Home of the American Circus

Freya reflects that she wanted to believe that, if she told Step what Charlie had done, Step would stand up for her, but she knows deep down that he wouldn’t have. The night of the laundry room assault, Steena called their mother. Charlie was claiming that Freya had “thrown herself” at him. When Freya arrived home, Step gave her a notebook and insisted she write an apology. Step said it was Freya’s fault for getting drunk and Charlie couldn’t be blamed for acting like a man. Freya considered using Step’s safety razor to cut herself, but she thought of the things she loved and realized she wanted to go to Maine. She wrote a letter saying she was not coming back and wrote, “Tell Aubrey I love her more than anyone I’ve ever met” (378).

Lenny Juice dies, and it proves an emotional moment for Freya and Aubrey. They perform a funeral, and Jam plays songs. Freya wonders how she’s going to leave Jam.

Freya and Jam discuss how Somers is named “The Cradle of the American Circus” (381) and Freya asks if Bet the elephant could have been happy. Jam takes her hand, and Freya thinks, “I am keenly aware that anything good is fragile and fleeting” (382). They have sex on the piano bench, and Freya suggests Jam could come with them and have his own hike.

Bee, Shray, and Jam come to the house to celebrate New Year’s Eve. Jam shows Freya that the support beams in the basement are soft with moisture. Freya asks him not to tell Aubrey.

A segment at the end of the chapter discusses how elephants are herd animals and how Bet was isolated from her kind. The report concludes, “In writing this paper, I’ve come to understand that society prefers to choose historical narratives based on what we want to believe and how we want to see ourselves” (385).

Freya looks through Step’s notebook as they prepare for their hike. He writes about birds and plants he wants to see. Freya reads a mention of Halley’s Comet and realizes she was nine when Step was writing about leaving her. Inside the cover are lists of trees, flowers, and birds. Freya thinks that if Step had left, “our family would have looked like a problem to the outside world. Maybe someone would have helped me” (391).

Freya visits Bee and reveals that her father was planning to leave her. She tries to consider how Step felt, but Bee reminds Freya that her parents were supposed to take care of her, not the other way around. As she drives away, Freya notices the names of the streets around Bee’s development match up with Step’s nature checklist. She returns to Bee’s and finds that the developer—Charlie’s company—used the banned drywall in building Bee’s house.

Freya recalls that, when she went to discuss her college paper on Old Bet with her history professor, he berated her for not basing her report on facts. Freya asked why a man should be more important than an elephant, and her teacher accused her of making “feminist performance art” (395). Freya dropped out of college and moved back home. She realized later that if she’d waited tables instead of going to college, she could have saved enough money to move out.

Freya goes to Steena and Charlie’s house with the papers giving her guardianship over Aubrey. She tells herself if she could feel anything right now, “I’d be crushed by the sadness of this moment, by how bad things have to be for it to come to this” (398). She wishes she could have had someone to do this for her.

She tells Steena if she doesn’t sign, Freya will reveal that Charlie used banned materials in the houses he built. Freya reflects, “I spent my childhood thinking if I tried harder, I could figure out how to be someone Steena could love, but it was always a lost cause” (399). Charlie, who appears to be heavily drinking, signs the papers also. Freya buys her and Aubrey cupcakes to celebrate. Aubrey describes the things she wants to see on the trail.

Jam comes to the house in the middle of the night before Aubrey is scheduled to take the GED. Freya can tell he’s high. Later Jam calls and says he’s under the elephant. He wanted to get her for Freya. He tells Freya that one night, he overdosed, and Eddie gave him a shot that saved his life. Jam reflects that he took up playing piano to please his mother, but then she died by suicide by driving into the reservoir. Freya understands his pain and also why he deals with it this way. She thinks that everyone she knows has been broken somehow.

Freya stores some of her things at Bee’s and says goodbye to Hans, whom Bee is dating. Bee asks Freya what she wants for her life, and for the first time, Freya imagines having a shop in Maine where she sells books and art. She imagines furnishing a bedroom where Aubrey can stay, and she thinks, “No one will yell in our home. No doors will slam” (411).

Freya has a picnic at the bridge with Eddie. He suggests he might come visit her up north, and she imagines him in her house and in her future.

Freya and Aubrey hold a sale, and Freya says goodbye to many of her friends. Gus says he will hold onto Vili’s woodworking tools for her. She hugs Bee, who will come visit them at the top of Mount Katahdin, the end of the trail. Freya takes Step’s bolt cutters and cuts away a section of the deer fence so the deer won’t be trapped.

Jam makes them breakfast the morning they leave. Freya tells him one more time he could come with them. She sits at the piano while he plays music and, when he asks, tells Jam what his mother had hanging from the rearview mirror of her car.

Jam will look after the house, which Freya hopes will sell. Jam sends her a tape of music labeled Seiđr, which is a term from Norse mythology that describes the goddess Freya’s magic. As she looks at the house, Freya thinks, “I’m glad I had the chance to repair what I could” (419).

Monson, Maine. September 2008. Freya and Aubrey visit the post office to collect their resupply package. Included is a newspaper clipping describing how Freya’s house burned down in a fire. Jam took in the cat, Coriolanus. Freya feels only relief and thinks how much stronger Aubrey looks. In six days they will reach the end of the trail, and after that, Freya thinks, “We can go anywhere” (422).