Nothing But Hot Air

Untitled Part 1

I hate this style of writing, and there is a reason this was never entered.

"Stay away from her," my mama said, "She ain't nothing but hot air."

I saw the humour in that statement, mama did not. Mama slapped me upside the head and said again, "Stay away from her, Baby, she is up to no good, mark my words."

Mama then told me to do my chores, and so I did, and I thought about the girl I'd seen, floating above the clouds.

Stay away, mama said.

It was easy to stay away, not like I was ever close. But when I was in town buying fruits and veggies and the like for mama, I stopped at the bookstore and asked Mr Geoffreys for a book on hot air balloons. And he gave me a manual with diagrams and pictures and funny symbols.

I got home with mama's food and my book, took out the watercolours mama got me for my birthday, and I painted the balloon in the sky with the pretty girl full of hot air.

When the balloon came back, mama and I were baking bread. I ran out, covered in flour, to stare at the girl in the sky. But mama grabbed me by my braid and said,

"I've seen that look in your eyes, Baby, she nothing but a rich town girl with too much money and she's gonna hurt you. Stay away Baby, she ain't nothing but hot air."

So I finished kneading the bread and looked out the window and thought that it might be nice to meet a rich town girl with too much money who ain't nothin' but hot air. But I didn't tell mama.

Next week, the balloon landed in Farmer Michaels Pumpkin Patch, and I was running with the other kids to see it when mama grabbed my dress and said: "Come inside Ally, you got chores."

But I turned around and said "Mama, please, just a look." And mama scowled and let me go, with the promise that if my chores weren't done by nightfall, I'd be in for a hiding.

So I ran down to Farmer Michaels Pumpkin Patch, and there she was, the pretty girl with the balloon. She was surrounded by older boys and young kids, and had that look in her eyes that mama would describe as "a fox starin' down the barrel of a shotgun". She talkin' to Dale, who's a right prick, and who don't know when to give up. He's smiling at her the way that all local girls learned to ignore a mighty long time ago. So I yell at Dale to get moving right along now, and he makes a fuss and scampers off. And then I herd Suzy and her friends away from the important looking ropes, and I stick out my hand to balloon girl, nice and polite like mama taught me, and I say.

"Hello, my name's Allison."

The girl had her hair pulled back all fancy like. Mama was right, her clothes looked new, soft and warm.

"Lilly, it's a pleasure to meet you."

She takes my hand, her accent is rich. Rich and heavy. "Don't you worry about Dale, he's a right brute, but he aint gonna fight a girl."

She drops my hand, "Because he's a gentleman?"

I grin, "Because he'd lose, and 'e knows it."

"Oh?"

And because she falls silent, and I hate silence, I keep talking.

"So why you land here? Ya' fly over all the other times."

"The road where I am usually picked up is closed, so Father is sending a car."

"Looks like they gonna be a time then, want me to teach you to braid flowers?"

And she nods, so I sit her down and show her how to string the dandelions together into a crown, like how I do with Suzy. She ain't that good, but she keeps trying over and over. When it's dark and we see the lamps of a fancy black car coming up Farmer Michaels road, I place mine on her head, and her cheeks go as pink as Farmer Michaels piglets, and she holds out her broken lil' crown and says,