I've been thinking a lot about sanity recently. I wonder if even the most
insane think they're perfectly normal? Oh well it probably doesn't matter.
What does matter is someone has gone missing and one of us might have done
it.
It's really scary when you think about it. That a killer or a kidnapper may be the guy you chat with every day. Sonja and I used to watch America's Most Wanted and have nightmares for hours because of the way people could slaughter another person with no more care than I might crush an insect. I mean sure there are people who get on my nerves--sometimes Coach Semenov annoys me when he asks me to redo a trick for the umpteenth time or the Duchess when she starts firing off her specifications for the lighting of her act-but I don't think I could be so callous as to kill them.
Sophomore year, Mr. Mischke had us read Lord of the Flies. That book gave me nightmares for weeks and still does. It's creepy they way Mr. Golding charts their downward spiral. It's even creepier when you think that us circus kids are living in almost the exact conditions necessary to recreate the book. We're cut off from people on the outside except performances and who knows maybe if it weren't for Mr. Henrie and all the other adults establishing a sense of conduct, we could degenerate into the savages in Mr. Golding's book.
In between practices, Sonja and I have been discussing our theories on who could have done it. We've kind of ruled out anyone younger than us--no way a fourteen-year-old girl could abduct someone twice her size-but we've reached a dead end.
We've also been talking about those strange people who've been hanging around. There's no way they're cops unless the academy's been accepting people at younger ages. Both Sonja and I have been wondering if they could be informants but if they are, they're sure incompetent ones. They've been coming right out and asking everybody.
Our parents have told us not to say a word and none of us have. A circus performer is good at being quiet. One of them asked Sun-Yi if she knew anything and she responded in Chinese, "The blue boat ate the big mouse." Most of us have been faking not knowing English, which isn't too hard because most of us speak at least two languages fluently.
I admit I do feel a little guilty about all this deception; if Sonja or Lian were missing, I'd hope that the people involved would be as helpful as possible. I asked my mom about this, but she couldn't give me much of an answer. She's been nervous and antsy ever since the police arrived. She's never been comfortable around the police. I think it's because she grew up in the Soviet Union. Though she escaped Stalin, she had relatives who weren't so lucky.
I have wondered if maybe my mother did it. She had been acting so nervous lately. Right now I'm classifying that theory under Possible but Not Likely. Why would she abduct a woman whom she'd never met and is bigger and stronger than she is? Plus where would she hide her: our trailer's the size of a shoebox and is already being shared by Me, Her, Oleg, and Sergey (two performers in our act.)?
It's really scary when you think about it. That a killer or a kidnapper may be the guy you chat with every day. Sonja and I used to watch America's Most Wanted and have nightmares for hours because of the way people could slaughter another person with no more care than I might crush an insect. I mean sure there are people who get on my nerves--sometimes Coach Semenov annoys me when he asks me to redo a trick for the umpteenth time or the Duchess when she starts firing off her specifications for the lighting of her act-but I don't think I could be so callous as to kill them.
Sophomore year, Mr. Mischke had us read Lord of the Flies. That book gave me nightmares for weeks and still does. It's creepy they way Mr. Golding charts their downward spiral. It's even creepier when you think that us circus kids are living in almost the exact conditions necessary to recreate the book. We're cut off from people on the outside except performances and who knows maybe if it weren't for Mr. Henrie and all the other adults establishing a sense of conduct, we could degenerate into the savages in Mr. Golding's book.
In between practices, Sonja and I have been discussing our theories on who could have done it. We've kind of ruled out anyone younger than us--no way a fourteen-year-old girl could abduct someone twice her size-but we've reached a dead end.
We've also been talking about those strange people who've been hanging around. There's no way they're cops unless the academy's been accepting people at younger ages. Both Sonja and I have been wondering if they could be informants but if they are, they're sure incompetent ones. They've been coming right out and asking everybody.
Our parents have told us not to say a word and none of us have. A circus performer is good at being quiet. One of them asked Sun-Yi if she knew anything and she responded in Chinese, "The blue boat ate the big mouse." Most of us have been faking not knowing English, which isn't too hard because most of us speak at least two languages fluently.
I admit I do feel a little guilty about all this deception; if Sonja or Lian were missing, I'd hope that the people involved would be as helpful as possible. I asked my mom about this, but she couldn't give me much of an answer. She's been nervous and antsy ever since the police arrived. She's never been comfortable around the police. I think it's because she grew up in the Soviet Union. Though she escaped Stalin, she had relatives who weren't so lucky.
I have wondered if maybe my mother did it. She had been acting so nervous lately. Right now I'm classifying that theory under Possible but Not Likely. Why would she abduct a woman whom she'd never met and is bigger and stronger than she is? Plus where would she hide her: our trailer's the size of a shoebox and is already being shared by Me, Her, Oleg, and Sergey (two performers in our act.)?