Page 35 of Barbie: Dreamscape

Rain pelts my face, and this umbrella is absolutely useless against it, careening in wild movements. The metal is screeching. The fabric is tearing. My fingers are slick against its handle. It feels like this world is laughing at me.

You thought you had it figured out? Yeah, right.

I can’t hold on for much longer. I look down at the growing distance between me and the ground and swallow. The word sky-splatter comes to mind. I imagine myself making a sparkling pink puddle. Pretty?

No. I don’t want to be sky-splatter. I just want to find the key. I just want to find my Fate.

“Is wanting a future so wrong?” I yell into the storm, and sky-rattling thunder responds.

“Is that a yes?!” I demand.

The sky just keeps on raging.

I will not be as angry as the sky. I will calm myself down. I will change it, just as I did the forest.

I close my eyes.

And I think of one of my first—and best—memories. A voice, singing a song. My mother’s voice.

It’s a wonder I even remember it. I was so young when she died. But I know it was her. And that lullaby… I think about it sometimes when I’m trying not to get stressed, or anxious, or afraid.

Because her voice… it was bright. And smooth. And kind. And it might seem silly to infer anything about a person by their singing, but I just feel like even with that tiny memory, I know her. And the thought calms me, just like talking to her statue.

I hum along, singing it for myself, allowing peace to root in my heart like a seed that grows with every line, blooming hope and life and love.

Love.

I feel it. She might be gone, but the whisper of her love is still here, like a handprint on my soul, like an echo in my heart.

The sky clears.

The rain stops.

And the mushroom that turned into an umbrella is now a giant daisy. The handle is now a thick stem. I float through the blue sky, the sun’s warmth like a hug, and—

I’m soaring over the treetops.

I might still be in complete danger of becoming sky-splatter, but—

This is nice.

Somehow, this feels different from being in Sunny’s boat. No, this is less of a panicked, uncontrolled experience, and more of a smooth sailing. Ken’s words echo through my mind. He told me to always make time for watching sunsets. Even though the sky is bright blue now, I know he was telling me to just enjoy the moment I’m in when I’m in it.

You know, this land is strange and dangerous and perplexing—but it is also wondrous. I take a second to marvel at it.

Below, the landscape is cut into pieces like the patches of a quilt, ever-changing. Becoming something different right before my eyes. Rivers turning to ribbons, trees becoming towers, mountains becoming giants.

Even the sky is ever-changing, the weather transforming like this place can’t decide on a single season.

Snow surges around me, and—

I’ve never touched snow before.

I reach out for a snowflake, which quickly melts against my skin as the weather turns to spring again, becoming a drop of rain.

And the daisy turns into a giant dandelion, seeds blowing off until I’m slowly lowering down—

Into a bed of sunflowers. I’m in a grove full of them.