Send In The Clowns Concluding our circus serial

Concluding chapters: As her dad recovers, Lolly is enjoying working with trapeze artist Russell – rather too much

The three hundred-strong matinée audience watched mesmerised as Lolly Sullivan flew in a low circle above a dry ice cloud that was rolling across the stage. Clad in a glittering white bodystocking, she hung in a star shape, held by one ankle and wrist by Russell, who was hanging upside down from a trapeze bar.

He released her ankle and she dropped gracefully to her feet. Supported by just the grip of their fingertips, she leaned at forty-five degrees as if being tugged away from him by a howling gale. But nothing could break the bond between the two angel-like figures. She pirouetted into his embrace and kissed his upside-down lips as the stage went black and the audience burst into applause.

As the stage was taken over by Irish juggler Sean, with his fluorescent hoops and pumping pop music soundtrack, Lolly and Russell fell into adjacent chairs in the darkened wings. Physically and emotionally drained, Lolly realised they were holding hands, sharing the satisfaction of creating their aerial ballet.

It was only a tiny segment of the endof-the-pier circus show, but it was so different to the knockabout comedy of their other routines scripted by her dad, Mike Sullivan. It was theirs.

Lolly glanced sideways at the chiselled trapeze artist and as their smiles met she realised that she loved him, even though they’d only ever kissed on stage… except once, when she’d pretended it was a joke.

As Sean reached the second half of his routine, Russell squeezed her hand and said, “Come on then, on with the motley!”

There was no time to go to their dressing rooms or be shy about their underwear. Avoiding each other’s eyes, they stripped off their body-stockings in the shadows by the quick-change rail and pulled on stripy T-shirts and dungarees for the show’s slapstick finale: Lolly and Pop Paper the Parlour.

I’m too worn out to go front of house!” Lolly grinned as they staggered from the stage, hair and shirts damp from the buckets of water they’d been throwing around. “Come in the office for a cuppa!”

As Russell looked around the unfamiliar cubby-hole of her dressing room, Sean walked by and peered in. Lolly shut the door in his face.

“Might as well start a rumour that we’re having a snog!” “If only!” Russell blushed. “Do you mean that?” she asked, heart pounding. Only Russell’s eyes answered and Lolly realised how shy the handsome trapeze artist really was.

Finally unable to stop herself doing what she’d wanted to do for six weeks, Lolly shoved his shoulders against the door, stood on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his. For a moment they were eyeball to shocked eyeball. She could have left it there and laughed it off like one of Lolly and Pop’s comedy skits. Instead, she closed her eyes and made the kiss real.

Russell wrapped his arms around her and she melted into his muscular embrace. As his starved lips devoured her, she felt giddy enough to faint.

“Easy, tiger!” Lolly stepped back while they both still could. “We’ve got another

“Easy, tiger!” Lolly stepped back from the kiss while they both still could

show tonight, and Dad might arrive early!”

“Sorry!” He grinned. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to do that.”

“Me too. Settle for a biscuit?” She clicked on the kettle.

She waved Russell into the only chair. Perching on the dressing table, she rested her foot on the chair arm. As he caressed her ankle, she knew they’d opened a bottle that wouldn’t be re-corked.

“I’m sorry I never said anything,” she told him. “I didn’t want to start something that might only last a season.”

“I wouldn’t want that either,” he replied earnestly. “I’m not looking forward to next week.” Lolly sighed. Cradling her tea, she gazed across the room at the show’s poster. It showed her and her dad in comedy pirate outfits. Russell was only standing in as Pop while her dad recovered from a heart bypass.

She and her father would soon be off working the holiday camp circuit, with a pantomime booked after that.

“It won’t be forever,” Russell reassured her. “Maybe we can start work on a new show next year…”

Lolly gazed wistfully at him and remembered her ill-fated long-distance relationship with Sean.

“I don’t want to be apart from you for six months,” she confessed. “Me neither.” He massaged her calf. “The problem is, how am I going to tell Dad I want to leave the act?”

There was a knock on the door and Sean’s Belfast brogue called, “Someone to see you, Lolly!”

Lolly sprang up and pulled open the door, saying, “Dad…!”

She froze, mouth open and eyes bulging in disbelief, like a Polaroid snap of someone who had just been whacked in the face with a wet fish. “Mum…!” she corrected herself. It was like looking in a mirror and seeing herself twenty-five years in the future. Same height. Same shade of blonde, though her mum wore her hair straight and shoulder-length with a sensible fringe – her spiky headed Lolly days were long behind her.

She’d filled out a little from the lack of high kicks and tumbling, but was shapely in a well-cut summer dress. She still favoured brighter than normal make-up, although her face was pale.

“Hello, Lolly,” Anne Sullivan said. “I just wanted to say that I came to the show this afternoon.”

“Which would be, what, the first time ever?” Lolly said with the chippiness of the sixteen-year-old she’d been when her parents split up.

“That’s only because I haven’t wanted to watch your father on stage,” Anne said quietly. “You did a good show. I’m proud of you.”

“He’s feeling a lot better, by the way, since you didn’t ask.” Lolly talked

over her mother’s last words. “You know, after heart surgery and all that!”

“I know,” Anne said stiffly. “I’m not too old to use Facebook, you know.”

Her taut features softening a little, she added, “And I’m glad he’s getting better.”

“Oh, Mum, I’m sorry!” Lolly threw her arms around her mother and pushed her chin into her neck, like a child. She squeezed her eyes shut but it didn’t stop her tears oozing out.

Her mother held her awkwardly and rubbed her back. As if that makes up for four years of barely communicating, Lolly thought bitterly.

Her mother had never been very maternal. She’d always been too busy dolling herself up for the spotlight, or sniping at the easy-going Mike about their lack of creature comforts and perpetually dire finances as they hawked their fading stardom around the country.

Lolly had always been her daddy’s girl, sharing his love of fun and laughter.

But at least her mum was here now, she told herself. Pulling herself together, she stepped back into the dressing room and wiped her eyes as she said, “This is Russell. He’s standing in for Dad.”

“I know.” Anne smiled at the trapeze artist. “You both did a fabulous show.” “Thanks!” Russell shook her hand. As he did so, Lolly’s stunned brain started to process some of the things she’d just heard. Her mother had actually come to the theatre. And she cared enough about her dad to monitor his health on Facebook. Her dad was coming to the theatre tonight, too. Was there a chance that they might…

“Lolly,” her mum said awkwardly, “there’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

For the first time, Lolly noticed a well-dressed man in his fifties, standing behind her mother in the shadowy wings. He edged into the room with a cautious smile on reddened features.

“This is Alan.” Her mum took the man’s hand in both of hers. “We’ve just got engaged.” “Oh.” It was all Lolly could say. “Congratulations!” Russell covered the awkward silence.

“Well, it was nice seeing you, Lolly,” Anne said, as she backed out of the dressing room with her fiancé.

“Won’t you stay a while?” Lolly followed her with a sudden feeling of desperation. “Dad will be here soon…”

“I’d better not.” Her mum backed away. “I…”

As Anne turned away, she stopped dead and Lolly did, too. The stage door opened with a screech of seagulls and a gust of briny air, and Lolly’s dad came into the theatre with Auntie Mim.

It was the first time Lolly had seen her parents together in four years and she thought her heart was going to stop. She dreaded to think of the effect on Mike’s freshly repaired ticker.

“Anne!” he exclaimed. “Hello. It’s been a long time.”

“You look very well, Mike,” his ex-wife said quietly. “You, too,” he agreed. Lolly could see from the way Mike’s belt was tightened that his jeans were now a size too big for him and his tennis shirt flapped loosely around thin arms, but the trip to the sea had put a healthy colour on his face and he looked much stronger than the last time she’d seen him a couple of weeks before. “This is my fiancé, Alan.” “Really?” Mike looked his ex-wife’s new man up and down, then he put a warm hand on both their arms. “Well, congratulations. If you need an act for the reception, don’t forget me and Lolly!” Anne and her man tittered nervously. “No, I mean it.” Mike beamed. “Life’s too short for hard feelings. I wish you both the best of health, wealth and happiness.”

“Er, thanks – you too,” Anne muttered as she hurried out of the door.

“You remember Mim, don’t you?” Mike called after them, but there was no reply except the sound of the waves.

“Oh, Dad!” Lolly ran to him and threw her arms around him for comfort. She could feel his ribs through his shirt, but he stood as straight as a fence post.

“Chin up, Lol!” He squeezed her fondly and ruffled her hair. “Hey, Mim, that bloke didn’t look like a lion tamer, did he?” “Lion tamer…?” “Stop it, Dad!” Lolly warned playfully. “Didn’t I tell you Anne ran off with a lion tamer?” Mike went on. “They had a lovely act. The lion used to put its head in her mouth!”

Thanks so much for driving Dad over, Auntie Mim,” said Lolly. “It’s such a long way.”

“I wouldn’t miss your show for the world!” Mim grinned warmly. She eyed Lolly’s glittering gold front-of-house tail coat and silver bowler hat where they hung on the wall beside her red and green harlequin outfit. “Coming backstage always feels like coming home!”

Although Mim ran a guest house and cooked fried breakfasts every morning, she didn’t look as if she ate them, Lolly thought.

At fifty-one, dressed in turned-up vintage jeans and a black vest with a Harley-Davidson logo, she still had her dancer’s physique. Her tanned face was all laughter lines and sparkly make-up, framed by glittering hoop earrings and short hair dyed a vivid ruby red.

“Just wait till you see Russell tonight, Dad,” Lolly enthused. “He’s got so good at the slosh routine!”

“I know, I saw a bit on YouTube!” Mike pulled out his smartphone. High-energy dance music filled the room as he showed them a clip taken from the audience of Lolly and Russell sliding about the wet stage with their buckets and ladders.

“Gerry Cottle phoned me up about it,” Mike boasted. “He said, ‘Here, Pop, you aren’t half looking young!’”

“I’ll go and get some more chairs,” offered Russell.

“Don’t worry, young man,” said Mike, sinking into the one seat. “Mim can sit on my lap.”

“Ooh, best seat in the house!” Mim giggled saucily.

As Mim sat down, Lolly noticed the easy familiarity with which Mike

She dreaded to think of the effect on mike’s freshly repaired ticker

linked his hands around Mim’s tiny waist and realised why her dad had been so upbeat when he met her mum’s new fiancé – and why he’d been enjoying his convalescence so much.

“Are you sure your heart’s not beating too fast, Dad?” she teased.

Mike kissed Mim’s tanned neck and said, “Mim’s been better for my heart than the operation – haven’t you, Gorgeous?”

It was funny, Lolly thought. Seeing her mum with a new man had been shocking but Mike and Mim looked so content, they might have been married for years.

“I’m not really Lolly’s auntie,” Mim explained to Russell.

“I know,” he grinned. “It’s just what circus people call, er…”

“…older circus people!” Mim laughed without embarrassment.

“Well from now on, Mim,” Lolly said, “I think I’ll have to start calling you ‘Mum’.”

After the show, the four of them went to dinner in the fish restaurant at the other end of the pier. The sound of waves crashing on the beach came through the open window and a golden moon hung low over its reflection in the darkly shimmering water.

Lolly couldn’t believe how different the dynamic felt. Instead of a daughter and her dad, as it had been for years, it was two couples.

For the first time all summer, she’d put on the one smart red dress she owned. Usually she went from her stage clothes to jeans or leggings and a sloppy shirt or jersey. She’d put on perfume and smoothed flat the pointy tufts of her short blonde hair. For once, she’d left her clown persona in the dressing room.

Beside her, in the rosy glow of the flickering candles on their table, Russell looked incredibly handsome in an expensive buttoned shirt she’d never seen before. He had a nice new scent of cologne about him, too.

Lolly wasn’t used to feeling so grown up and it felt a bit scary, as if she were leaving part of her old life behind.

As the others talked about clown cars and custard pie fights, she realised she was just toying with her food. Eventually, she reached under the table and took Russell’s hand in hers for support.

“Dad,” she said with a dry throat, “this is probably the wrong time to say it, but there’s never going to be a good time.”

“What is it, Lolly?” His face creased with concern.

Lolly gripped Russell’s hand so hard she thought her knuckles would pop out.

“Russell and I want to start our own circus company. We want to do a new kind of work…”

“Like the trapeze routine we did,” Russell jumped in as she dried up. He enclosed her hand in both of his. “Only bigger – a proper show. A theatre tour…”

“It means I’ll have to leave Lolly and Pop!” she blurted, and put a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob.

Mike took a deep breath and she saw tears forming in his eyes, too.

“So my little girl’s ready to leave the nest?” He smiled tearfully.

“I’ll stay for the holiday camps and the panto…” she assured him, dabbing her eyes with a napkin.

Mike shook his head as he thumbed the corners of his own eyes. “No, Lolly, you need to start working with Russell now. You need to be with Russell now.”

Lolly looked at Russell’s proudly smiling face. She hadn’t realised their love was so obvious.

“Oh, Dad, you’re so understanding!” She ran around the table and hugged him.

“That’s what love’s about,” he told her. As she sat down, Mike straightened his shirt and said, “That’s a bit of wisdom for you, young Russell. Something to remember in years to come.”

“Actually, Mr Sullivan, I have something to ask you, and now might be as good a time as any.” “As long as it’s not a loan,” Mike joked. “No, it’s for something more precious.” Lolly stared in shock as Russell said, “Would you mind if I ask your daughter to marry me?” “Marry you?” Lolly gasped. “Hey, you’ve stolen my line!” Mike protested. He pulled a small velvet box from his pocket. “I was going to ask Mim!” “Oh, Mike!” Mim gasped. “So who’s gonna go first?” Mike asked. “I’m the youngest, so I will!” said Russell. “Lolly, will you marry me?”

“Oh, Russell, of course I will!” She threw her arms around his neck.

“Ahem, ahem!” Mike interrupted. “A little hush please. How about you, Mim?”

“Oh, you devil, Mike, you know you don’t even have to ask!”

“That’s a relief,” said Mike, as a waiter approached the table, “because I bunged this young man a fiver to bring us a bottle of bubbly right on cue!”

As they clinked their glasses and Mike took a bow to the cheers and applause from the other diners, Lolly was gripped by a sudden sense of loss.

“But… what’s going to happen to Lolly and Pop?” she asked quietly.

“Well, that’s something Mim and I were talking about earlier.” Mike smiled fondly. “When I saw you and Russell on stage together, I knew you couldn’t go on working with your old dad much longer.”

“And although my dancing days may be behind me,” said Mim, “I could have a whole new career ahead in clowning.”

Mike put his arm around her. “Take a look at the new Lolly and Pop!”

“So my LITTLE GIRL is ready to LEAVE THE NEST?” He smiled TEARFULLY