The midway was lit by forty-watt bulbs dipped in honey. Every booth offered a room that belonged to someone else: someone who was expected for dinner, someone whose laugh was considered charming rather than disruptive, someone who did not have to apologize for taking up a chair.
Nocturnal pavilions where visitors try on other people's lives for an evening.
Faint calliope music in minor key, smell of wet cedar and sugar, shadows moving behind canvas.
Motifs
▯The Borrowed Doors
✦The Red Paper Crane
🗝The Heavy Keys
Figures
The Tailor
Notes
- The carnival ticket admits you to every room except your own.
- The mirrors are slightly convex.