The sign read ‘The Show of Evil’. It had been on every lamp post as Jeff walked home from school, and now there was one on the post outside his house.

It felt like someone was leaving him a message, leading him to the circus that had arrived overnight on the old sports field.

It was the talk of the school yard this morning. Nothing ever came to Rollin Plains, a backwater bush town, covered in swirling dust, and a dwindling population. Yet the circus was here to greet all the kids on the way to school.

Wallpaper Access

There were wagons covered in colourful pictures, lions, elephants, horses. 

Jeff thought he could hear a lion huffing from the road, his imagination already on fire. He couldn’t wait to tell Birdy, about the big tent that was being put up.

Birdy was his best friend—at nine, best friends were your school buddies, and in a school of only 60 kids, there wasn’t to many 9-year olds to choose from. 

Still Birdy was pretty good as buddies went, they’d known each other for a few years now, since Jeff and his Mum moved to Rollin Plains.

Of course, his Dad was with them then. They’d all moved here for a job in the sugar mills, but the mill closed down after the first year—his Dad moved on, and they stayed.

Jeff’s Mum worked in the local bakery, and he sometimes wished she worked somewhere else, there wasn’t much news that didn’t filter through the bakery, especially when it was about him and Birdy.

 

Dreamtime.com

 

Jeff pulled the flyer off the post and walked up the weed covered path to his front door, he pulled the key from under the flower pot and went inside to the kitchen, poured himself some juice, sat down and started spinning the flyer on the table as he thought of ways, he could talk his mother into letting him go to the Show of Evil.

Jeff blinked for a moment the spinning flyer felt like it was calling him, as the paper spun the picture of the magician looked straight at him. 

He knew that wasn’t possible, but there it was right in front of him.

He slammed his hand flat down on the flyer and stopped the spinning, the magicians face was still there but that falling feeling had stopped. 

This was something he needed to tell Birdy about.

Sutterstock

Jeff had a feeling of impending danger as he peddled over to Birdy’s place. Some how he needed to get into the Show of Evil, even
though he didn’t understand why.

The old man dressed all in black turns at the sound of the garden gate, and watched as Jeff peddled off down the street.

This is an example of a story that could be made into something bigger, with greater character development, and plot.

What do you think?