Freaks {AMERICAN HORROR STORY}

Chapter 6

"Joy has a new act." Jimmy said to Elsa for me.

"She does? What is it liebchen?" She asked from her seat.

"It's hard to explain, but I can read souls." I replied. Elsa gave me a look as she puffed on her cigarette.

"Read souls?"

"Can I read yours?" I asked, "The only problem is it, it's very personal." I looked back at Jimmy.

"Jimmy, leave us please." Elsa said, "Ethel was looking for you earlier."

Jimmy nodded and listened to Elsa without any protest. I sat down across from Elsa in her tent.

"I need your hands." I said as I reached out mine. She looked at me with some hesitation, but she eventually set her hands in mine.

I closed my eyes and let myself feel everything. She was definitely complicated and harder to read, but I said the emotions as I felt them.

"You have room for lots of love in your heart. All love for everyone you have saved. But,"

I stopped for a moment and let myself try to decode it more. "There is nothing you love more than the spotlight. You dream of being famous so much that it hurts. You are scared. Scared of what, I can't quite tell. Maybe scared of it being too late or scared of death or scared of the unknown future. Maybe scared of all of it. But nothing scares you more than not being remembered."

"You miss someone. They aren't dead, but they aren't here. A sibling?" I paused for a moment. She was harder to read than Jimmy, "No... it was someone you loved. A lost love."

I let go of her hands. I know I felt something else. A big shame or guilt maybe. I couldn't really tell what though. It was something she pushed down.

"Was I close?" I asked.

"Why did you not tell us this, gift, you had before?" I could see that she looked a little glassy eyed, but she wasn't letting it come through.

"It takes a lot out of me. I didn't want to do it originally." I admitted. I still could feel all that she was feeling. The most prominent of which was her desire, a desire so desperate, to become a star.

"You should not hide your talents." Elsa remarked,"We will make a place for you where you can read people's souls for money."

I nodded. I knew that was going to be a lot for me, but what else was I going to do?

It was later in the afternoon. They had already managed to make me a sign outside my tent. It had that dumb title for me, "Magnificent medium" and it said that I would read your past. That wasn't necessarily true, but I guess it made more sense to people than read your soul.

I didn't want to read people's souls. Every time I did, I felt everything they felt. Mostly it was all the pain. Pain was easier to feel. It overwrote happiness in most cases, and I didn't want to have to feel a bunch of stranger's pain. I only wanted to have to deal with one pain, my own, and all I was feeling was a desperate need to get my brother back.