Home of the American Circus

Aubrey brings over her friend Shray, whom Freya finds highly likeable. Freya makes an Italian soup and recalls how her mother’s parents tried to act wholly American and only spoke Italian at home. The three of them make stars out of old wood scraps, and Freya finds the process of making art therapeutic. Shray reveals that he caught Carter trying to follow Aubrey into the girls’ bathroom, and Freya wonders what she can do to help Aubrey get away from this situation.

Aubrey insists that Carter isn’t harassing her, and Freya decides not to press. She hangs the three stars they made on the living room wall. Later, Aubrey explains that she didn’t want to have sex with Carter: “I didn’t tell him to stop because I was scared he wouldn’t and that would be worse” (215). Freya knows exactly what she means. They each tell the other they are sorry that happened to them.

Freya considers her mother’s watch and realizes what it meant for her mother to be a young professional woman in her time. She knew her mother was the driving force behind the success of Step’s insurance business, especially after she encouraged Step to work with Charlie. Freya takes out Vili’s woodworking tools and starts carving designs into her parents’ bedroom furniture. The act of creating makes her happy.

Every time she visits Hans’s office, Freya is worried that Charlie will spot her. While Freya is filing paperwork one afternoon, a woman with a baby comes by asking for Hans. She leaves the child with Freya. Hans returns to explain that the child is Emmeline, his daughter. Freya doesn’t think Step ever looked at Freya the way Hans looks at Emmeline.

Hans explains that, after his wife left him and his children grew up, he feared the rest of his life would be lonely, so he agreed to a co-parenting arrangement with Mira. Freya wonders if the truth is that no one has their lives all figured out, even those who appear to. Bee joins them at the bar and warns of the winter storm that is approaching.

Freya drives home and she and Aubrey prepare the house for the storm. They eat leftovers from the restaurant and watch movies, and when the power goes out, Freya makes a fire in the fireplace. She is concerned about keeping Aubrey safe. They get a scare when Jam knocks on the back door, coming to see if they’re okay. The three of them fall asleep in front of the fire.

Jam decides to leave before Bee arrives the next morning. Freya guesses he still remembers how Bee dated a boy who bullied Jam as a child. Jam says he should just get over it, but Freya asks, “What if we get over all that old shit and then we just deflate?” (238). Bee brings breakfast, and as Freya feeds Lenny, Bee guesses that Aubrey took the rat from school.

After the lights come back on, Bee helps Freya tour the house and yard. They find a leak in the ceiling of her parents’ bedroom. Bee helps Freya go through her parents’ things. Freya keeps her mother’s gold watch. They find old pictures, and Freya is taken aback by a picture of her mother as a girl. She thinks, “That beautiful, happy child is a shock to my system because I assumed she’d always been sad and angry” (243).

Freya remembers a night when Step forgot to pick her up from Steena’s, and Charlie, who’d been drinking, drove Freya home. He kissed her again, and Freya started to cry. Her mother saw what happened, but instead of coming to Freya’s defense, she blamed Freya. Freya remembers wishing, “I had the kind of mom who would chase down Charlie and tell him not to lay a hand on me ever again” (246). Freya started working at The Aster, got her own car, and could visit Aubrey whenever she wanted. She told herself nothing had ever gone wrong.

Eddie helps Freya find and patch the leak in the roof. He reveals that he married Lexi Doyle, a girl in their grade, but is getting a divorce. Freya reflects, “the fact that Eddie tried means he had an idea of what he wanted and reached for it, which is so much more than I can say for myself” (250). After Eddie leaves, Freya sees a deer trapped in the deer fence, trying to jump back over. She guides the deer out of the yard.

Freya walks to Jam’s house and finds him playing piano while water covers the basement floors. He tells Freya he’s ruined, and she thinks, “I’m afraid he might be” (254). He says there’s a crack in the soundboard of the piano. Freya helps him remove the water but is frustrated by Jam’s seeming apathy. She gives him a bath, and he apologizes, saying, “I don’t know how to be me in the world” (256). The next morning, he plays a tune he composed, and the melody makes Freya think of stars.

Aubrey pulls Step’s backpacking gear out of the basement to dry it. Step had plans to hike the Appalachian Trail, which Freya never knew about. Freya is profoundly surprised that her timid father would have planned and prepared for such an undertaking. Aubrey says she thought about hiking the trail before Freya returned. Aubrey likes to read Step’s notebook, where he kept plans and records.

Shorty helps move Jam’s piano to Freya’s house. Jam begins to tune the piano, and Freya is glad to see he is still attached to it: “It makes me feel like Jam is still existing in the world, trying to connect” (264). Freya finds her rowboat and rows out onto the lake, enjoying the experience. That night, as she, Aubrey, and Jam eat dinner while Jam plays, Freya looks at their reflection in the window and thinks, “we look so happy” (265).

An excerpt on Old Bet at the end of the chapter reflects on the conflicting stories about her death.