Finally, the ringmaster stuck his hand out for me to shake. “I hope you’re funny, Jack,” he said.
“But my name is Ray,” I said.
Some clowns raised their fingers to their lips. They were telling me to be quiet.
I felt a chill at the back of my neck. Why were they all so frightened of the ringmaster?
“Welcome to our little world, Jack,” Mr. HahaFace said. “I’m sure you will make your uncle proud. And I’m sure you’ll learn a lot this summer.”
“I — I’ll try,” I stammered.
Then Mr. HahaFace reached under his red jacket and pulled out a huge needle. A doctor’s needle for giving shots, only it was more than a foot long!
“Someone hold Jack in place,” he ordered.
Uncle Theo didn’t move. But two other clowns stepped up behind me and grabbed my shoulders.
“Give me your arm, Jack,” the ringmaster said. “I need to take a blood sample.”
“A blood sample?” I asked. My voice came out high and shaky.
He waved the enormous needle in front of me. “I need to see if you have any clown blood in your veins.”
“No. Wait,” I said. I swung my arm away from him. “You can’t —”
“Hold him still!” Mr. HahaFace shouted. “Don’t let him run.”
The two clowns gripped my shoulders and held me in place. I shut my eyes as Mr. HahaFace lowered the huge needle to my arm.
Silence. I waited for the sharp stab of pain. Gritted my teeth and waited.
I opened my eyes. Mr. HahaFace stood with the big needle in the air. He tossed back his head and laughed.
The other clowns began to laugh, too. But I could tell they were only pretending to laugh.
Mr. HahaFace patted my shoulder. “Relax, Jack. That’s a joke I play on all the new people.” He chuckled. “Go ahead. Sit down. Enjoy your snack.”
He nodded to Uncle Theo, tipped his top hat to the other clowns, and strode out of the tent.
Several clowns let out sighs of relief. I heard low mutters and tense laughter.
I’ve never been afraid of clowns. But something about Mr. HahaFace totally terrified me.
I turned to my uncle, who had taken his seat beside me. “He’s kind of scary,” I whispered.
“Kind of,” Uncle Theo agreed. He stuffed a cookie into his mouth.
“Why is everyone so afraid of him?” I asked.
Uncle Theo chewed for a long while and swallowed his cookie. He kept his eyes on his food plate. “Just keep clear of him, Ray. Keep clear of him, and you’ll have no worries.”
“Hey, kid,” Billy Laffs called from down the table. “Don’t worry about HahaFace. We’re all one big happy family here.”
“Yeah, if you belonged to a family of SHARKS!” Uncle Theo barked in his Murder the Clown voice. He gave me a playful shove. “Clown life is murder! Murder!”
Mrs. Giggle-Wiggle stood up. “The only thing better than being a clown,” she shouted, “is being ME!” She wiggled her big pillow butt.
Everyone laughed.
“Speak for yourself!” Billy Laffs said. “I’d rather see you than be you!”
“I’d rather be a clown than be the circus elephant,” another clown cried. “He works for peanuts!”
“Do you know what the monkeys work for?”
“No. What?”
“Same salary as you!”
As the clowns laughed and joked, I turned and glanced around at the other tables. I looked for the yellow-wigged clown from the Dunk-A-Klown tank. I went from face to face. But he wasn’t in the tent.
I elbowed Uncle Theo. “Where is the clown from the Dunk-A-Klown tank?” I asked.
He stared at me for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he said finally. Then he stared down at his plate. He didn’t look me in the eye.
I pictured that clown being flushed from the tank, sinking out of sight with that terrified look on his face. And I thought about Mr. HahaFace, how the clowns all grew silent as soon as he entered the room.
Something strange is going on here, I thought. Something strange and frightening. Something Uncle Theo doesn’t want to tell me about.
At the back of the lot, several long trailers and mobile homes were parked in rows. This is where the circus people lived.
Uncle Theo’s mobile home was painted bright red and had a painting of his face, axe and all, beside the front door. I climbed the metal steps and followed him inside.
He had a small, yellow-tiled kitchen, a living room with a big leather armchair and a flat screen TV, and a tiny bedroom and bathroom at the other end. The walls were covered with portraits of other clowns, dozens of grinning, painted faces.
He smiled at me. “Pretty nice place, huh?”
“It looks very comfy,” I said.
“Yeah, it’s cozy.” He motioned me into the living room. “I’ll take you to your trailer, Ray. As soon as we get you in costume.” He disappeared into the bedroom in back.
I dropped onto the small couch across from the armchair. “I have my own trailer?” I called.
“Well, no. You have to share it,” he said. “I think you’ll like your roommate. He’s a good guy.”
He stepped back into the living room carrying a blue-and-white ruffled clown suit and a big pillow. “Try this on.” He tossed it to me. “The pillow goes on your stomach.”
I laughed. “This is really for me?”
He nodded. “For the rest of the summer, your name is Mr. Belly-Bounce.”
“Mr. Belly-Bounce.” I repeated the name. I didn’t really believe it.
“That’s your whole act,” Uncle Theo said. “You bounce your belly. You practice it till you’ve got it. Till you’re funny.” He slapped my shoulder. “You’ll kill! You’ll murder them!”
I laughed and rolled the pillow between my hands. “Well … we’ll see if I have any clown blood in my veins.”
Uncle Theo tugged me to my feet. “Come on. I’ll take you to your trailer and you can try on the costume.”
He led the way out of his mobile home. I had the pillow in one hand and the clown costume draped over my other arm.
Down the row of trailers, I saw a bald, grinning clown juggling duckpins. He kept dropping them and muttering to himself. Loud hip-hop music poured from another trailer. A clown was busy washing down the front of another mobile home with a hose and a big sponge.
Uncle Theo led me behind the tall show tent. “Your trailer is on the other side,” he said, pointing.
We were walking at the back of the show tent when I heard an alarmed shout: “Hey — look out!”
I turned — and screamed — as a knife with a long blade came flying at my head.
No time to duck. I shut my eyes and waited for the crushing pain.
I felt the air off the blade as it zinged by my face. Still frozen in place, I opened my eyes. The knife made a ripping sound as it stuck into the tent canvas.
I opened my mouth, but I was too startled to speak.
“Hey — who threw that?” Uncle Theo screamed. He jumped forward, his eyes darting all around the circus lot. “Who threw that?”
My whole body was tingling. It happened so fast, I didn’t really have time to be frightened. I stared at the knife handle poking out from the tent canvas. And again, I pictured the long, shiny blade soaring right at my face.
“Who threw that knife?” Uncle Theo screamed.
There was no one in sight.
He turned to me. “Someone thinks I need another hole in my head!” he exclaimed. “I told you, it’s murder around here!”
“It’s not funny,” I said, finally finding my voice. “Are you sure that knife was aimed at you?”
“Maybe it was an accident,” he replied. “I think the knife just slipped away from someone. I don’t think they were aiming. And why would someone throw a knife at you? No one knows you.”
My uncle was a bad liar. Even under his thick red face makeup, I could see he wasn’t telling the truth. He knew i
t wasn’t an accident.
The sun was going down. Long shadows stretched across the grass. I squinted into the gray light. Beyond the tent, a clown was watering an elephant. Across from him, a clown pushed another clown in a wheelbarrow.
I shuddered. I kept hearing the zing of the knife as it whirled past my head.
I still felt shaky as Uncle Theo led the way to a clump of metal trailers at the far end of the lot. They weren’t lined up. They were parked at funny angles, as if they’d been tossed there.
The grass gave way to gravel as we stepped up to a trailer. It had a hand-written sign over the door that read: Top Cat.
“They all have names so you can find yours easily,” my uncle said.
Out in front of the trailer, a clown stood at the side of a ping-pong table. He had a paddle in each hand and appeared to be playing a ping-pong game all by himself.
He stopped slapping the ball and looked up as Uncle Theo and I stepped over to him. He had a painted white face with a red smile from ear to ear. A red light bulb nose twitched beneath big, black eyes. A red yarn wig rested at an angle on his head.
“This is your roommate, Bingo-Bongo,” Uncle Theo said. “I’ve got to run. You guys get to know each other.”
He turned and trotted off, his big clown shoes kicking up gravel.
I stepped up to the ping-pong table. “I’m Ray,” I said.
“No, you’re not,” my roommate replied.
“Excuse me?”
“We don’t use our real names here,” he explained. “Only our clown names.”
“I get it,” I said. “Well … I guess I’m Mr. Belly-Bounce.” I held up my costume and the pillow.
He laughed. “Maybe I’ll call you Ray.”
He bounced the ping-pong ball on the table and began hitting it back and forth over the net. “Bingo-Bongo, Bingo-Bongo,” he chanted. “See? My name goes with my act. I play ping-pong by myself.” He played faster and faster till I could barely see the ball.
Finally, his left-hand paddle smashed the ball hard. His right hand swiped and missed. “Game over,” he said, raising his dark eyes to me. He set the paddles down on the table. I could see sweat forming on his white face makeup.
“That’s awesome!” I said. “Is that your whole act?”
“No. Then I do it blindfolded,” he replied. “It takes a lot of practice. What’s your act?”
“Well … I guess my act is … I bounce my belly up and down.”
We both laughed.
“That takes skill, too,” he said. “You’ll see.”
A few trailers down, I heard a man and woman arguing loudly. Country music floated out of a trailer behind ours. Next to us, a clown had set up a hammock and was slowly rocking on his back, sound asleep.
“So do I call you Bingo-Bongo?” I asked.
He nodded. “I told you, we don’t use our real names here — especially around Mr. HahaFace.”
“Tell me,” I said. “Why is everyone so afraid of HahaFace?”
“Yes. Tell him,” a voice boomed behind me.
I spun around and saw that Mr. HahaFace was standing right there. Had he been eavesdropping?
“Go ahead, Bingo-Bongo,” he said. “Why don’t you tell him why everyone is afraid of me!”
Bingo-Bongo stumbled and knocked the ping-pong paddles off the table. His eyes went wide with fright.
I stepped back, adjusting the pillow and costume in my arms.
“Well …” Bingo-Bongo said. “I was just explaining some of the rules to Mr. Belly-Bounce, sir. I want to help him rehearse. And I’ll help him in the ring tomorrow.”
Mr. HahaFace frowned. “And why is everyone scared of me?”
“Uh …” Bingo-Bongo hesitated. “I was about to tell him that no one is scared of you. Everyone respects you, sir. That’s all I was going to say.”
Mr. HahaFace studied Bingo-Bongo for a long while. Then he turned his eyes on me. Finally, he said, “Be funny, guys.” He tipped his top hat to us, turned, and strode away.
I watched him till he disappeared around the side of the show tent. “So tell me,” I said, “why are you so scared of him?”
Bingo-Bongo shrugged. “He’s the boss. That’s all.” He scowled at me. “I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“No problem,” I said. “Do you think I’ll be ready to perform tomorrow?”
“It’s easy,” he replied. “Bounce your big belly up and down and bump into people. Knock people over with it. That’s always funny.” He squinted at me. “You’re not afraid, are you?”
“No,” I answered. “I like adventures. Seriously. I’m already the class clown at school!”
He laughed. “Go inside and put on your costume. I’ll show you a few things.”
A hip-hop beat suddenly burst from our trailer. “Oh. That’s my ringtone,” Bingo-Bongo said. “I left my phone in there.” He scrambled up the steps and disappeared into the trailer.
I gazed around. I suddenly felt happy and excited. Here I was in a new world. It really was like being on a different planet. A clown planet where everyone wore crazy makeup and costumes, and everyone had a funny name.
It was maybe the only place on earth where the only thing everyone cared about was making people laugh.
Could I be a funny clown? Of course. Back home, Heather was always calling me a clown. She didn’t know I’d really become one.
I turned and started to follow Bingo-Bongo into the trailer. But I stopped when I saw the door to the trailer next to ours swing open.
A girl clown stepped out. She wore a short, pleated yellow skirt over white tights and a sparkly blue vest. Her blond hair fell around her painted white face. Even with the makeup, I could tell she was about my age.
I walked over to her to introduce myself.
But she spoke first. “I know who you are,” she said. “You’re the next victim.”
I gasped. I couldn’t hide my shock.
She laughed. “Joking,” she said. “See? We’re clowns. We’re supposed to make jokes.”
I could feel myself blushing. “I’m new here,” I said. “I just arrived today and —”
“I know,” she said. “I’m Deanna Banana. And you’re Mr. Belly-Bounce.”
“You seem to know everything,” I said.
She nodded. “I get around.”
“I just got here from Tampa. That’s where I live,” I said. “Where are you from?”
“Mars.”
I laughed. “You don’t look like a Martian.”
“How do you know? Actually, I’m a circus kid. I’ve lived at this circus my whole life.”
“Weird,” I said. “What kind of act do you do?”
“I do a knife-throwing act.” She pulled a long-bladed knife out from under her vest. She flipped it into the air and caught it on the third spin.
“Hey,” I said, “did one of your knives get away from you a few minutes ago?”
She squinted at me. She had round blue eyes. “No. I’ve been inside.” She pointed to her trailer. “But you know what? One of my knives is missing. I counted them this morning, and I couldn’t find one.”
“Well, someone threw a knife at me,” I told her. “Back of the big tent. It just missed my head.”
Her painted red mouth formed an O. “Seriously? Why?”
“I don’t know,” I said. I lowered my voice. “Something funny is going on at this circus, Deanna.”
“It’s supposed to,” she said.
“No. Funny weird,” I said. “I just got here, but I can tell something is wrong. I mean, my uncle won’t answer my questions about Clown Street or the Dunk-A-Klown booth.”
She tossed back her long hair. “Really? Do you think he’s hiding something?”
I nodded. “Yes. I think something scary is going on. And what’s up with that ringmaster?”
“You mean Mr. HahaFace?” she said.
“Yes. He’s some kind of freak. Why is everyone so afraid of him? When HahaFace showed up in the
food tent, everyone instantly went silent. It was totally weird.”
“Yeah. Weird,” she repeated.
I started to say more. But I was interrupted by a shout from Bingo-Bongo from inside the trailer. “Hey, Belly-Bounce. Where are you?”
“I’d better go inside,” I said. “Catch you later.”
I turned and hurried into the trailer. It wasn’t as luxurious as Uncle Theo’s mobile home. I saw two narrow cots, a tiny stove and refrigerator, a counter with two stools for eating, and two folding chairs.
I dropped my costume and the pillow onto the cot against the wall. Then I turned to Bingo-Bongo. He was sprawled on the floor, his back against the trailer wall.
He looked up from his phone. “Who were you talking to out there?”
“The girl from the next trailer,” I said.
He lowered his phone. “Deanna Banana?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
He sat up straight. He narrowed his eyes at me. “What did you talk about? You didn’t say anything bad about the circus — did you?”
“Well …” I hesitated. “Yeah. Kind of.”
Bingo-Bongo slapped his forehead. “Don’t you know who she is? She’s Mr. HahaFace’s daughter!”
“Oh, wow.” I sank onto the cot. “I didn’t know. Do you think she’ll get me in trouble?”
Bingo-Bongo rolled the phone around in his hand. “No. You’re probably okay. She knows it’s your first day. And you didn’t say anything bad about Mr. HahaFace — did you?”
I swallowed. “Well … actually. I think I said he’s some kind of freak. And I asked Deanna why everyone is so scared of him?”
Bingo-Bongo slapped his forehead again. “I don’t believe you did that. What did she say?”
“Nothing,” I replied. “She didn’t have time to answer. You called me to come in. Do you think I’m in trouble?”
“Does a pig sleep in mud?”
I stared at him. “What does that mean? Yes or no? Come on — answer me. What does that mean?”
He tapped away on his phone and didn’t look up.
* * *
That night, I tossed and turned on my narrow cot.
I was so happy and excited when I arrived at the circus. But now, worries spun through my mind, worries and fears. I thought about Deanna Banana and what I’d said about her father. Maybe she wouldn’t tell him. Maybe she thought it was funny.