Monster (part one)

None of us cared about the cook offs with the free samples, or the pretty red-headed woman sitting at the kissing booth; nor were we intrigued by the domesticated foreign animals that stood solemnly behind the bars of their cages, or the never ending smell of popcorn and hot dogs.

Near the rear of the fair grounds stood the black tent, the tent that drew our attention, the tent that sparked our youthful curiosity into a raging inferno. Next to the tent sat a small sign composed of an old battered sheet of plywood nailed to a wooden stake that protruded from the ground. Written apon it were the words: "Doctor Winston's House of Freaks and Rare Oddities".

The freak show was normally ignored by the greater half of the state fair's audience, most of them being to old to still be withholding an ounce of youthful imagination. "Grown-ups" weren't entertained by the freak show, they sought their entertainment at the animal cages and the concession stands.

Eight feet away from the tent's entrance was where we stood, trying to garner up enough strength and courage to venture inside. My friends and I had visited the freak show on plenty of occassions, but each new year Dr. Winston brought forth a new "freak" that promised to be more terrifying than the previous collection.

So far Dr. Winston's promise was kept. Last year it was the Wolf-Man from the frozen steppes of Siberia, part wolf and part man. The year before that was the Cyclops Monster from the wilderness of Greece, and prior to that the main freak of attraction was the Mermaid Queen supposedly from the lost continent of Atlantis.

Four of us stood there, in our minds we were the Earp Brothers and Doc Holiday about to head into the O.K Corral to face off with the McLowery and Clantons. The four of us had been friends for all of our lives, the type of friendship we had was one that was forged through the bond of a group of kids who had lived together on the same block.

All of our families knew each other, our father's played poker together and watched the World Series together. Our mother's knitted quilts and blankets together, shared recipes, and hosted bible study groups. Our older brothers and sisters dated each other and attended the same high school.

Issac Bernstein was the youngest of us all at 9 years old. Atop his oval shaped head was a "crop" of sandy brown hair that was always long, tangled, and uncut. He was quiet around others, but around us was annoyingly loud and talkative. For some reason he didn't celebrate Christmas like the rest of us, and he didn't eat pork chops either. We all thought that was weird, but we didn't hold it against him for we all could count on Issac to get us free candy and chocolate from his father's job at Silverman and Heinz Chocolate Factory located on the northern end of town.

Then there was the only female in our little group, April Brewster.

In the words of my father, "she was the classic essence of Americana, she reminded him of a Norman Rockwell painting." Long fiery red hair that was always in the two ponytails, unlike most little girls we knew she she wore denim overalls as opposed to dresses. My mom called her a tomboy. None of that mattered to us, she was the toughest; whenever Jimmy Newsome and his little brother Fredrick would try to steal our baseballs or plastic green army men, she would be there to enforce justice in the form of two mean and hard hitting jabs.