Buoyancy

Bouyant

I've chosen a cape, and I'm making it work as I descend the staircase into the main event space. This place used to be a bank vault, or maybe it was a library. That would make more sense; bank vaults probably don't have marble staircases down into them. My balance is off somehow, but it isn't the shoes. I'm well practiced in that. A plush purple runner cascades down the steps, but that should only help. At the bottom of the stairs waits a silver gold queen in a huge blonde B52. She waves enthusiastically, and I smile, but she isn't waving to me. She looks past me up the stairs. I look away, over the crowd I'm headed down into. Many, many wigs. Many, many spangles. Much clinking and sniping. Much bubbling and fizzing. The beehive queen starts coming up the stairs, faster than I'm going down. She has a microphone in her hand. She focuses still up the stairs behind me. I don't want to turn to see who's back there. I don't want to cede that power. I don't think anyone's noticed me, though, descending in my cape. No one's looking up at me. I came alone. I don't expect to know anyone here. I'm still going down the steps. The beehive queen passes me going up. She doesn't touch me at all, but my balance is further upset. I almost tumble, but gravity is strange so I float a bit instead. I have to work hard to keep my feet on the purple carpet. The tips of my shoes scratch for purchase. I keep a hand on the brassy railing. My toes are off the carpet now. And I was so close to the bottom of the staircase. I'm trying very hard not to step on any wigs as I start to float out over the heads of the crowd. Still no one notices. Trays of cakes and things circulating. Trays of shrimps and things circulating. Colory cocktails in quarter-filled martini glasses. I have to step on a few heads or I'd be completely lost. Depressing a bouffant here, finding a solid bald stepping stone there. For princess sake, am I a ghost? No one has noticed my floating above the crowd or my stepping on their precious heads. They continue to pop and fizz and crackle like a fire. I'm still working this cape. I still regret nothing. The beehive queen has reached the balcony at the top of the stairs, and she's introducing someone to the crowd. She speaks underwater, far away. I watch her mouth move but hear her voice delayed and muffled. The crowd attends but doesn't quiet. But they too are blurrier. More distant. She raises an arm and moves aside to admit whoever she's introduced to the room. Curtains part. Darkness beyond. I'm turning in the air. I'm turning away from the scene. My feet float free, too far above the heads below. I can't control my bouyant little body. I won't see who comes out of the darkness. I won't see the reveal. It's already behind me. I'm tangled in my cape, tied in it. I'm facing the back wall of the event space which does indeed have a large bank vault door in it, like in a cartoon. But also above it shelves of books. Ah, so the space was both. Of course. I glide toward the book shelves. Colorful collections but dour, serious-looking. My face gets very close. My feet find the shoulders of the guard at the vault door. He is also dour and serious-looking. They've made him dress for the party, and I can tell he doesn't like it. He's in a tuxedo coat and bowtie with no shirt underneath. The heels of my shoes start to press into his coated shoulders. I'm finding gravity again. I try to get a grip on the shelves to steady myself, but I just keep pulling books off. My heels slip off the guard's shoulders, and I sink slowly, my feet drawing lines  down his back until I'm sitting backward on his shoulders with my crotch in his face. I still think he hasn't noticed until I feel his hands on my back, and he's laying me down on the marble floor. He stands back up, over me, and I continue sinking. I sink a marble trough into the floor and look up as if from a coffin in the ground. Of course the beehive queen looks over the rim, and a couple other partygoers. She smiles and drops the mic down to me. I hold it and start singing. Something jazzy and sad. The space in the floor widens, bubbles out. I have room to move my limbs, swish my cape, kick my feet. The bubble closes over me, dark, but I keep dancing. My feet find a floor and normal-feeling gravity for the first time. Curtains open, and light hits me. The beehive queen stands beyond at a balcony overlooking a party, holding out the microphone to me. As I step forward into the light and effervescent applause, I see a sad queen in a cape floating out over the crowd, turning slowly, slowly away.