Page 47 of Barbie: Dreamscape

They… aren’t? Because I’m pretty sure I’m doing all this for a very specific reason…

She must see my continued disbelief, because she lifts a shoulder. “It’s fine that you don’t see that yet. That just means your journey isn’t over. When it is… you’ll know exactly what I mean.”

I’m not holding my breath.

She continues, “Life’s color is the in-betweens, the quiet realizations, the side quests, the unexpected adventures.”

Right.

“That’s amazing,” I say, really trying to mean it. I reach toward the bell. I’m just a hair too far away. “But I really need to—”

“No,” Posey says, her voice firm. “It can wait. Trust me.”

Then she shoots up into the air, her wings curling around her, launching up through the sky like a rocket.

And I hesitate.

Why am I hesitating?

I should grab the bell while I can. I’m lucky I even made it out of that trench. Who knows if this land is about to change again?

But I watch Posey, and that ember of light I felt in the pit… it turns into a longing I haven’t felt in years—that simplicity and infinite yearning for play…

The same emotion that had me laughing, running down halls with Robin. The same one that had me painting far past my bedtime.

The same feeling I abandoned after school started taking up all my free time, and life got busy.

Any time I got the urge to do something not related to academics or success, I would admonish myself. Tell myself I was too old to be joking around or pursuing things just for the fun of it.

But are you really ever too old to just play?

Are you really expected to just abandon fun for the sake of success, and only do things that are deemed productive?

Another thing I don’t want becomes clear as day, the realization slamming into my soul like it did when Robin told me I could stay in Swancrest with her forever.

I don’t want to live a life devoid of color, and creativity, and imagination and fun.

Not anymore.

So I shoot off after Posey.

My body pierces cloud after cloud, and some are cold, some are full of water, some are full of surprises, and I emerge from one covered in glitter, another covered in crystals, yet another covered in—

Chocolate?

“Chocolate rain is the best,” Posey crows, flying past me. She reaches inside the cloud I just emerged from and pours some into her mouth. “Here, follow me…”

I race after her, through a storm cloud that washes the chocolate away, then into a wind funnel that dries me and sends my hair flying out of what was left of my braided crown, the strands now fully loose and free. When was the last time they weren’t pulled back into bows or clips?

Relief. The tension in my head eases, air flowing against my scalp, the tightness released.

I reach up and clutch the necklaces, thinking of an entirely new outfit, before shooting through yet another cloud—and emerging in a billowing dress of various fabrics every shade of pink, cut into squares like a quilt, inspired by the landscape below.

I hear Posey whoop with approval before flying through a cloud and appearing in a completely different ensemble as well, violet pants with bell-shaped bottoms and a rhinestone top in the shape of butterfly wings.

That officially starts an Outfit Battle.

In bursts of pink and purple glitter, we change ensembles over and over, going back and forth, until our designs start to bleed into the clouds. We paint them every shade and pattern, from houndstooth to candy stripes to polka dots to herringbone.