Francine's File: One Watery History

Francine looked up at the stars, her head flung backward over the side of the seat with her curls trailing down, dangling free. She'd never seen so many stars. And there, clear as could be, was a shooting star. Then another, quartz opal and larger than the first until it flew apart into hundreds of lavender fingers of light that faded into a pale warm glow.    

A man's voice, echoing like over a faulty microphone said, "Wow. You were really flying." His pink Venetian mask with black swirls in a figure eight around tiny peepholes glided into view on a halogen stick. The faulty microphone voice asked "Is there someone I can call for you?

"I'd love to play," she heard herself whisper. "Will there be games with prizes I can win?"

A swirly pink straw with full smiling perfectly shaped red lips slid around from behind the mask. "You must be thirsty, love," it said. The straw dripped warm water onto her cheek. 

Puckering her lips as though for a kiss, water flowed around them and slid sideways.

"You are not the surface of the lake, you are the lake," the water said. The smooth opening bars of Beethoven's 9th played on the current which lowered first her head, then her feet. Her fingertips and toes spread out, warm breath hovered all around like a halo. 

Her father sat erect up front driving a carriage pulled by two white horses. Her mother peered from inside, her fingers beckoning, drawing the halo closer and closer.

Bliss. She smelled it. Like white birthday cake with butter cream icing. 

The lights shifted through a rainbow spectrum. Francine drifted off in a bubble of perfume. 

A vibrant orange silk ribbon wrapped itself around the sphere like a package with a big bow. With her breath, Francine unfurled the bow into translucent bubbles where she saw her reflection. Or was it her mother's reflection? Or was it the reflection of someone she had yet to know? 

And then, poof, the bubble was gone. Francine, Francine, are you there or have you gotten lost?