I still hadn’t located them. Perhaps they had rehearsals.
After the flower trick, I sashayed to the cardboard table at stage left, buoyed by my guests’ enthusiasm. I settled into the familiar rhythm of my show, a forty-minute routine that had taken me six months to assemble and practice. From the table I grabbed my old rope, cutting it in two before making it whole again. Golf balls appeared between my fingers, then vanished as quickly. I did a series of scarf tricks, first pulling one long rainbow-striped piece of fabric from my mouth. I separated it into five smaller scarves, each one an individual color, then turned them back into one tie-dyed piece. Though the stunts were hardly innovative, the audience went wild. According to the new book I was reading, magic wasn’t about the tricks. It was about selling your audience, making them believe in what you were doing.
Show after show, I kept working at the basics. I was impatient to move on to more difficult executions but had vowed not to do so until I perfected the routine I’d already put together. I’d worked that rope until my palms bled. Blisters bloomed on the fingers that wielded my wand. Most nights I hardly remembered my head hitting the pillow when I got into bed. I didn’t concern myself with boyfriends or best friends. I was singular in focus, and my hard work was paying dividends. Onstage I was growing more confident. This was the best crowd response I’d ever had.
I was about to transition to my favorite part of the show when a low “boo” rumbled at the back of the theater. My stomach turned. I squinted. A few spectators peered around, trying to find the source of the noise. The four faces I’d been searching for slowly came into view in the back row. They’d been hiding low in their seats the entire time, waiting for an opportune moment. Normally they sat in front. My heart sank.
Not tonight. Not while Sir is here.
Perhaps he wouldn’t hear them. He was slightly deaf in his left ear.
I returned the microphone to its stand and held up a pair of complicated-looking handcuffs, the same pair Sir had bought me the day after the incident with Mother’s platter. “For my next trick, I’ll need an assistant. Any volunteers?”
Hands shot up in the crowd.
“Why don’t you make yourself disappear?” one of the four called. I knew it was Alan, my old swim classmate, by his nasal voice.
I wiped my forehead and scanned the crowd. Behind my parents was a family with two boys. The older one was spellbound, had honey eyes and a crooked nose. He looked like the type to sit at home reading books about Houdini, memorizing every performance, every clue, like I had. Like I still did. I called him up while wondering whether crowds had booed Houdini in his early days. The books never said.
Houdini’s first taste of success came from handcuff escapes. In one of his earliest acts, he boasted he could break free from any handcuffs the audience or local police supplied. He made good on his word. From there he transitioned to jail getaways, then leaping off bridges, then locking himself in boxes underwater. At fifteen, I had no idea how I would even buy the provisions necessary to attempt his later feats. How would I get inside a jail? Did one need permission to jump off a bridge? These tasks were impossibly gargantuan to someone who had never traveled more than two hours from her hometown. A lack of other options forced me to take my performances one step at a time. As a child I’d taught myself card tricks, like Houdini had. If simple handcuff escapes accelerated Houdini’s career, then I would master them too.
The spellbound boy joined me onstage. “What’s your name?”
“Gabriel.”
I thought of the magician who had chosen me all those years ago. “Did your family drive far to be here, Gabriel?”
He stared at his mom, fear plain on his face. She nodded encouragingly. He opened his mouth. “W- . . . w-we’re from Aldsville.”
Aldsville was a couple of towns over. I winked at Gabriel’s parents. Gabriel’s little brother was on the literal edge of his seat, eyes shining. “Thank you for coming to see me today.” I turned back to Gabriel. “How would you like to be my assistant for this next trick?”
He nodded eagerly, alarm subsiding.
I held my handcuffs in the air. I’d been practicing with this pair for almost five years, knew every scratch and dent in the metal. Escape had become second nature.
I handed Gabriel the handcuffs. He locked them around my wrists, then showed the audience the key so they could see it was he, not I, who held it. The drama club students had been quiet while Gabriel introduced himself and assisted me but were jeering loudly enough now that even my father would hear them.