â I am always dreaming, even when I am awake. â
     â then they canât be very good dreams.âÂ
her nightdress is too long for her, drags upon the ground & dusts floors with its hem, tangles in her feet as skinny little legs clamber up, kneel at foot of bed. eyes wide as two small moons gaze at brother, luminous. (when she speaks she speaks in just a whisper, cannot wake mary-lou, nor chastity, canât wake anyone at all, sheâs begun to think sheâll ALWAYS have to whisper).Â
          - - - not very good dreams at all, if they all look like this, like chapel and new salem pamphlets, like mary lou and kids with soup bowls, like dreary rooms, and sheâll only say things like this with CREDENCE, where sheâs SAFE, where the truth doesnât hit like a belt-snap.Â
             âitâs alright, you didnât wake me. i couldnât sleep. i think thereâs a BAT in the attic, again. i could hear it flapping.â and so sheâd wandered, tiptoed, heard him say something, thought he must be dreaming, came to find him here. âso you didnât wake anyone else, either.âÂ
itâs so LONELY here, all day, even with the other children, sometimes thereâs only HER and sometimes - - well, sometimes ONLY HER feels much too big, like there are seams in her skin and sheâs bursting through them, like thereâs something she canât-quite control, and those days she sings more than ever, witchâs awful fates a chant to chase it all away.Â
     âdonât make me go back, yet? please? iâll be very quiet, and iâll only whisper. promise.â