Story for Their Town: A Town of Circus Freaks

Chapter 2: One Day

One day, about maybe a week or two or three ago, before you came riding into town, Nick was up on his farm, minding his own business, and busying his mind. He was feeding his beloved chickens and giving water to those there cows (oh yes, he has cows, but their milk is… don’t tell no one this… rubbish, like an old man’s dry split without the delicious tobacco flavour… or so I heard), when something a new happened in this very town below his very farm.

A few fellas rode into Our Town. One of them was on horseback, dressed in all gold with a silver cowboy hat, while the others were on donkeys and wore rags but they were almost, almost completely covered in jewels, necklaces and all that high-end fancy stuff that rich ladies of the night at the saloon tend to wear. The only reason I knew that rags were their clothes was that when the jewels moved I could see the dirty, brown, thin cloths that had seen years of age, wore, and tear. So it was almost covered by jewels, almost. I guess they spent all their money on jewels that the clothes beneath mattered not, since they would be barely seen. And as you would expect they had big muscles due to carrying around jewels, necklaces and all the jazz, so much so that their donkeys looked as if they were crawling on the ground instead of walking on it. If you had looked to the ground behind them you would have seen three straight lines engraved into the land. It is madness I tell you.

The man in front riding the horse lifts up his right hand, putting his pointing finger and middle finger together up in the air, and then moving those two fingers up and down three times, I have keen memory for such things so I know, three times and one of the people that were on the donkeys, got off their donkey. The donkey seemed to have floated up due to the absence of the weight on his back, and his face had the most generally beautiful expression that a donkey could ever get. He turned his head to one side, then the other, and quickly turned around and made a run to freedom, away from the jewels. His rider reached out their hand to try to catch him but the jewels made it too slow to move. By the time his arm was up the donkey was gone. The person turned slowly around and started to make their way to the front of the group. He seemed sad; I cannot tell you if it were for the loss of their donkey or because the jewels were making him feel like a donkey felt now that he had to walk. Well… more like a drag than a walk.

This fellow that was making his way to the front had crisp and clear features, the likes that I have never seen, and you may not know it by looking at me but I’ve seen many fine species of our human race. And this fellow was indeed one of them. I looked out the corner of my eyes to spot one of the long-necked triplet sisters using her one flat hand to fan her face while the other flat hand was used to fan her sister’s face. That long-necked sister mouth was wide open, jaw almost dropping to the floor. Her right hand was keeping the mouth of the other triplet closed whenever it would’ve open. Every time it opened, her sister closed it, open, close, open, close. The third sister was just frozen with her eyes slightly bulging and the smallest hint of drool and she was the one batting for the other team. That is how fine this jewel-wearing, feet-dragging fellow was.

He, FINALLY, reached the front of their group. He stopped, stood up as straight as he could. His blue eyes looked from side to side. He reached into his pocket, we reached into others and he drew out a tiny little, adorable trumpet. He wet his lips with a bit of spilt, place the trumpet on his lips, inhaled deeply and blew. His cheeks puffed up to the point that they closed his own eyes and his face, nay, his body went red. But, the sound was … worse than pour dry dirt directing into your good ear, it was high pitched that I swear the mouse-faced teenager’s ears were bleeding. He has very sensitive ears. It was one long, high pitched note that belonged to no scale. This went on for some time and I think someone, can’t really remember who took a nap while standing, it could’ve been the horse body man but I ain’t too sure. So the note stopped. He cleared his throat and said:

“Presenting! The! Honourable! And good looking. Michelle! Prince!”

I think they must be French coming here on some boat and what not cause Michelle aren’t too much of a man’s name but what do I know, the times are a changing. The good-looking announcer of a man turned around and dragged himself back. This too took some time with the only sound being of his body being dragged across the dry sand and buzzing in our ears from the note. He saw he had no donkey so just stood there rather awkward-like in place of the donkey. The other men on their donkeys were a-blanked faced as a newly made-up wall while the donkeys looked jealous. Seeing animals being jealous is a strange sight to behold.

Michelle… Prince or something or another, the name just escaped my mind, I know I just said it but that was a few ticks ago. Anyway, he cleared his throat and looked around at all that stand before him. Some of us were curious about this new stranger while I think others just wanted him to move since he and his gang were blocking the only path through the town. It is a small town but has many busy, business people. Anyway… he began his speech in his quite lovely and smoothen voice, the perfect tone that can rock a baby to sleep and make women and men feel certain things… down there, if you know what I tell ya. He said to us all:

“Hear me, hear me…”

“Sir! I think you need to be louder!”

That person was right. Michelle cleared his throat…

“HEAR ME!”

“HEAR ME!”

“We would rather hear you less!” shouted McGary and the sounds of agreement filled the dense air. Michelle looked to be getting slightly annoyed but he eventually figured out the correct volume, well he did after a few tries.

“HEAR ME” that was one.

“HeAr ME” was another

“HE…ar …mE” was a different one. And so on and so forth. Until…

“Hear me, hear… me?”

Finally! We clapped and some of us nodded. This was the perfect volume that we wanted or that we were willing to put up with. Micelle let out a slight smile but quickly killed it since this was going to be a serious matter to hear.

“I come before thee today to announce a most important matter.”

Boy, he sounded fancy…

“A matter of most importance…”

And repetitive.

“I wish to take thee land from thee… for thouself.”

People shuffled while others blinked. Michelle cleared his throat one last time before going on a long speech. A very long speech. I ain’t got no memory for words in sentences I am for everything else but words… and dates… times…But that there speech did a number on me, on all of us, that we have all craved it into our own brains and into each other’s’. Well as much as we could and not literally of course… well, I think not literally… Anyway, Michelle said:

“Hear me, hear me, good fellows… and … ladies of this here fine land. I wish you not harm of any sort but merely wish to take thee land and make it better. To be fairly blunt, thee fine… inhabitants, thou a good job did not.”

“For this fine land needs a fine hand, to bring about a fine profit of maximum proportion. I am that fine hand and I will give all of me to this land. However… you must leave. You cannot stay since you are… well, best not to use words. I shall give thee, since I am a fine and fair man, until dawn to say your farewells. I believe this to be fair.”

That was the important bit. He went on about tearing down the houses that we have made from our bare hands, uprooting the soil to bring in another, and giving no trace that we were ever here. We did not like this at all, I mean would you? A random person-thing comes to your house, your place and demands that you suck and must leave… that be unfair. It be. But we had a sort of plan… kind of… and then Nick came in and fixed all the mess. No, seriously he did. For real though.