Quick note to begin with. I'm not making sexuality a big taboo in this story even though it is mostly based in 1931. Because it shouldn't be an issue to begin with. So same sex couples are totally normal.
Also: Glee does not belong to me neither does Water For Elephants written by Sare Gruen or it's film adaptation by Francis Lawrence.
Enjoy!
The rain pours down from the heavens above. Soaking my old, battered frame. I stare up ahead, the lights shining through the rain, pointing at Circus Vargas. I haven't been this close to a circus in years.
Promises of clowns with their dogs, acrobats soaring through the air, and animals you could only otherwise find in the savannah of africa...Or a zoo, wait beyond the booth.
The tent rises high up above, capturing rain, pouring over the sides.
There's a man still shuffling around in the ticket office, and I just watch him curiously. He, in his warm booth tallying up his earnings of the day. Me, standing in the pouring rain, wishing my tired body could have moved me faster to get here on time.
There's a loud honk behind me from one of those loud trucks awaiting to dismember the tents and attractions of the circus. As if a rude gesture such as honking at an old woman would get me to move. I turn around to face them, shaking my cane at them in contempt.
"C'mon lady! Whatcha doin anway?" I shake my fist at them, but otherwise stay silent.
Who raised these kids anyway? Didn't their mothers teach them any manners?
"Um excuse me? Can we help you?" Someone interrupts the shaking of my fist from behind. I turn around to see the young man from the ticket booth accompanied by a man who carries himself with authority. This is the man I want to talk to. I can spot the man in charge anywhere.
The man in charge stands behind a wheelchair. He looks at me like most people do these days. Like I'm a crazy old woman. And while yes, that might be partly true, I am not crazy in the sense that I have lost my marbles. I still have all of those. I'm crazy because I choose to stand out in the pouring rain in hopes of making it on time to the circus.
"Did I miss the spec?" I ask, even though in my gut, I know the answer. The younger man, the one that is tatted up and covered in piercing rolls his eyes at me, as if he is too busy to have to deal with the ramblings of an old woman. The one in charge sighs, water dripping of his baseball cap and onto his face when he nods his head. A look of pity washes over him.
"Uh yeah, I'm afraid so, the show was this afternoon." He tells me. I close my eyes and shake my head. This is not what I was hoping to hear.
"Did you come with the folks from Green Haven?" He questions me. I commend this man for being patient with me. Especially because we stand out in the freezing cold with rain pouring down on us. "Why don't we get out of the rain and we'll call 'em for ya?"
The young man covered in ink steps forward reaching his arm out helpfully, wanting to guide me to a wheelchair.
"No, no." I shake my head, pulling away from his touch. "I came on my own." What a waste that was.
"It's ok!" The young man speaks loudly and slowly to me. A common misconception between our youth is that we're deaf and dumb. While yes, I do know a few friends of mine that are hard of hearing, and might be a little slow, but old age effects everyone in different ways. I do not like being labeled as stupid just because I'm old. "We'll call the folks at Green Haven for you. They'll come pick you up."
"I'm tellin ya! I didn't come with the home!" I bark at him, feeling a little smug when the young man steps back in fear. "Maybe if you take those rings outa your head - you won't be deaf and dumb."
He laughs slightly, probably having heard what I just told him a million times before. He doesn't take offense to it. His boss even joins in on the laughter.
"Well it's alive." He jokes, getting a smile out of me.
"I'm sorry kid, I didn't mean that." I apologize. Here I am judging the rowdy men behind me for honking at me, when I'm being rude myself. "I-uh- your rings look very..." I struggle to find the right word "Pretty."
The man scratches his head, unsure of what to do with me.
"Russ." The man in charge steps in. "Why don't you take her cane over to my trailer then finish packing up." The boy listens reaching out his hand for the cane, silently asking if it's alright. I hand it over without protest.
"Ma'am, I gotta get you out of this parking lot. Why don't you sit down in the wheel chair? We'll go inside and dry off, and I'll make some calls for ya. C'mon please." I nod, not putting up a fight and take a seat in the chair. He wheels me towards his office then looks back at the rude men in their large trucks.
"Malcolm, tell them to come through!" The engines rev loudly. They're ready to take it all apart.
The man sits frustrated at his desk, making call after call, trying to get the number for Green Haven. If he would have just asked, I would have given it to him. But apparently a senile woman would likely forget the number to the nursing home she lives in. So I let him go through the trouble as I explore the contents of his office.
The man is a real enthusiast of the classics. He has old ticket stubs and photographs along with advertising posters littering his walls. All vintage of course, most from the Wringling Brothers, but there are a couple of other ones as well.
"I'm looking for a number that I don't seem to have in the phonebook." The man in charge mutters into the phone, rather annoyed. "It's called Green Haven." He enunciates each syllable carefully.
"I hope they sweat." I announce, pulling my eyes off a poster announcing his own establishment. CIRCUS VARGAS in big yellow print across a blue poster with a tiger roaring on the front. " Walked right out of the door and nobody noticed."
"GREEN HAVEN!" He repeats loudly into the phone slightly exasperated. "It's a nursing home. Hello? Hello?" The man hangs up the phone.
I stand before an old black and white photograph. I immediately recognize it.
"Hagenbeck Wallace, before the wreck." I announce, moving onto the next picture.
"Uh yeah, you know circuses?" The man asks distractedly. The way most people do when talking to their grandparents. Feigning interest.
"I should. Was in two of them myself." I reply proudly.
"Hey is there a relative I can call? Another number you have?" The man ignores my comment so of course, I must elaborate.
"The first was the Benzini Brothers." This gets his attention.
"Benzini Brothers?" He asks in a skeptical tone. I nod, turning away form the photographs on the wall. "Uh when?"
"1931." I answer. It's like he's challenging me. Not sure if I am telling the truth.
" '31 for how long?" He asks me. I, in turn smirk at him and chuckle slightly.
"Now you know the Benzini Brothers never saw the end of '31" He's still slightly skeptical of me. Which in a sense is understandable. For all he knows I'm a senile old woman.
"Are you telling me that you were there for-" I don't even let him finish.
"Right in the middle of it."
"Well thats incredible." He turns around in his chair, looking through the cluttered items he has on the small desk behind him. "Because you know, after the Harper fire and the Hagenbeck Wallace wreck, that's the most famous circus disaster in history." He pulls a frame from beneath scattered papers and presents me with a photo.
I grip the generic black frame in my hands tightly. Tears welling up in my eyes.
It's the most beautiful sight I ever had the pleasure of seeing in person. Center frame is an elephant with an elegant headdress, on top of her is the most beautiful creature anyone will ever have the pleasure of laying their eyes upon. A woman with blonde hair, poses for the camera, the trunk of the elephant coiled around her waist, hoisting her in the air.
Posing with them is a man in a top hat and what I know to be a red coat, even though the photograph is black and white. I know the color of the woman's hair, and her eyes. I know that the mans pants are white and his boots are black. I know this because I took this picture.
I feel my lips tremble as I take in the sight before me. I'm flooded with memories from so long ago. I sniff, willing myself not to cry.
"Are you ok?" The man asks hesitantly.
"You got anything to drink around here that isn't apple juice?" I ask the man. He chuckles, then realizes I'm being serious.
"Uh, yeah, I think so." He begins to rifle through his desk drawers. He produces a half full bottle of whiskey and two glasses.
"Here you go." He offers me the glass, not filling one up for himself. He settles back in his chair and watches me as I take my first stip.
"Ah," I sigh "I remember you." I breath into the glass, bringing it to my lips again for another sip.
"So how long have you been in that home?" The man asks, finally really paying attention to me.
"Too long." I tell him. "I don't know why they call it a home. You don't know anybody there. They stuff you so full of drugs, you don't care. 3 kids and not one of them has a place for me since their mother died. They take turns visiting on weekends. My son forgot who's turn it was today so... Can't blame him." I take a sip from my glass "The kids 71. He's starting to loose it up here." I tap my temple with the framed photograph in my hand.
The man nods, almost in understanding, but there is no way he understands me. At least he's sympathetic.
"They're not bad kids. It's not their fault I'm old. I had a good life, ya know." I take a deep breath and look down at the photograph in my hand " A big life."
The man stands and pulls out a chair for me.
"Take a seat." He offers. So I listen. I wipe at my eyes with my sleeve, clutching to the photograph in one hand and my whiskey in the other.
"I'm sorry." He apologizes. "My name is Charlie O'Brien the third." He reaches out to shake my hand.
"Rachel Berry - the only." I tell him, setting down my glass to give him a firm shake of the hand.
"That's good." Charlie chuckles, sitting back in his chair.
"Don't you have to call the home?" I remind him. Though I know I have him hooked. A smile plays at my lips.
"I think we should let 'em sweat. But if I could, I was wondering- Could you talk to me about what happened in 1931?"
I look down into my glass, prepared to take another sip, then I smile up at him and raise my glass slightly to him.
"We're gonna need another bottle of this."
What did you think? -A