Saturday 15 March 2014

Penny Does a Runner: Part XI

It was in something of a daze that Penny was led back to the circus tent. Before she knew quite what was happening she stood backstage amongst half a dozen young women dressed in blue leotards just like hers.

“Ah, you must be the stand-in for Josephine!” a brunette girl said to her. “What luck – I had thought we would be one down this evening.”

“Thirty seconds!” a man said.

“B-but... I’m not...” Penny said to nobody in particular, turning on the spot in bewilderment as the girls chatted and fussed distractedly. “I shouldn’t really be...”

Just then the vast red curtains behind her parted and the noise from the ring beyond came flooding in like a cacophony: the roar of the crowd; the deafening music; the amplified baritone of the ringmaster.

“They will dazzle and amaze you!” he cried. “Thrill and astound you! The most fearless females this side of the Amazon, each and every one of them ready to risk DEATH as they fly through the air!”

Penny’s stomach did a death-defying somersault as she was taken by the hands and led by a pair of skipping girls through the curtains and into the ring.

If her senses weren’t quite overwhelmed already, they were when a pair of blinding spotlights were turned onto her and the rest of the acrobat troupe. Blinking in the glare, Penny wondered – not for the first time that day – quite how she had got herself into such a spot.

As her sight returned she realised that the view from the sawdust-covered floor of the ring was quite different to the one she had enjoyed not half an hour earlier from the safety of the stands: all around her was colour and motion, jugglers tossing clubs with dizzying speed and skill; exotically tattooed fire-breathers sending bursts of flame skyward; the ringmaster under a spotlight of his own, resplendent and fantastical. And, all around, up to the roof of the tent itself it seemed, hundreds upon hundreds of faces keenly trained on the acrobats about to perform.

Two girls set off on gymnastic floor routines, extravagantly toppling and somersaulting around the ring, while two more began their ascent to the pair of tiny trapeze platforms high above. Penny watched with as much wonder as any child in the towering circus tent as the pair climbed the narrow ladders with disarming insouciance. In no time at all they had reached the top of them and, without so much as a pause, took hold of a trapeze and leapt.



The audience oohed and ahhed as the girls swung and flew and flipped with breathtaking grace, and gasped in unison when they swapped trapezes mid-air. Far below, unnoticed by all, young Penny Hasler gasped for quite a different reason, as she was shepherded to the foot of a ladder.

17 comments:

  1. Penny had some gymnastics classes as a tot, I hope?! <3

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    1. She can do handstands, and the occasional cartwheel (after a fashion)... no trapeze, though. :(

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  2. Great writing, Penelope. I'm on the edge of my seat. You've really captured the moment beautifully.

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    1. So glad you like it, TFD! :) It won't be six months til the next bit, I promise.

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  3. Oh dear...I don't see a net beneath her...

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    1. Nope! No net... poor Penny might go splat!

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  4. Wonderfully atmospheric, P.

    And the whole thing has the surreal feel of one of those anxiety dreams - you know, where you suddenly find yourself on stage with The Rolling Stones in front of 100,000 people, having to stand in for Keith Richards without knowing which way up to hold your guitar. In your underwear. Or maybe it's only me who has those.

    Still, at least you have your gymnastic practice to back you up. Speaking of which, you know when you're using the climbing ropes - do you ever get that funny tingly feeling between your legs?

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    1. Thanks, U! :D

      The anxiety dream I have is always the same: I'm back at uni and I have an important essay due, and there's no time to do it. Such a feeling of relief when I wake up and remember I graduated ages ago :)

      I must confess I haven't climbed a rope in years... the last time would have been when I was seven or eight. I don't recall feeling anything nice and tingly (though I understand why climbing a rope might give one such a feeling); the feeling was more one of terror as it seemed awfully high and the floor far below awfully hard.

      Hm. Maybe this story is some kind of catharsis!

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  5. fingers crossed for Penny :)

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    1. Thanks, Katherine - she needs all the help she can get :)

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  6. Yikes!! I think Penny needs to rush to her teacher in the front row, confess all, and beg for the spanking machine (set on full!!)

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    1. All things considered, that might be a preferable option! Poor, silly Penny :D

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  7. I like your writing my dear . Very well done . Yes Little penny is in dire need aof a good sound spanking ..

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  8. I would like to see Penny triumph on the trapeze then, as she ascends in triumph, her leotard catches on an inconvenient hook and tears, leaving our heroine with tits out, or bum cheeks exposed to the audience.
    A combination of feelings - mortified at the accident, exultant at her performance, exhilarated to avoid injury, feeling horny being publicly exposed - overcome her as the other performances rush her off stage, still in the spotlight.
    five minutes later in the dressing room she is just composing when enters the circus master, and the headmistress. They exchange knowing looks as they advance on Penny.

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  9. Penny a nice story she is a naughty girl doing dangerous acts not knowing skills like the other girls,big spanks needed ,best,Tim.

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