“I do not like sitting idly by when something clearly isn't right. I feel... not trapped but something like it, and I don't know what to about.”

“Is it not that bad to be trapped somewhere, then? Depending on where you're trapped?""I suppose it depends on how much you like the place you're trapped in," Widget says."And how much you like whoever you're stuck there with," Poppet adds, kicking his black boot with her white one.”

“They are enthusiasts, devotees. Addicts. Something about the circus stirs their souls, and they ache for it when it is absent. They seek each other out, these people of such specific like mind. They tell of how they found the circus, how those first few steps were like magic. Like stepping into a fairy tale under a curtain of stars… When they depart, they shake hands and embrace like old friends, even if they have only just met, and as they go their separate ways they feel less alone than they had before.”

“I know, I'm sorry, "Bailey says. "What does exsanguinated mean?" The girl smiles. "It means draining all your blood," she says. "But they don't actually do that, I don't think.”

“And yet I cannot be myself. You teach me all these things and then you put me here to pretend to be something I am not, while she is center stage, doing exactly what she does.”

“Something about the circus stirs their souls, and they ache for it when it is absent.”

“But I'm not special", Bailey says, "not the way they are. I'm not anyone important." "I know", Celia said, "you are not destined or chosen. I wish I could tell you that you were if that would make it easier, but it is not true. You are in the right place, at the right time, and you care enough to do what needs to be done. Sometimes that is enough.”