Peek Behind The Curtain

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Enter the Freak show Gallery

Backstory

Rain hammered violently against the circus tents the night Misaki was born.
Thunder cracked through the skies while performers rushed frantically through muddy pathways carrying props beneath flickering lantern light. The traveling circus had stopped outside a forgotten little town, settling temporarily in a field soaked with rainwater and rotting grass.
Inside one of the wagons, a woman screamed in labor while distant carousel music echoed softly outside.
Then—
silence.
A baby cried moments later.
“She’s beautiful,” the old ringmaster whispered while carefully lifting the infant wrapped in crimson blankets.
Her exhausted mother smiled weakly through tears.
“Promise me something…” she breathed shakily. “Promise me she’ll never live without applause.”
The ringmaster chuckled warmly.
“In this circus?” he said. “That little girl was born for the spotlight.”
Outside, lightning illuminated the tents like glowing ghosts.
And somewhere beneath one of the wagons…
small glowing eyes watched quietly from the dark.
Misaki never lived a normal childhood.
The circus became her home before she could even walk properly. Instead of bedtime stories, she fell asleep listening to rehearsal music and distant audience applause. Instead of classrooms, she learned balance from acrobats and rhythm from dancers.
The performers raised her together.
One taught her how to juggle.
Another taught her how to sew costumes.
The aerial dancers taught her grace.
The clowns taught her how to smile no matter how much pain she felt.
“Always smile for the audience,” they told her constantly.
“Even if your feet bleed.”
Especially if they bleed.
But the circus also taught her another lesson early:
People only loved things that entertained them.
Everything else became a monster.
That was how she met Jester.
He wasn’t human.
Nobody even knew what he truly was.
The circus workers found him years before Misaki could remember, trapped inside an abandoned animal cage near the woods beside an old carnival route. Tiny. Starving. Terrified.
He looked like some strange hybrid between a rat, a raccoon, and a possum.
Oversized ears.
Dark ringed eyes.
Tiny clawed paws.
A long curling tail.
Patchy black-gray fur.
One torn ear from old abuse.
The performers hated him immediately.
“He’s ugly.”
“Looks diseased.”
“Throw that thing back outside.”
The ringmaster only kept him because audiences paid money to see strange creatures in the freak show.
Children screamed when they saw him.
Adults laughed at him.
Workers kicked at him whenever he stole scraps of food.
Then one day, six-year-old Misaki found him trembling alone beneath the bleachers after someone hit him with a broom.
She slowly crouched beside him.
Instead of recoiling…
she smiled.
“You’re cute.”
Jester stared at her silently.
Misaki carefully offered him half of her cotton candy.
After a long pause, the tiny creature slowly crawled toward her hand.
And from that moment on…
he never left her side again.
Jester became her shadow growing up.
He slept curled against her chest every night inside her wagon.
Followed her around the circus on tiny paws.
Sat beneath the tightrope while she practiced.
Perched on her shoulder backstage while makeup artists worked.
Whenever Misaki cried, Jester somehow always knew immediately.
He would crawl silently into her lap until she held him close enough to stop shaking.
And honestly…
Misaki trusted him more than she trusted most people.
Because Jester loved her before she became Psycho.
Before the applause.
Before the spotlight.
He loved her when she was still just Misaki.
The circus performers continued mocking him for years.
“Ugly little sewer rat.”
“Freak mutt.”
“Trash animal.”
But Misaki defended him every single time.
“He’s not ugly,” she snapped once. “He’s just different.”
That was why Jester loved her so deeply.
She never treated him like something broken.
To Misaki, Jester wasn’t part of the freak show.
He was family.
Her best friend.
As Misaki grew older, the circus itself slowly decayed around her.
Its red tents faded beneath age and weather.
Wooden stages creaked dangerously during performances.
The rides constantly broke down.
The animals looked thin.
But audiences still came.
Because of her.
The “Little Star.”
That was what they called her.
By six years old, she performed balancing acts before crowds.
By ten, she danced elegantly across tightropes suspended terrifyingly high above the audience.
And every single night, when applause thundered through the tent…
she felt loved.
Not truly loved.
But close enough.
As she grew older, her performances became more dangerous.
Higher ropes.
Longer falls.
Sharper movements.
The audience adored risk.
And she adored hearing them scream her stage name.
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
Her appearance evolved too.
Half-black and half-pink hair.
Dark ribbons around her wrists.
Heavy lashes framing exhausted eyes.
Ballerina heels designed more for beauty than comfort.
And a painted smile that widened slightly more each year.
Eventually…
the makeup stopped feeling like costume.
It became armor.
Because beneath the makeup was just a terrified girl afraid nobody would care about her without the performance.
But outside the circus…
Misaki secretly lived another life.
College.
By day she looked almost ordinary.
Oversized hoodies.
Coffee-stained notebooks.
Late-night studying.
Quiet laughter during lectures.
Most students only knew her as the shy art student who always looked tired.
Nobody recognized her without the makeup.
Nobody connected the quiet girl to Psycho.
And Misaki desperately wanted to keep it that way.
Because college gave her something the circus never could:
A chance to feel human.
That was where she met him.
The boy who made her heart race for the first time.
He sat beside her during literature class one rainy afternoon, awkwardly asking to borrow a pencil before immediately dropping it.
She laughed softly.
He smiled.
And suddenly the world felt gentler.
He didn’t look at her like an attraction.
He looked at her like a person.
And slowly…
she fell hopelessly in love.
Not long after, she met her best friend too.
The brightest part of her normal life.
They studied together constantly.
Shared food between classes.
Stayed awake texting until sunrise.
Complained about professors.
Talked about dreams and futures.
And for the first time in her life…
Misaki experienced genuine friendship outside the circus.
But she hid one massive secret from both of them.
Neither her boyfriend nor her best friend knew she was Psycho.
Neither knew she performed nightly beneath circus lights.
Neither knew she spent every evening becoming someone else.
After classes ended, Misaki disappeared back into the circus while the rest of the world slept.
Only Jester knew both versions of her completely.
And sometimes…
when she stared into mirrors while removing her makeup late at night…
she wondered which version was actually real anymore.
Death first appeared in Misaki’s life long before the fire.
She just never realized it.
As a child, she used to tell performers strange things that made them uncomfortable.
“There’s a man standing near the curtains.”
“There’s someone watching the show.”
“He keeps following me.”
But whenever adults turned to look—
nobody was there.
The ringmaster blamed her imagination.
The clowns laughed nervously.
Eventually Misaki stopped mentioning him.
But she never truly stopped seeing him.
Sometimes during performances, standing high above the audience beneath blinding spotlights, she would catch glimpses of a tall figure hidden near the back rows where shadows swallowed the seats whole.
Always dressed in black.
Always silent.
Always watching only her.
And somehow…
she never felt afraid of him.
As Misaki grew older, Death became more present.
Not physically.
Never close enough to touch.
But always there.
Watching from impossible places.
Behind circus curtains.
Reflections in mirrors.
Darkness beneath bleachers.
Death watched her entire life silently.
He watched six-year-old Misaki offer cotton candy to a terrified little creature everyone else called ugly.
He watched her defend Jester when performers kicked at him.
He watched her fall asleep backstage curled around him because she hated sleeping alone.
And slowly…
Death fell in love with her kindness.
Not the performances.
Not Psycho.
Misaki.
The girl hidden underneath everything.
A few nights before the autumn performance, Misaki decided she wanted to do something special for him.
Not because she had to.
Not because he asked.
But because she loved him so deeply that even the thought of making him smile filled her chest with warmth.
She wanted to take him somewhere important to her.
Somewhere deeply personal.
And hidden beneath that excitement was a secret she planned carefully inside her heart:
She wanted him to unknowingly watch Psycho perform…
then reveal afterward that the girl beneath the makeup had been her the entire time.
For once, she imagined him looking at her with amazement instead of confusion.
Maybe he’d smile proudly.
Maybe he’d finally understand why the circus mattered so much to her.
Maybe he’d see every hidden part of her and still stay.
The thought alone made her nervous enough to feel sick.
One rainy evening after classes ended, Misaki sat beside him outside the campus library while cold wind drifted through the trees overhead.
Jester slept curled quietly inside her hoodie pocket while Misaki nervously picked at the sleeves covering her hands.
“There’s something I wanted to ask you,” she said softly.
Her boyfriend glanced up from his phone.
“Yeah?”
Misaki hesitated briefly before forcing herself to smile.
“Would you maybe like to go to the circus with me this weekend?” she asked quietly.
Her fingers tightened nervously against her sleeves.
“I’d really love to have you there with me.”
There was something unusually vulnerable in her voice when she said it.
Soft.
Hopeful.
Almost shy.
Because to her, this wasn’t just asking him to go somewhere.
This was Misaki opening a door she normally kept locked shut from the rest of the world.
He blinked in surprise.
“The circus?”
Misaki nodded quickly.
“Yeah,” she said softly. “There’s gonna be a really important performance that night.”
Excitement flickered briefly in her eyes despite her nervousness.
“I just thought it might be nice if we went together.”
She almost told him everything right there.
Almost told him that Psycho was her.
Almost told him she wanted him to see the real version of her hidden beneath the makeup and stage lights.
But she stopped herself.
Because she wanted it to be a surprise.
She wanted to see the look on his face afterward.
Instead, his expression shifted slightly.
Almost hesitant.
“Oh,” he muttered awkwardly.
The excitement inside her chest weakened immediately.
“I actually think I already made plans that night,” he said after a moment.
And just like that—
something inside her heart quietly cracked.
“Oh.”
The word left her mouth softer than intended.
“I’m sorry,” he continued casually. “Maybe another time?”
Another time.
Misaki smiled anyway despite the ache slowly forming in her chest.
“That’s okay,” she whispered quickly.
“I understand.”
And she truly meant it.
Because loving someone meant respecting their boundaries.
So she never pushed.
Never guilted him.
Never asked what his “plans” actually were.
But what Misaki never knew…
was that he never actually had plans.
This was the plan.
The entire time.
He rejected Misaki because he already planned to come to the circus with her best friend instead.
At first it started small.
Lingering conversations.
Late-night texts.
Inside jokes.
Then eventually—
touches that lasted too long.
Smiles meant for each other.
And finally…
something unforgivable.
The night of the performance arrived cold and rainy.
Backstage, Misaki sat silently in front of her mirror while distant applause echoed through the tent walls.
White foundation.
Dark lashes.
Pink glitter.
Black lipstick.
Psycho stared back at her piece by piece.
She glanced toward Jester sleeping nearby in costume fabric.
“You better watch from backstage tonight, okay?” she whispered softly.
Outside, the crowd roared loudly.
The ringmaster burst into the room grinning wildly.
“They’re completely packed tonight! Everybody came for Psycho!”
Not Misaki.
Never Misaki.
Only Psycho.
The lights suddenly dimmed.
The audience erupted instantly.
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
Misaki closed her eyes briefly.
Then stepped toward the stage.
And Psycho was born again.
The spotlight struck her instantly.
The audience exploded into screaming applause while she gracefully climbed the towering ladder toward the tightrope suspended impossibly high above the crowd.
And high above the audience—
Misaki finally looked down.
At first, she searched instinctively through the crowd.
Looking for him despite everything.
And then she found him.
Front row.
Beside her best friend.
Smiling at each other beneath the carnival lights she begged him to stand under with her.
Her chest tightened painfully.
No…
Then—
he leaned closer toward her best friend.
His hand gently touched her face.
And he kissed her.
Not quick.
Not accidental.
Not confusing.
The kind of kiss shared between two people acting like a real couple.
Comfortable.
Natural.
Intimate.
And her best friend kissed him back.
In that exact moment—
Misaki’s entire world shattered.
The music distorted violently.
The applause became deafening static.
Her breathing stopped completely.
No no no—
Suddenly every fear Misaki ever buried deep inside herself crawled violently back to the surface all at once.
Not enough.
Never enough.
Too strange.
Too broken.
Too hard to love.
The audience mistook her trembling for part of the act and applauded louder.
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
“PSYCHO!”
Tears blurred her vision beneath the makeup.
But nobody noticed.
Nobody realized the girl smiling beneath the spotlight was breaking apart in real time.
Misaki took one shaky step backward.
Then another.
Her heel slipped against the rain-slick rope.
And suddenly—
she was falling.
The crash shook the entire stage.
Wood exploded beneath her body.
The audience screamed.
The impact shattered ribs instantly while blood stained splintered boards beneath her.
Then chaos erupted.
Lanterns overturned during the panic.
Flames spread rapidly across old curtains and dry wooden beams.
Smoke swallowed the tent ceiling almost instantly.
People trampled each other trying to escape.
Children cried hysterically.
Performers screamed backstage.
And beneath collapsing debris—
Misaki lay trapped.
Unable to breathe.
Unable to move.
“Help…” she coughed weakly.
Nobody came.
Not the audience.
Not the ringmaster.
Not him.
Nobody.
Then through the smoke—
Jester came running.
The tiny creature bolted through flames desperately searching for her.
“Jester…” Misaki cried weakly.
He immediately clawed frantically at the debris trapping her despite his tiny body barely being strong enough.
He refused to leave her.
Even while the fire spread closer.
Even while the heat burned his fur.
Even while the tent began collapsing around them.
Misaki sobbed the moment she realized he came back for her.
“No… no no, Jester, run…”
But he wouldn’t.
He stayed beside her until the very end.
A flaming beam suddenly crashed beside them, sending sparks violently across the stage.
Jester curled tightly against Misaki’s chest instinctively while she held him close with trembling arms.
And there beneath the burning wreckage—
they died together.
The last thing Misaki felt before darkness swallowed her completely…
was Jester trembling safely against her heart.
For a long time after that—
there was nothing.
No pain.
No applause.
No screaming.
Just darkness.
Heavy.
Endless.
Cold.
Then slowly—
dim carnival lights flickered alive around her.
Misaki opened her eyes inside an empty flooded circus that stretched endlessly into darkness.
Her body was ruined.
Burn scars twisted across pale skin.
Dark ribbons fused directly into flesh.
And carved permanently into he

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