The last show of the week was also the first done with my hurting ankle. I couldn't say that I was happy with what I came up with as a last minute special performance that didn't put so much stress on my feet. But it turned out alright with me just riding on May's back while she made some stunts. Her stealing popcorn from people's hands with her trunk made kids laugh. And that's all that matters.
When kids are happy, their parents are happy and its parents who have the wallet. Smiling kids open the purses of adults and some even handed a dollar to me for their kids to pet May. It tugged on my heart that all the people touched her because I know that she's had a difficult time with humans. She was my baby. I've tamed her with all the love I've given and now she is the gentle giant that everyone loves. I just kept praying that she stayed calm during the few minutes of the performance. She would never ever have to give herself away for money again as soon as I could stand on my own two feet again and not rely on hers.

After I locked her in her wagon for the night with some extra peanuts as compensation, I could finally breath again. Nothing bad had happened. I didn't fall again. I didn't get hurt. Everything was fine. That's how I limped back to the fairground. Relieved and tired and in need of some sweets. The crowd just poured out of the biggest tent where the circus show had taken place and now started to fill the space between all the smaller tents. Night has fallen but the air was still stifling and all the people didn't help clear up the atmosphere. I found myself in front of the small tent with eerie black and red stripes where usually the psychic scams people into giving him money. No. It was the tent where I had hoped to see Paddy. But it was closed and empty. It had been empty since yesterday when he disappeared in the middle of the show. I wished for him to be here and then I left to get sweets and I didn't wish for him any more. I didn't wish that I could apologize for being childish and I didn't wish that he could have been here when I got hurt either. I didn't even wish that he was here so I didn't feel so alone with Danny gone too. I would never wish for such things since I was still angry. I was always angry at something. Patrick just seems to be the easiest choice for me to be angry at, to protect myself.

I waited at the counter of Harald's booth until he recognized me.

"The usual?", he greeted me, squeezing his eyes so he could see me better.

"Yes sir." Was my answer. We played this game since I've been old enough to stand at his counter and ask for a cherry popsicle with the same two words. Harald has been old since I can remember. He doesn't get older, he just keeps living and sweetening up everyone's day.

"Do you know where he is?" A deep drunk voice spoke too loudly all while standing right next to me.

I turned even though I didn't have to because I could always make out Patrick's father from a mile away by the smell of alcohol that gave me nightmares as a kid. "Who?", I asked him.

"Patrick of course!" He slurred.

"How would I know." I said and turned back to Harald who gave me a handful of my favourite sweets. Patrick's father didn't like when I got cheeky with him but I also couldn't possibly make myself stop annoying him. That's the least he deserved as well as all I could do.

"I know you. He's all mad about you. And everyone knows you put out for him. Don't lie to me! Where is he?" He spits, with every word getting more erratic and agitated.

"He didn't tell me and I don't give a shit. Fuck you." I stayed dangerously calm even though my voice was shaking. Even whispering so the people wouldn't realize there was a fight going on. Everyone knows, he had said. I couldn't even wonder who spread that lie before I flinched as he lifted his hand against me.

"You be drunk somewhere else." Harald finally intervened. "And stop sticking your nose in the kids' business."

"And who cares for my business? Fucking Patrick left in the middle of business hours and looses my money. What use is a son that doesn't want to earn money!" He screamed at us and then at the rest of the audience that cared to listen to him. When he left people kept their distance until the crowd swallowed him whole. His problems always resolved around money and not having any. Even at his worst right before Paddy disappeared for the first time, everything was about green paper. Not his son or even his own liver. Never about his son at all.

"Don't worry about him. He's all words and no taking action.", Harald explained in his old man's manner and handed me some extra sweets as if I was still ten.

"I know. But he's obnoxious. I don't know why he's still part of us and not kicked out yet.", I muttered while leaning on the counter with my elbow, shielding my face from him.

"Well, we all wouldn't want Patrick to leave because of his father's mistakes, right?" Harald smiled to himself while preparing some other customer's sweets in a neat paper bag. "And the carny folks are lazy. Once they accepted someone they don't just loose them. Where would he go? We are his family."

"I'm not sure he wants family.", I said, still bitter.

"Everyone wants family. Some just don't admit it. - Also no one wants to have their future read by lovely Mariah. She told me I will die three times now and I'm still here." He always ended conversations with a joke when he grew tired of talking. Being the positive, lovely old man that he was, it was probably terribly exhausting to talk about less positive matters. It must be nice to be happy with everything that life presented you.

"You're right.", I gave in and thanked him again for the sweets before I left.

This night I lay in bed way too long. My parents had a silent fight and then went to bed while I still tossed and turned sleeplessly. At least it gave me a sense of normality to hear them disagree. The only thing I missed in our trailer was Danny's snoring. And what I really missed was knowing Patrick was sleeping just a few trailers next to me. When I finally fell asleep I dreamt weird things about a piano in a house with brick walls and a garden. A house that didn't move and that had big wooden doors. It was always at the same place in the same town with the same people and the same bakery around the corner. And a bedroom with a giant bed that was just for me and... Well it was a good dream.