.”
“Well, maybe five is enough, not four though.”
“You haven’t seen what these kids can do. Sparky doing dressage, I’m telling you. We’re talking capriole, we’re talking frickin’ mezair.”
“I grew up half a mile from this boardwalk,” Mr. Moore says, “in a studio above a bar, on a blowup mattress, with three women who all claimed to be my mother. And you’re telling me there’s something I haven’t seen. I’d like to know what that is.” He shakes his head and his eyes land on Sam, who’s leaning now against a filing cabinet in the corner. Mr. Moore stares at him for a moment, mouth shut tight until his lips disappear. “Be a doll, Sam” he says, “And bring us that bundt cake. Top shelf in the fridge.”
Born and raised in New Jersey, Alison McCabe lives and writes in Tucson. She teaches English at the University of Arizona where, in 2010, Alison received her MFA in Fiction. She is currently at work on a novel.
the dic·tion·ar·y pro·ject 