Chapter 2: Two Worlds, One Family
"Sorry Ma'me but you're not allowed back here," a large guard at the back end of the tent says sternly.
After the show, Emma and the rest of the group are trying to get backstage, so the cousins could reunite after years of being separated.
"But I know Phillip Carlyle the Ringmaster, he's my cousin," the young lawyer explains.
The man looks at her, obviously not believing a word of her statement. "Sure, he is, and I'm a three-toed orangutan with fur and a hairy moustache.
"But it's the truth," she insists. "I've known him since he was five-years-old."
As Emma continues trying to build her case, Barnum gathers all his performers together.
"Amazing as always everyone," he says beaming at his circus family. "We really blew them away tonight."
Everyone gives themselves a round of applause before going to change out of their costumes and makeup and get ready for a well-deserved rest or drink. The ringmaster tucks his top hat under his arm and goes towards his dressing room, where he'll change before he goes home to meet Charity and the girls, who would be home after another long night of his daughters being at ballet practice. He had to remember to book off the Tuesday next month for Helen and Caroline's recital. He loosens the buttons around his collar as his mind wandered back to the piece of paper in his dressing room. A telegram from an agent in the United Kingdom who wanted the "Barnum Freakshow" to come on a European tour. It sounded like an amazing idea, great opportunity for everyone to display their talents to new audiences and get the circus international recognition, but Barnum had to keep telling himself that it wasn't about the money. He had yet to tell Carlyle about the opportunity and he knew that Charity wouldn't want to leave home to go abroad again.
As he passes the entrance to the backstage area, he hears the growing ruckus in the doorway.
"I'm telling you!"
"What's going on here?" Barnum asks, keeping his guard back and he looks at the crowd of people. None of them are familiar to him. He immediately assumes that they might be protestors or reporters, neither of which he wants to be bothered with.
"Are you P.T Barnum?" Emma asks, trying to hide her excitement.
"That's what they call me,"
Just then Phillip passes by with Anne Wheeler, his fiancée and trapeze artist and her brother W.D. Wheeler. Knowing she didn't have much time, Emma clears her voice.
"Well, as I live and breathe if it isn't my cousin who ran away with the circus," Emma calls out.
Phillip turns towards the familiar voice. He turns from talking with W.D. and Anne, his blue eyes lighting up in recognition when he sees the familiar face. Emma ducks under the guard and hurries over, embracing her cousin tightly, she begins laughing uncontrollably and tears fill her eyes. Phillip Carlyle's reaction to seeing his beloved cousin is equally happy, laughing and actually lifting her into the air for a brief moment before putting her down again. She kisses her cousin on the cheek and smiles as wide as she can.
"Oh my god Emma! How... How have you been?" Phillip asks in disbelief.
"Me? What about you? Mr. Ringmaster…"
"Did you see the show?"
"See it, Phillip, we lived it, it was amazing!"
"We?" Phillip asks.
"Oh right, Peter?"
The guard is reluctant to let the rest of them backstage. Barnum, seeing that Phillip knew this group, taps the guard on the shoulder. "Let them through, this is a family reunion of some kind."
With a grimace, the guard allows everyone passage backstage. Phillip is surprised by the sheer number of people with his cousin.
"Phillip, this is my husband Peter Whitman, Peter this is my cousin, Phillip Carlyle," Emma says introducing the two men.
Both men reach over and exchange a friendly handshake.
"Nice to meet you," Peter says.
"Likewise," Phillip says.
"These are my friends Rose and Jack Dawson," Emma continues. "And Peter's sister Holly, her husband Carl and their son Thomas."
The young four-year-old waves eagerly. It took all of his parents' strength to keep the child from running off to get a closer look at the circus tent.
Phillip smiles warmly at the pregnant redhead and shakes the blonde-haired man's hand. He shakes Carl and Holly's hand as well.
"And Molly Brown and Rose's mother, Ruth DeWittBukater."
"A pleasure," Phillip says, shaking the women's hands.
The cousin's eyes then wander up to the child sitting on Peter's shoulders. "Is that your daughter?"
"Her, no, this is Sybil, your other cousin," Emma says, taking her little sister down from her husband's shoulders.
The ringmaster blinks in surprise. "You have a sister?"
"For almost a year and a half now," the young lawyer then turns to her sister. "Now Sybil, this is your cousin Phillip. Say hello."
"Ph…Ph…" Sybil babbles, trying to form new words every single day. The toddler then waves at her new relative with eagerness and childish joy.
"She already likes you. Would you like to hold her Phillip?" the older sister asks.
The young man swallows hard and his stomach turns. He's never held a young baby in his life. Sure, he'd interacted with Barnum's young daughters, but a child, barely out of babyhood was something completely different. He looks at the bright blue eyes and the golden locks of the toddler in his beloved cousin's arms and his heart immediately melts into a puddle. He's curious about meeting the cousin he never knew he had. With some hesitation, he holds his arms out to receive her.
"Sure," he answers.
Emma comes then hands the young one over to him. He struggles at first, but then Emma shows him how to hold Sybil comfortably. Once the toddler is in his arms, their blue eyes meet each other. Almost immediately, the young girl begins to gurgle and smile at him. She grabs at the gold buttons of his circus outfit and lets out a high-pitched laugh.
At that moment, Phillip loved Sybil Carson. She was a charmer, she immediately had him wrapped around her little finger as Phillip takes his top hat off and puts it on the girl's head, which falls over her eyes. This makes Sybil screech with laughter as she grabs at the costume piece. Phillip lifts the hat up so he can see her beautiful blue eyes, very vivid like his own; he then bops the girl on the nose, making her laugh even louder than before. The older cousin and sister have no choice but to join in the happy exchange.
Everyone around them smiles widely, some of the performers turn to the contagious sounds of a happy child. Even Barnum turns and laughs amusingly at Carlyle playing with the little girl. Anne Wheeler also steps closer, the image of her fiancé with a child was a surprising moment, but a joyful one.
"Ph… Ph…" she says over and over. Sybil begins drooling a little bit.
"You like that Sybbie, don't you?" Emma coos.
"She's beautiful," Phillip says, trying to fight back happy tears. "She looks just like your mother."
"Says everyone, but she's got a personality that's all her own. She now owns you, Phillip. Everyone she meets become slaves to her charms."
"She definitely has a knack for show business," Barnum says, coming up to the group. The ringmaster turns. "P.T Barnum, at your service."
"Emma Carson-Whitman, this is my husband Peter, my sister, Sybil, my best friends Jack and Rose Dawson," she says remembering her friends who have just been watching the interaction the entire time. "And my sister and brother-in-law, Holly and Carl Gregson and their son, Thomas. And this is Ruth DeWitt Bukater and Margret Brown, but we call her Molly for short."
"It's a pleasure," Barnum says. He shakes Peter and Jack's hands and then kisses Rose's, Holly's, Ruth's, and Molly's hands.
"You're quite the charmer yourself sonny boy," Molly says with a smile.
"It's what any showman must be," he says returning a smug grin. He then turns to Phillip and casually takes Sybil into his arms, Emma not objecting in the least. "She reminds of my daughters when they were this little."
"I didn't know you had children," Emma says in surprise.
"Two beautiful daughters, Helen and Caroline, both courtesy of my beautiful wife, Charity."
"She's a lucky woman," Ruth says politely.
Barnum pulls out his pocket watch and dangles it in front of Sybil, which the toddler grabs at gleefully.
"It was an amazing show by the way," Rose says. "I've never seen something quite like that."
"Thank you," Barnum says. "That's our goal. Our family works the hardest out of anyone to give the audience what they want."
"Nothing's more special than family," Rose smiles, running a hand over her own baby bump.
Sybil keeps everyone's attention for awhile, then Emma turns back to her cousin.
"I'm so sorry I didn't write to you to tell you about Sybil. With you moving around so much, I knew that it would be impossible."
"It's fine," Phillip says. "I missed seeing you."
"Me too, I wanted to know what you'd been doing. The last I heard from Uncle Daniel and Aunt Gwendolyn that you'd gotten involved in the works of a scoundrel."
"A showman," Barnum corrects. "A showman."
"Sorry, a showman. Anyways, I wanted to come and see your show, but Sybil was born and then… my parents passed on."
"What?" Phillip gasps. "Uncle Andrew and Aunt Bernadette are dead?"
Emma is equally shocked that he didn't know. The thoughts of her parents come back and she can feel heaviness forming in her body. The sadness had not left her, and probably never will. "Yes, for almost a year now. I assumed the only reason that you didn't come to the funerals was that you were overseas. Did your parents not tell you?"
Phillip shook his head and swallows hard. "I haven't spoken to them in years."
The female cousin's face falls into an expression of confusion and sadness. Yes, it was true that she hadn't heard from Phillip in a few years, but she just assumed that was because he was constantly on the road and didn't have time to stay in contact.
"What? Why? God, Duncan must be heartbroken."
"Who's Duncan?" Anne asks, coming up next to her fiancé. At first, the trapeze artist had been reluctant to approach any of Phillip's family, knowing how his parents had treated her several years ago. It was because of her race, her class, and her chosen career that they had rejected her. Despite this, the two fell in love anyways and were now engaged to be married, which made her so happy. She had assumed that any of Phillip's other relatives would reject her too because of their higher social class. However, with the way that Emma had lovingly greeted her cousin and the appearance of the group in general, except for the two elderly ladies at the back of the group, the people seemed to be from a humbler middle-class background.
Phillip swallows and turns to introduce Anne.
"Uh, Emma, this is Anne Wheeler, my fiancée,"
"Oh, my gosh, Phillip why didn't you tell us you were engaged?! Congratulations!"
Emma wants to hug the new member of the family but decided to give her some personal space offers her hand to the pink-haired performer with the widest and most welcoming smile anyone could muster. Anne feels the warmth and smiles back, returning the handshake. The cousin then looks at the simple glistening stone on the performer's finger.
"It's beautiful, like you." she squeals. "Hello, Anne, I'm Emma Carson-Whitman, this is my husband Peter Whitman, my friends, Jack and Rose, and this is Sybil, my sister."
Peter shakes Anne's hand and Emma takes her sister back from Mr. Barnum up to greet the newest member of their family. Sybil becomes in entranced by Anne's sparkling unitard and her pink hair. Almost immediately, the younger one begins to smile and reach over eagerly.
"Looks like she wants to meet you," Emma says. "Would you like to hold her?
Anne swallows and reluctantly accepts the toddler into her arms. She's never held a baby before, she was actually fearful, which was ironic because she braved death-defying heights every single day.
Sybil looks at Anne with bright blue eyes, obviously taking in the trapeze artist's unusual attire. The toddler then reaches up and pulls at Anne's hair. Emma immediately comes to her rescue.
"No, no, Sybbie," Emma says sternly, wrestling the pink lock of hair from her sister's grasp. "I'm sorry Anne, she's going through a hair pulling phase."
"That's okay," Anne says.
With the hair out of her grasp, Sybil becomes entranced by Anne's sparkly outfit. She begins grabbing at the purple material in curiosity. The artist is amazed and feels comfortable handling this child, she smiles at the little life in her arms.
More of the performers from the show come closer to the alleged family reunion. At first, the visiting group is a little uncomfortable by the diverse array of circus acts, a lot of them seemed much different up close. While it was slightly off-putting, no one wanted to be rude. Everyone was different and special in their own way, they themselves were living proof of that.
The little man who was dressed as Napoleon stands next to Barnum. Emma smiles warmly at him and leans down to shake his hand.
"Emma Carson-Whitman," she says. "I'm Phillip Carlyle's cousin."
"General Tom Thumb," he says giving a mischievous smirk. "But my real name is Charles Stratton."
"A pleasure to meet you, Charles,"
Peter then shakes the smaller performer's hand.
"This is the rest of our family," Barnum says. The performers begin shaking hands with the group of people. Suddenly, the ringmaster notices someone missing.
"Where's Lettie?"
"Right here," the bearded-singer says, coming up to join the party. She is holding the hand of a small, blonde child. The Carson/Whitman/Gregson family gasp, realizing the small child is Thomas. Somehow, he managed to sneak away from his parents to see everything. "I just found this little guy trying to feed the elephants."
"THOMAS ARTHUR GREGSON!" Holly shrieks in anger and embarrassment that her son had snuck away from her. She grabs her son's arm roughly. She immediately begins scolding him.
"Thank you so much for finding him," Carl says, shaking the bearded lady's hand.
"It's no trouble, I'm just glad he wasn't trying to feed the lions."
Holly turns to Barnum. "I'm so sorry, I've told him many times about wandering away."
"No harm was done," the owner of the circus says, holding up his hand calmly. He knew that being backstage at a circus is too tempting for a child to just to stand and not do anything. "As long as he didn't get hurt."
Barnum then leans down to the child's level. Thomas was now pouting after his mother had told him how naughty he had been. The small boy gazes into the ringmaster's eyes, becoming slightly shy and hiding behind his mother. Without hesitation, Barnum smiles and then takes his hat and places it on the child's head. It immediately plunks down over his eyes since it's still rather big for him, but this makes the mischievous boy giggle and smiles widely.
"Perfect fit," Barnum chuckles.
The ringmaster grins, part of him wishing that he had a son of his own. He loved his daughters very much, but part of him wishes that he had a boy who could carry on the family name. He saw a surrogate son in Phillip, but he was his own man, with his own affairs now. Barnum admired children for their curiosity and sense of wonder. They were some of the main people he was trying to entertain with his circus.
Thomas holds the hat up to peer at the man.
"You could be a showman one day son," the ringmaster chuckles. "If you wanted a tour of the circus, all you need to do is ask."
Holly again apologizes, and Barnum tells her again that no harm was done.
The two groups from very different worlds chat amongst each other about anything that came to mind. Peter asked Charles what it was like to meet Queen Victoria. Molly engaged in conversation with the conjoined twins Eng and Chang about current politics. Carl asks the tattooed man, Prince Constantine, how many designs he had on his back and chest. Lettie asks Rose how far along she is in her pregnancy, while Jack and Holly chat with Barnum about show business.
Emma and Phillip continue to catch up, talking about their careers, and hugging every so often, overjoyed to be able to see each other again. Anne watches from the sidelines, her mind still processing everything and still wondering if Emma and Peter would reject her. They did not seem to judge her in any way and they even entrusted Sybil to her. Despite her hesitation, the trapeze artist enjoyed the company of the bubbly toddler.
Eventually, Thomas begins to yawn, and he can barely stand up any longer. Carl scoops his son into his arms, where he soon falls asleep on his father's shoulder. Sybil follows suit almost immediately, curling up in Anne Wheeler's arms. Emma goes over to take the sleeping load from the performer.
"I guess it's time to head home," Emma says. "Thank you for carrying her. She always likes to welcome new people into the family."
Anne smiles, feeling much acceptance and comfort getting to meet some more of Phillip's family.
"It's nice to meet," Anne says.
"You too, welcome to the family," Emma smiles. She leans in and hugs Anne, which is not something the artist was expecting. "When you set a wedding date, be sure to put this little one in as your flower girl."
The performer continues to smile, looking down at the ring on her finger and then back at her soon to be relative. She goes over and lays her head on Phillip's shoulder. He promptly kisses the top of her head. He then embraces his cousin, so happy to see her again.
"We'll come and visit more often now that we know you're here," Emma says. "And you and Anne will have to come for dinner sometime."
"Definitely," he agrees.
"Don't ever be strangers," Barnum says to the group. "Come by anytime. Maybe we can give Thomas a proper tour next time."
Holly smiles and shakes hands with the ringmaster.
The circus performers say goodbye to the group before they exit the tent. Everyone felt good like they weren't being judged by anyone. They were being treated like anyone else you'd meet on the street, even though they were extraordinary in every way. They all then break away, going to gather their belongings and go home to rest for tomorrow night's show.
Phillip and Anne decide to take a small walk down by the docks before W.D. came to collect his sister.
Trapeze artist lays her head on his shoulder, feeling so overwhelmed and so in love. The two watch the stars and surrounding lights of the city reflect in the sea, it created a truly romantic picture.
She sighs heavily.
"What's wrong?" Phillip asks.
"Nothing, I just didn't expect your family to be so… open. They seem to be very good people."
"They are much better than my parents. In fact, Emma's parents used to raise me in the summertime, while my parents travelled because they just wanted to be rid of me." He grumbles angrily. He wanted so badly to forget about his parents, after how rude they were to Anne, but the mention of someone important had taken away some of his long-held anger towards them. "Emma and I pretty much grew up together, she and her parents were the family I wanted and deserved. I don't miss my parents, not at all and they probably don't miss me."
"But what about Duncan…?" she asks. The name kept rolling around in her mind, ever since Emma had brought up the name. He sounded important, someone close to both cousins, but she wasn't sure who it was. "Would he miss you? Who is Duncan?"
Phillip swallows a large lump in his throat, knowing he had to be honest with Anne.
"Duncan is my younger brother…"
A/N: Extending the Phillips family.