LEELIO
And then they were all gone. And it was all gone. The bearladies and the dwarf-huggers and the lobster boy and the knife-throwers and the fire-eaters and the ice dancers and the rope-swingers and the ball-kickers and Tarzan and Thumbelina and the jingling gigglers and the half-built squeakers and the strong men and the stronger women and the eight-fingered people and the amputees and the squints and the camels and the mammoths and the cavelady and the giant and the mousefaces and the bluehairs and the greenhairs and the clawfoots and the wireflyers and the platespinners.
And they all fell under the lake.

We’re somewhere over Ohio. I think. I know we passed Chicago last year. Spent a week on the tiptop of the Sears Tower drying out. It was about Christmas time.

Sometimes I think I see land. Soundbite did. Soundbite thought he saw land all the time. He thought it was his fault, that the lake fell in. It wasn’t his fault. Once, we saw a tuna can floating far, far away. Soundbite said that tuna can was Canada, and he was going.

I said: Soundbite, that’s a tuna can.
He said: I’m going.

PAMELA’s ghost rubs LEELIO’s hair.

And then he swam away.
He believed in everything.

PAMELA
Because because because. . .

LEELIO
I miss the people. I miss them and all their eyes on me.
I miss turning out the lights in the tent
and sweeping up trampled funnel cake
and eating whatever refried crap Max put in the kitchen.

PAMELA
Because you. . .

LEELIO
I miss having a reason for these tattoos. I still get new ones every once in a while. (Looks up to the sky.) All this water, and you’re still depressed, big guy? Get a pill, dude. I am not a prescription.
I miss Soundbite.
But after he left, this ghost found me.

PAMELA
You’re the second child I’ve plucked from the waves. Because because.

LEELIO
All you hear now is waves
waves waves
waving.

I lost my only friend in the world to a can of tuna.

I figured out last week I can walk on water. But there’s nobody here to see that. So what good is it?

I guess I do have this ghost.

PAMELA
And I will take extraordinary care of you.
There is never a shortage of children to rescue. Somebody is always putting their child in the sea. All I had to do was wait. And here you are.