05-08-2025, 12:14 AM
Sámiel wandered.
Not with purpose, nor with haste, but like smoke curling from a dying ember drawn by the night’s quiet breath.
The Carnival was half-asleep and shivering beneath its winter coat. Might as well have been muttering to itself. Ropes creaked on weather-beaten tents. Painted signs cracked with frost. The midway lights buzzed and flickered like fireflies caught in jars too small for flight. The scent of scorched sugar and burnt oil hung on the air, undercut by the tang of melting snow and the smell of rust.
Somewhere a violin screeched in minor thirds, drunk on its own sorrow.
Sámiel moved unseen, though not unacknowledged. A few carnies gave him nods, wary or amused. He was not strange here, merely known. Like a cracked mirror hung in a hallway: no one questioned why it stayed, only what it might reflect. The fracture of reality.
He paused near a heater bolted down beside a popcorn stand, its heat straining but alive, the flames inside dancing like spirits behind bars.
“Cold night for ghosts,” he murmured.
From his coat he withdrew a thin joint wrapped in waxed brown paper. He cupped his hands, shielding the lighter’s tiny flame from the jealous wind, and lit up. The first inhale filled his lungs with the slow, creeping warmth that no fire could mimic. The second wrapped his mind in gauze, softening edges, quieting the world.
Beyond the bleachers, across the half-frozen mud, sat the Voz family trailers. Their windows glowed with false cheer, too bright, too brittle. Sámiel watched them from the dark like a fox regarding a henhouse. Not hungry, but curious.
Roza and Esper had vanished. He chuckled to himself.
Why?
He turned the thought over, rubbed it between mental fingers like a coin worn smooth. They had always flirted with the idea of escape, like most did. But few did it. Fewer still made it out alive. The Carnival had gravity. It pulled you in, made you part of its myth. The only way to leave clean was to vanish entirely. No footprints, no echo. Of course, there was always death.
He pulled deeper on the joint. Smoke spiraled from his lips, lazy and listless.
No. He wouldn’t leave. Not really.
He never stayed anywhere long, but never really left either. He was driftwood, carried by black tides, bumping up against piers and strangers' shoes but never moored. It was like the flicker of memory stirring faint and untethered. The idea of a home. Not a place, not even a face. Just the warmth of purpose. The shape of belonging without the name.
A memory of a memory. And probably not even real.
He exhaled sharply through his nose. The Brotherhood came to mind. The tricks. The blood-slick performances. The ritual laughs and ritual absurdities. It had amused him then, the pageantry of it all. But the thrill was gone now. It felt... irrelevant.
Maybe everything did.
A dog barked in the distance sharp and sudden. Sámiel’s eyes flicked toward the sound. Just a mutt chasing shadows. He rolled the joint between his fingers and let the silence settle again. Behind him, laughter erupted from the firepit near the Ferris wheel. Red-faced men and women roasted sausages.
He stayed in the shadows. Alone felt better. Smoke on a winter night, he thought, that’s all I am.
The last of the joint crackled to ash between his fingers.
He looked up at the sky. No stars. Just a low gray ceiling, like the heavens had hung a shroud over the world and decided not to look down tonight.
Fine by him.
Not with purpose, nor with haste, but like smoke curling from a dying ember drawn by the night’s quiet breath.
The Carnival was half-asleep and shivering beneath its winter coat. Might as well have been muttering to itself. Ropes creaked on weather-beaten tents. Painted signs cracked with frost. The midway lights buzzed and flickered like fireflies caught in jars too small for flight. The scent of scorched sugar and burnt oil hung on the air, undercut by the tang of melting snow and the smell of rust.
Somewhere a violin screeched in minor thirds, drunk on its own sorrow.
Sámiel moved unseen, though not unacknowledged. A few carnies gave him nods, wary or amused. He was not strange here, merely known. Like a cracked mirror hung in a hallway: no one questioned why it stayed, only what it might reflect. The fracture of reality.
He paused near a heater bolted down beside a popcorn stand, its heat straining but alive, the flames inside dancing like spirits behind bars.
“Cold night for ghosts,” he murmured.
From his coat he withdrew a thin joint wrapped in waxed brown paper. He cupped his hands, shielding the lighter’s tiny flame from the jealous wind, and lit up. The first inhale filled his lungs with the slow, creeping warmth that no fire could mimic. The second wrapped his mind in gauze, softening edges, quieting the world.
Beyond the bleachers, across the half-frozen mud, sat the Voz family trailers. Their windows glowed with false cheer, too bright, too brittle. Sámiel watched them from the dark like a fox regarding a henhouse. Not hungry, but curious.
Roza and Esper had vanished. He chuckled to himself.
Why?
He turned the thought over, rubbed it between mental fingers like a coin worn smooth. They had always flirted with the idea of escape, like most did. But few did it. Fewer still made it out alive. The Carnival had gravity. It pulled you in, made you part of its myth. The only way to leave clean was to vanish entirely. No footprints, no echo. Of course, there was always death.
He pulled deeper on the joint. Smoke spiraled from his lips, lazy and listless.
No. He wouldn’t leave. Not really.
He never stayed anywhere long, but never really left either. He was driftwood, carried by black tides, bumping up against piers and strangers' shoes but never moored. It was like the flicker of memory stirring faint and untethered. The idea of a home. Not a place, not even a face. Just the warmth of purpose. The shape of belonging without the name.
A memory of a memory. And probably not even real.
He exhaled sharply through his nose. The Brotherhood came to mind. The tricks. The blood-slick performances. The ritual laughs and ritual absurdities. It had amused him then, the pageantry of it all. But the thrill was gone now. It felt... irrelevant.
Maybe everything did.
A dog barked in the distance sharp and sudden. Sámiel’s eyes flicked toward the sound. Just a mutt chasing shadows. He rolled the joint between his fingers and let the silence settle again. Behind him, laughter erupted from the firepit near the Ferris wheel. Red-faced men and women roasted sausages.
He stayed in the shadows. Alone felt better. Smoke on a winter night, he thought, that’s all I am.
The last of the joint crackled to ash between his fingers.
He looked up at the sky. No stars. Just a low gray ceiling, like the heavens had hung a shroud over the world and decided not to look down tonight.
Fine by him.