INTO HIS HANDS

Rosa

I find Rosa in her office at seven that evening.

She is at her desk with the season accounts open in front of her and the expression of a woman doing mathematics that are not producing results she likes.

She looks up when I come in.

Something moves in her face.

Quick. Controlled. Gone.

The specific expression of someone who has been waiting for a particular conversation to arrive and has just heard it knock.

I sit down across from her.

I say: the maintenance access log. The fourteen entries outside scheduled maintenance in the six months before the accident. The access code belonging to a consultant contracted through a third party.

She is very still.

I say: which third party Rosa.

She closes the season accounts.

She folds her hands on the desk.

She says: the consultant was contracted through the Meridian company.

The office is very quiet.

I say: the Meridian company contracted the rigging consultant for the Stellara.

She says: cost sharing arrangement. Industry standard. Smaller circuses use shared contractors to reduce costs. She says it with the careful precision of someone presenting facts in the least damaging possible order. The Meridian company had an existing relationship with the consultant. They offered to include the Stellara. It saved us money we needed to save.

I say: who arranged it.

She says: it came through Marcus.

Of course it did.

Of course it came through Marcus.

I say: Marcus arranged for a Meridian company contractor to have access to our rigging.

She says: at the time it seemed straightforward. The consultant had good credentials. The official record was clean.

I say: the official record was clean because the unofficial entries were not in the official record.

She says: yes. She says it quietly. I know that now.

I say: when did you know.

She looks at her hands.

She says: I found a discrepancy three weeks after the accident. One entry that didn't match. She pauses. I told myself it was administrative error. I told myself the investigation would find it if it mattered.

I say: and the investigation.

She says: looked at the official record. Did not look at the secondary access logs. She meets my gaze. I didn't tell them to look there.

The office is very quiet.

I say: Rosa.

She says: I know. She says it with the weight of someone who has been carrying something for four months and is finally putting it down in the right place. She says: I made a calculation. A terrible one. The debt. The Meridian contract. The season that had to happen or everything Thomas built would be dismantled. She pauses. I told myself that if I said something the investigation would take longer. The contract would fall through. The circus would close.

I say: and my father.

She says: your father was already gone Ivy. She says it gently. Nothing I said was going to bring him back. She looks at the desk. I told myself he would have understood. I used that. I used it and it was wrong.

I sit in Rosa's office and look at the woman who has run my father's circus for twenty two years and made the worst kind of decision. Not a cruel one. A frightened one. The decision of someone who looked at two terrible options and chose the one that kept the lights on.

I say: the second page.

Rosa goes very still.

I say: there is a second page of the investigation report.

She opens her desk drawer.

She puts a single folded page on the desk between us.

I look at it.

I say: how long.

She says: since the investigation closed.

I pick it up.

I read it.

The investigator's notes careful and specific. Possible unauthorised access to suspension housing. Recommend audit of full access log history. Flagged for follow up.

Follow up that never happened because Rosa said it was nothing.

I put it down.

I say: I'm taking this to Zane.

She says: yes.

I say: and then to someone outside this circus.

She says: yes.

I say: a lawyer. The regulatory body. Morrison if he handles this.

She says: yes.

I say: this is going to become something legal Rosa. Something that goes outside the industry.

She says: I've known that for four months. She looks at me with twenty two years and one terrible decision. I've been waiting for you to get here.

I stand up.

I fold the page.

I put it in my pocket.

I say: when this is over we are going to have a long conversation about what you chose and what it cost.

She says: yes.

I say: a very long one.

She says: I expect so.

I go to the door.

I stop.

I say: the debt. How bad is it.

She says: bad enough that losing the Meridian contract closes the circus. She pauses. Bad enough that I would have done almost anything to prevent that.

I say: almost.

She says: almost. She meets my gaze. There are things I would not have done.

I say: I know Rosa.

I go.

The big top light is on.

I push through the side entrance.

He is on the catch bar.

Not working.

Inverted. Still. The thinking position. The at-rest position of a man who uses height to think about things that are too large for the ground.

He hears me come in.

He says without looking down: Rosa.

I say: yes.

He drops from the bar.

The controlled landing. He crosses the apron.

He stops in front of me.

I take the page from my pocket.

I hold it out.

He takes it.

He reads it standing up.

When he finishes he looks up.

He says: the Meridian company.

I say: Marcus arranged it.

Something happens in his expression.

Not surprise.

The specific expression of someone who has been building a picture and has just received the piece that makes the whole thing visible.

He says: Celeste.

I say: yes.

He says: she used the Meridian connection to get someone inside our rigging.

I say: yes.

He says: across six months. Fourteen times.

I say: yes.

He looks at the page.

He says: this is enough to reopen the investigation.

I say: is it enough to prove it was her.

He says: not yet. He folds the page carefully. But it's enough to start. He looks at me. I need to call Cole.

I say: who is Cole.

He says: my cousin. Rigging and equipment specialist. He says it simply. If anyone can read what was done to the suspension housing from the access entries it's him. He pauses. He's the only person I trust completely.

I say: call him.

He takes out his phone.

He looks at me before he dials.

He says: Calloway.

I say: yes.

He says: you did well tonight.

I say: I asked Rosa questions.

He says: you asked the right questions. He holds my gaze. And you listened to the answers even when they weren't what you wanted.

I look at him.

The dark eyes.

The jaw.

The chalk on his hands and the page folded in them and the rigging above us that someone accessed fourteen times.

I say: she was protecting the circus.

He says: yes.

I say: it was still wrong.

He says: yes. He looks at me steadily. Both of those things are true simultaneously.

I say: how do you hold both things at once.

He says: practice.

He dials.

He turns slightly away.

I hear it ring.

I hear a voice answer.

Zane says: Cole. I need you at the Stellara. Now. He pauses. Bring your kit. He pauses again. Because someone tampered with the rigging that killed Thomas Calloway and I need you to prove it.

He hangs up.

He turns back.

He says: he'll be here tomorrow.

I say: that fast.

He says: that's Cole.

He puts his phone in his pocket.

He looks at me.

We are standing in the empty big top at seven thirty in the evening with the second page of the investigation report between us and Celeste Voss's name sitting in the middle of everything and Cole coming tomorrow and the investigation becoming real.

And then he does something I do not expect.

He crosses the remaining space between us.

He stops directly in front of me.

Very close.

His hand finds my face.

The rough chalk white hand.

Warm.

His thumb tracing my cheekbone slowly.

The roughness of the callus against my skin specific and present and the warmth underneath it always underneath it.

He says: go home. Get some sleep.

I say: that's not why you crossed the room.

He says: no.

I say: why did you cross the room.

He says: because you walked in here with your father's investigation report in your pocket and Rosa's confession behind you and fourteen entries and six months and Celeste Voss and you are standing here holding all of it upright. He says it with the dark eyes close and the thumb still moving along my cheekbone. He says: and I wanted to.

He stops.

I say: wanted to what.

He says: be close to you while you hold it.

The big top is very quiet.

His thumb traces my cheekbone one more time.

Slow.

The roughness of it.

The warmth of it.

He drops his hand.

He steps back.

He says: go home Calloway.

I go.

Outside the lot is dark and cold and I walk back to my trailer and I think about his thumb on my cheekbone and I wanted to be close to you while you hold it and I think:

The trouble has calluses and says things that are more devastating than anything gentle could ever be.

I go inside.

I lie on the bed.

Cole comes tomorrow.

Everything is about to change.