PROLOGUE
Ronan
February, 1995…
Today was going to be the best day of thirteen-year-old Ronan O’Mara’s life. The circus was in town. For weeks now, television commercials had been advertising the seven day event. Each one getting Ronan more and more excited for the Grande Promenade, where a heard of elephants would stomp down Causeway Street on their way into the new Boston Garden, which would be their temporary home during February school vacation week.
After seemingly endless days of pestering, Ronan’s mother, Erin, had finally agreed to take her son to the parade, which was how he ended up freezing his tiny ass off at the corner of Canal and Causeway waiting for the elephants. “Mom! Where are they?” Ronan whined.
“Maybe they’d decided to stay in their warm beds, like we should have done.” Erin looked as miserable as Ronan felt. Her cheeks were bright pink with the cold. Even wrapped from head to toe in a heavy wool hat, jacket, mittens and boots, Erin O’Mara resembled a frozen fish stick.
Ronan, was a junior fish stick. Why had he thought this was going to be fun? Getting up at the ass crack of dawn like he would on a regular school day, standing in the freezing cold weather, waiting for a bunch of elephants to amble up the street. He had to be out of his mind.
A loud squawk from down the street caught Ronan’s attention. “What was that?”
“Elephants!” Erin said, as several more trumpeted their arrival.
Ronan felt the ground shake under his feet. Normally he would have assumed it was the subway’s Green Line roaring past underfoot, but today it was something different. Today the shaking was caused by the elephants. His mouth hung wide open when the first huge pachyderm came into sight. The animal was enormous! It’s massive head swung back and forth as the creature eyed its adoring fans. She trumpeted again, so loud that Ronan slapped his hands over his ears. Perched on the elephant’s shoulders was a small girl, who looked to be a few years older than Ronan. She was dressed in a frilly red gown adorned with feathers and beads. Her blonde hair hung in waves to the middle of her back. She was the most glamorous person Ronan had ever seen in his life.
The elephant paused in front of him. It’s trunk swung toward Ronan, sniffing at his feet before moving up his legs. Ronan laughed when the elephant raised its trunk higher toward his face. “Hello, beautiful.” He stroked the elephant, under his mother’s watchful eye.
“Ro, look up.” Erin whispered.
The girl riding the elephant was leaning down toward him. In her hand was an envelope, which Erin reached up to retrieve. “Thank you!” Ronan called, as the elephant moved off down the street. When the parade rounded the corner, he turned to his mother. “What is it?”
Erin handed the envelope to Ronan, who ripped it open. It was a postcard with the elephant and the beautiful rider on the front, when he flipped it over, he saw it was an invitation. “Admit two,” Ronan read. “Come meet the stars of the show. Elephants! Lions! Tigers! Oh, my! Take photos with Ringmaster Sterling Reynolds. Ride a trick pony. Enjoy a meet and greet with the clowns. Facepainting. Games. Food and more!” Ronan handed the card to Erin. “Can we go, Mom, can we?”
“Sure!” Erin agreed easily. She hurried Ronan across the street, managing to avoid a massive elephant turd, to the main entrance of the new Boston Garden. They showed the invitation at the door and they were allowed inside.
The lobby of the Garden was festooned with brightly colored balloons. Ronan could smell popcorn and cotton candy. Laughter and loud squeaks from the right caught his attention. Clowns were making balloon animals and telling jokes to the kids waiting in line. There were happy clowns and sad clowns.
One clown in particular caught Ronan’s attention. The bald man must have close to six feet tall. He was dressed in a one piece outfit that was black and white, stripped in some places, polka dotted in others, with large, black pom-pom buttons. His face was painted completely white, while his mouth and eyes were ringed in black. Exaggerated eyebrows were drawn halfway up the clown’s forehead, giving him a permanently sinister look, even when he laughed. The man was twisting long, black and white balloons into what looked like a segmented snake. Ronan absolutely had to have one of those.
“Mom! Can we go see the clowns? I want to meet the black and white one!”
Erin’s grin turned sour. Ronan almost thought she looked afraid, but that couldn’t be, Erin O’Mara wasn’t afraid of anything. She looked as if the last thing she wanted to do was meet clowns. “Okay,” she agreed sounding apprehensive.
Ronan bolted toward the dwindling line of kids waiting to meet his favorite clown. He knew his mother would catch up to him. He’d hated the scared look on Erin’s face. He promised himself that he’d do the dinner dishes without complaint to thank her for everything she’d done to get him here.
Rocking back on his heels, Ronan heard the clown tell the kid in front of him that his name was Ying Yang. He watched with fascination as the clown blew up two more balloons and deftly twisted them to make a snake. Ying Yand handed the balloon animal to the boy with a dark look. “Watch out it doesn’t bite ya!” The clown pinched the boy’s left shoulder and laughed loudly, stomping his feet, and honking the bike horn attached to his hip. The boy squealed in response.
It sounded to Ronan like it was a mix of joy and terror. All of a sudden, he wasn’t so keen on meeting Ying Yang. Maybe there was still time to get into another clown’s line. A girl dressed from head to toe in pink was making pink poodle balloon animals for the kids in her line. He was about to step out of line when Ying Yang spoke to him.
“Hey kid! What’s your name?” The clown eyed Ronan with curiosity.
“Ronan.”
“Ya like snakes, Ronan?” Ying Yang asked.
“Yeah, they’re wicked cool!” Now that Ronan was talking to the clown, he felt more relaxed. Erin set her hand on his shoulder, which gave him even more confidence.
“I bet your Ma likes snakes too, huh?” He waggled his exaggerated eyebrows at Erin and started blowing up balloons for Ronan’s snakes.
Ronan watched fascinated as his balloon animal took shape. As a last touch, the clown added a red sticker to the front of the snake, which looked like a forked tongue. “Here you go, Ronan. Watch out it doesn’t bite ya!” Ying Yang pinched Ronan like he’d done to the kid who’d been in line ahead of him. Thankfully he’d known it was coming. He laughed with the clown who honked his horn.
“Let’s get away from the clowns, huh, Ro?” Erin asked.
“Sure, Mom,” Ronan agreed easily. “Why don’t we get something to eat?”
