Vodka Sting

I swept down to kneel in front of the girl and handed her the flower. She giggled again. "Where's your other shoe?"

"I'm hoping it's on the plane."

"Why would it be on the plane?"

"My boyfriend has it. Or he's supposed to."

She looked at the gate thoughtfully. "I hope he remembers."

"Me too."

"Is he a clown too?

"No. But I like him a lot anyway."

"We're waiting for my mommy's boyfriend."

"He's not a clown, is he?"

"Noooo, he's a banker." The little girl wrinkled her nose and her mother drew herself up a bit.

"That's a neat job, isn't it?"

She gave me a little frown. "I guess."

I was interrupted by a sudden tide of people flowing out of the gate. A carefully coifed man in an expensive suit power walking just a bit ahead of the pack gave the woman a polite cursory kiss. "Long flight. I'll grab my suitcase, and we'll just get out of here." He turned and headed for the baggage carousel without looking back.

The little girl squealed. "I see your shoe!"

Following her gaze, I saw Björn towering above the crowd, holding my other red clown shoe above his head.

I looked at the little girl for a second, then booped her nose gently. "Thank you. I don't know if I would have seen him without you!"

She giggled.

It took me three bounding steps to reach him and jump up into his arms. He caught me easily and carried me in one arm. I kissed him and snuggled into his chest. "Missed ya!"

"I missed you too. Hold your foot up, Clownderella."

I did and he slipped my shoe on. He nodded seriously. "I had to make sure I had the right girl."

"Do you run into a lot of clowns with only one shoe?"

"You'd be surprised." He paused. "You know this is crazy, right? I can't believe you talked me into moving in together. We barely know each other."

"Crazy is kind of what I do; I am a clown."

If it didn't work out, we could always go our separate ways. But I had a feeling...

Björn voiced it. "I just have a strange feeling it's going to work just fine."

That earned another kiss.

"Bye!" The little girl was right in front of us, holding her mom's hand while the banker walked by them looking down into his cell phone.

The mom's expression was complete shock; her mouth was even hanging open a bit. Björn was apparently not what she'd been expecting.

I waved to the little girl. "Bye!" Then I winked at her mom and pointed slowly at Björn's chest. "Told ya there were perks."

Post Production Notes

When we wrote Tequila Shuffle, we just really liked the way Kelsea came off. So when we decided to do a follow up to Shuffle, we decided to do her story. Clowns have really fallen on hard times lately. Stephen King, John Wayne Gacy, and the collapse of most of the traditional circuses have really hit the profession hard. I got in touch with a few former Ringling Brothers clowns, some magicians, and some street buskers to get a feel for how things are going in their world. Things are tough all over right now, but their world really hinges on interaction, and it's very bleak right now.

MacKenna's Tavern is modeled on a real place, and some of you may recognize it. Please don't out it in comments if you do, I'd really like to be able to go back there.

Kelsea's Nose Trick in the Tavern is not one I've seen done. We chose not to out any effects/tricks that we know of out of courtesy. So The Missus and I worked this out using the principles of Slydini's paper ball trick. It is all about misdirection and timing. It works, but you have to be smooth as hell, and have a good natured audience and target.

Again, thanks to everyone for the really, really, insanely short-notice beta reads and edits; this would be unreadable without them. We are talking over 1100 edit changes. Seriously, it was like being in fourth grade all over again. Mrs. Wilson, wherever you are, I'm sorry. You were right, I should have paid more attention in class. The changes ranged from missing commas and semicolons to hunting and killing the plethora of "reallys" that infested the story. There were also several suggestions on wording and plot that helped a great deal. Thanks to qhml1 for the Clownderella quips.

The Missus was, as usual, amazing. She researched diamond smuggling and diamond treatments, high end boutique shops (painful, I'm sure), and helped work out the cons and gags that Kelsea uses. She worked out Kelsea's background and devised key points to the plot.

We are finally getting close to finishing the next Needles&Delaney story, "Unstoppable Man"; it keeps growing on us, but I think we are catching up. We're also close to finishing a Delaney/The Shack Story entitled "The Milk Run" that features the Camp Mayhem crew off the leash.

Finally, in all seriousness, It's been over four years since our first story, and the readers here have never failed to amaze us with their unbelievable energy and support. Thank you; we really mean that.

Glossary

I've put this in two parts. The first part is the section headings in the story, the second part is random clown and magician terms within the story.

The Come In The period an hour before showtime when the public is entering the arena before the circus begins. Clowns are in place on the arena floor and in the seats

Clown Alley The backstage for clowns. The clowns' dressing and prop area where they have some privacy.

The Walkaround A clown feature in which they stroll the hippodrome track performing very brief visual gags that can be easily picked up, moved and performed again for another section of the audience.

"Stars and Stripes Forever" Circus bands played this as a signal that an emergency has come up; it signals the clowns to come running out from the Alley to take action immediately.

Charivari A raucous acrobatic clown routine, typically done by a large group of clowns, consisting of a series of fast-paced acrobatic maneuvers and comedy jumps off of a mini trampoline, over a vaulting horse and into a mat

The Blow-Off The visual "punchline" of a clown gag or joke.

*****

Boss Clown The clown responsible for coordinating both the clowns and the various gags in a show.

Bunny Tugger A somewhat derogatory term used by some in the magician community for magicians who don't keep their act updated. Kelsea uses it wrong here, but, as she points out, she's a clown, not a magician.

GagA single self-contained comedy piece.

Gimmicked/Gaffed Something that has been secretly rigged to work in a way other than intended. Marked cards, unfair carnival games, etc.

Hey Rube! A rallying call, or a cry for help, used by clowns and carnies in a fight with outsiders. It is also sometimes used to refer to a fight.

Misdirection Often mistakenly referred to as distraction, which is exactly the opposite meaning. Misdirection is deliberately focusing the audience's attention on the wrong thing.

*****

Guinness Stew

Coming from a rural background, The Missus has a firm belief that every man should be able to use a rifle, swing an axe, run a chainsaw, and have a good stew recipe for cold and miserable days. This is the one I taught our sons.

This is an eight hour slow cooker version, because I never have spare time to stand over a pot for hours. All the measures are in whatever it is they call that system that we Americans use; if you use the metric system, you will have to convert it to millipedes and quadrupeds or whatever. Because we apparently only use the metric system to measure bullets.

2.5-3 pounds stew beef Any tough, cheap roast will do. Chop into 1 inch chunks. You can use mutton if you feel particularly Irish today. Easier to get beef here.

Six strips thick-cut Bacon Don't go cheap here, get some good stuff, but not too lean, you need the fat on it.

1 large Yellow Onion, maybe two if you feel that way Peeled and chopped into chunks. You can add a leek here if you want and are feeling fancy. Cleaned and chopped.

3 large Carrots Peeled and chopped into half inch pieces.

2 to 3 ParsnipsWhich I suspect are turnips pretending to be carrots, peeled and chunked the same way. If you can't find them, add a couple more carrots.

Three to five Potatoes Depending on size. Washed and chopped into one inch chunks. Don't bother peeling them.

Two Stalks Celery Chopped into quarter inch thick pieces.

Four Cloves Garlic Peeled, smashed, and chopped really small, because somehow 'minced' doesn't sound right with this stew.

1 bottle Guinness Extra Stout

Three cups Beef Broth

1 Tablespoon Tomato Paste

Salt, Pepper and Thyme

A bay leaf If you have one handy.

3 Tablespoons flour If you want to thicken the stew

Fry the bacon until crisp, crumble into slow cooker.

Salt and pepper the beef (or mutton), then brown it in the bacon grease. Brown thoroughly but don't burn the damn stuff. Put beef into slow cooker.

Put onion and garlic into bacon grease, cook just until it starts to soften and the smell really kicks out. Put into slow cooker.

Pour some beef broth into pan and scrape the browned bits left behind by the bacon and beef off the bottom, pour it all into the slow cooker.

Put the carrots, parsnips, leeks and potatoes into slow cooker.

Pour in beer. Then add the rest of the beef broth. Stir in tomato paste and thyme. Toss bay leaf on top. I'm not sure what that actually does, but add it anyway, if you have one.

Close slow cooker, turn on low.

All slow cookers are different, but plan on at least eight hours on low, or until the beef just starts to fall apart. If you want to use the flour, take some fair amount of juice out of the slow cooker, maybe a half cup or more, let it cool completely, whisk the flour into that, then slowly add the mixture back to slow cooker and stir in thoroughly when you think you have about three hours left. Do not add dry flour directly into the hot slow cooker.

Go make bread. If you don't know how, get one of those frozen lumps of bread dough and follow the directions on the package, it will work. You'll want hot fresh plain bread with this, nothing fancy.

Serve in big bowls with hot, sliced, buttered bread and a pint of your favorite. Ale seems to go best with it, but you do you.

Talk loud and rest your feet on the dog, who should be sleeping under the table. If you don't have a dog, look outside, there's probably one waiting by your door. Let him in. Occasionally sneak him a bit of beef when nobody is looking.

Laugh and talk shit, but keep it fun and don't take anything seriously.