She Dances In My Shadow

I get fired from the Moscow State Circus for messing with a bear.

Martin tells me to be ready at 6 a.m. He has coffee in a thermos and hands me a cup. It’s medicine. I require coffee. We’d been on the beach all night. Our house is right on the beach. The ocean draws you out at night. Dreams as waves crash along the shore.

We make our way across Adelaide. Streets empty. I don’t know the city. Martin is from here. He drives fast, coffee in one hand, wheel in the other.

Martin is a tall, skinny guy with an unkempt beard. I met him in Sydney. He said there’s work in Adelaide. He can hook me up.

Work means work as a stage crew vagabond. I learned you can travel and job into shows and concerts, pick up cash. Gets me around the world. Gets me into some pretty peculiar situations, too.

Today’s job is with the Moscow State Circus. I’ve never worked at a circus before. Martin looks across.

“Be ready to work hard. It’ll bust your balls.”

We pull into an empty field, a bunch of guys standing around, some trucks pulled up. Nobody is doing much, cigarettes and chatting. Martin knows these guys. He introduces me around. But men, you know, they hold back and grunt.