In sales, It’s as if it has been etched into the granite of commerce itself the long held expression is that the customer is always right--but let’s be perfectly blunt about it: whoever said that never had to sell anything.

My name is Carmen, and though you may not know my name, you most certainly have played my game. If you have ever attended a circus, then you’ve been lured by my form. If you have ever flipped a coin, then you’ve rolled my dice. If you've ever placed your trust in the cranium of a gripping claw for a teddy bear, then you’ve done so at my pleasure—I am the one who sold it that you could actually sway the fate of the universe with a single throw—had you say my name or sing it as I held your eager hand and lured you in with the offer of a ritzy reward—fueled, of course, by your desire to try again. And I did it all with a smile. 

But, dear reader, I’m not as confident in my own capabilities as you may think - my career has been a parade of missteps, a series of blunders, flops and failures.

So buckle on up, It’s going to be a long ride. And your sole witness to it all will be me.

The story I’m about to tell is a confession. Sins were committed, lives were destroyed and illusions were fostered. I admit it - I guess I got carried away in the pursuit of a better life and the seduction of money and fame. And I suppose in the process, I betrayed my sisters and brothers until there were nothing left of them but ash. But still, while some people say I am to blame, and you may not agree with all of my choices, I invite you live vicariously through my sins.

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Probably my biggest sin was to believe that I had escaped my past. 

There was a time, long before the grand spectacle of the big top, when I lived a life of captivity - confined to a small, cramped shed. 

It was aged and weathered, tucked away against the far corner of 'The Bodach’s' property, and it was a remarkably humble and an unassuming shed. It's walls, wooden slats bent and twisted by age - it was as if the night itself had taken refuge inside there.

Through a number of different slits and rifts in the shed's walls, Carmen watched and listened as 'The Bodach' greeted a group of   villagers gathered at the edge of his property, keeping a watchful eye on the Bodach's activities.  "Good evening, neighbors," The Bodach 

"I heard he talks to those birds of his like they're his children," one of them said, an old woman known as Old Mrs. McAllister, who had a face like a dried apple, and a voice like a rake being dragged through gravel. 

"Hpf. I don't trust him, in the least." Miss Peggy, a younger standing next to Mrs. McAllister, but seemed to contain a dread of her own. "You know what I think? That cunning scoundrel is out there, quietly pinching the socks off my clothesline. Can you believe the nerve?"

MacGregor, a short, plump man, tugging on his white-whiskers, reshuffling and restacking them on his head as he spoke up "Mark my words if he isn't, then he's getting ready to go.

Walter, the youngest villager stared unimpressed out at the pieces and parts of the Bodach's world, "Prebyterianism is what he is." His narrow eyes rolling in mock annoyance interjected, narrow eyed and cross armed just as dissatisfied. He stirred and shifted like a fish as he spoke. "In any case, I believe him to be a spineless tyrant."