Purple Clouds

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky.

And I loved watching them intertwining with each other, and creating playful figures. Sometimes a cat playing with a ball, sometimes a fire-breathing dragon… so cute but so ephemeral. They would shape-shift every five seconds or so. I wondered, are the clouds alive? Are they sentient beings? Because I cannot imagine this level of movement and dance and ebullient creativity not being orchestrated by creatures that have a will of their own…

No, no, no! No look at them! Cried my ages-old Chinese caretaker, whose name was Su-Yin.

They evil! Can hypnotize you!

I don’t care, I responded. They are truly mesmerizing and I cannot stop looking at them.

Well! No good! No good! Repeated Su-Yin, pointing her long index finger at me and clucking in disapproval. She tried taking me by the arm and shoving me towards the house, but I was stronger and more agile than her and got loose from her grasp.

No good! No good! She repeated, as she continued clucking her tongue, crossing the bejeweled paved walkway going towards the house to enter it through the kitchen door.

I go get your papa now! You see!

She lifted her worn amethyst purple silk dress with the embroidered dagger in the back, splayed her four spidery legs and scurried across the glimmering ruby red, emerald green and lapis lazuli blue of the cobblestones.

A flash of light startled me. It was the reflection of a mirror, but there was no mirror around…

How strange, I thought to myself, and continued looking up at the purple clouds.

“How strange”, the words echoed in my consciousness but the tone of voice was not my own. It was a tone of voice that was playful and seemed to be mocking me. It was the voice of a young, cocky 8-year old boy… and I’m a girl.

“What was that?”, I thought to myself and started to feel the skin in the back of my neck prick up. An uncomfortable feeling invaded me and I started looking around.

“What was that?”, said the young boy’s voice in my head.

All of a sudden, from the corner of my eye, I saw the flash of light again. I turned as fast as I could and saw a pixie in a moss-green head-to-toe outfit with an earth brown cap tilted sideways, under which was a mass of brazen curls and a set of brown eyes, cute button nose and berry-colored lips.

“Hey! Who are you?”, I said out loud, trying to still my beating and startled heart.

“Hey! Who are you? Do you know who you are?”, said the pixie, lifting its silver flute to the heavens.

“Well, yes… but who are you?”, I asked, not knowing if the pixie was a he or a she…

“I know who I am but I don’t know if you know who you are. What are you doing wasting your time looking up at the sky at those purple clouds?”.

“Well, I don’t think it’s a waste of time. See, look here, look how that cloud just formed a tea kettle and started pouring tea into a teacup. And see, it just transformed into a cute teddy bear… and see, it shape shifted again and is now a wizard with a long lilac beard. Isn’t that fantastic?”

“Yes, but isn’t it a better use of your time if you actually levitated to see the clouds up close?”, the pixie said.

“What? Is that possible?”, I said.

“You obviously don’t know who you are, and therefore you obviously don’t know the full potential you have and the extent of your powers… Who has been keeping that secret from you? Is it your Chinese nanny?”, said the pixie.