In Concord, ten-year-old Bailey sits with his sister Caroline and her friends in an oak tree playing truth or dare. Caroline, asserting control over the group, dares Bailey to break into the Night Circus during the day and bring back proof.

Bailey accepts immediately, partly to defy Caroline and partly because he is drawn back to the circus, which has returned after vanishing years earlier. As he walks across the field, Bailey recalls his first real visit the previous night: the circus is not a single show but a maze of wonders—acrobats, mirrors, and astonishing food—so immersive he cannot describe it afterward.

At the locked gates, Bailey reads the warning sign and feels the daytime circus’s eerie silence. Wanting privacy and an easier entrance, Bailey follows the fence until he finds a gap between tents, then squeezes through the iron bars into the grounds.

Inside, the circus seems worn and abandoned in daylight, and Bailey cannot find anything suitable to take. After wandering among signed tents, Bailey nearly collides with a red-haired girl in all white, who calmly tells Bailey he should not be there and guides him through twisting passages, pausing to avoid being seen, before leading him to a different spot in the fence.

Back outside, Bailey asks what “exsanguinated” means, and the girl explains it is draining all his blood, though she doubts it truly happens. When Bailey admits he must bring back proof for a dare, the girl gives him one of her white gloves, and she unexpectedly calls him by name. Bailey returns to find the others gone and later realizes he never told the girl his name.