A few hours drive from Strangerville, in the shelter of an abandoned horse pasture, the Lou Dufour Circus had hoisted their tents as if by magic. They spent the late summer months there, drawing a nearly never-ending stream of visitors to their show night after night. Lured by the the promise of forgetting their worries for one fanciful night, people came from all corners of the West, traversing along the route that ran through the region’s heart like a life-giving artery.
Come Fall, when the desert nights grew too cold and the townsfolk had given what little coin they had to spare, the tents would disappear as quickly as they had arrived, gone south to Florida where they would spend the winter months. Then the horse field was left abandoned once more, the well-worn pathways of a thousand hurried footsteps the sole reminder of the magic that had been there only weeks before.
Only to Violette, none of it seemed temporary. How could it be? How could mere mortals fold and package infinite yards of canvas like a rabbit hidden in a magician’s hat?
How could they balance knives and tame lions? How could they make the desert night shine so brightly that you couldn’t even see the darkness anymore? Only stars above made of artificial light that were even brighter than the ones in the sky. Stars that made you feel like you were shining too - shining like all of these lights and this magic that had sprung from the dry ground where nothing grew. Especially not magic.
It seemed as though just like Oz, it was a city crafted out of wonder and illusion alone, somewhere between the things she had seen in her dreams and what she knew was possible.
Maybe even more amazingly, she soon realized, was that she had yet to see even a portion of this Oz’s magic. If outside the tent had been enchanting, it was nothing compared to the wonder hiding beneath the big tented red fabric jutting from the center of it all.
One act after another wowed them. Strong men and lion tamers, acrobats and jugglers, each of which elicited cheers or laughter or gasps of awe from the audience. When Violette could tear her eyes away from the performers, she liked watching the people in the audience almost as much as the acts themselves.
There was something in the crowd that was unlike anything she had ever felt before. Like a rising tide that had picked them up and carried them together, their cheers crashed onto her ears like waves, amplified beyond any one voice or singular emotion. It was all-consuming, intoxicating even, and yet she wasn’t even the one in the center of it all. What those performers must have felt like in the spotlight, surrounded by the ripples they had created, echoing through the audience one by one until they rolled back down on them as waves of adoration and thunderous applause.
Yet none of it compared to the moment an aerialist descended from the center of the tent, her arms extended and the silk of her outfit shimmering as though she held all the stars in the sky within herself. Even Violette pulled herself away from the faces of the crowd to stare at her. Their laughter and cheers had ceased, leaving only a silent and suspended wonder hanging in the air. The woman floating above held them all captivated as they waited for her to move, and she allowed them time to observe every ounce of her beauty before she amplified it with a single movement of her delicate hand.
Violette had never seen anything like it, had never seen someone captivate so many people and look so beautiful except for…
She turned to her side, where her mother’s profile was staring at the aerialist in wonder as she began her routine. Except for her, magnetic and free as she shined like a star in the night on that stage all those years ago. Now there she sat, watching another, the light within her dim by comparison, but clear for Violette to see.
On the other side of her profile Violette saw her father steal a glance in the same direction. The flashing circus lights shined across the crowd and onto her mother’s face, and in that moment Violette knew that her father could see it too - the light in her mother that she remembered from all those years before. It went beyond simple beauty, although she knew that would always be a part of it. But it was more than that - a sort of spellbinding talent that could be switched on for a crowd to see, captivating and magnetizing them all at once, or kept hidden like the candle of a precious flame for only a rare few.
High above them the aerialist flipped forward, hanging suspended above the hard ground below with only her hands. All at once the crowd took in a sharp gasp of fear, until her leg went toward the heavens and they went quiet once again.
Violette watched her every movement in awed silence. No. There was nothing hidden about her, nothing shy or reserved or precious. Only a sense of limitless adoration surrounding her like magic. Nearly every eye in the crowd was trained on her and only her, as though waiting for her permission to clap or breath or even move their eyes.
No that - that was what Violette wanted, to be at the center of the crowd without a care in the world other than their love. Because once she was surrounded by their eyes and their waves of wonder, she would never need anyone or anything else ever again. If she had that, then she would have everything.
(All my gratitude to @historybunnny @doctorsimcraft and @surely-sims for their lovely sims, custom content, and build skills. I wouldn’t have completed this scene without yall ♥️)
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