The Cloud-Running Girl
Lily had the most wild, curly hair in her whole class. It bounced around her face like a tangled brown cloud, and she hated it. Every morning, her mom spent twenty minutes trying to tame it with brushes and ribbons, but by lunchtime, it was always flying free again.
One rainy afternoon, Lily was running home from school when she spotted something twinkling on the sidewalk. It looked like a little orange gummy shaped like a sunshine, with sparkles that shimmered like tiny stars. Being eight and curious, she popped it into her mouth.
"Mmm," she said. "Tastes like orange dreams!"
She didn't know it was a special cloud vitamin, dropped by accident from a sky wizard's pocket.
The next morning, Lily was running late for school. She grabbed her backpack and sprinted down the sidewalk — but instead of staying on the ground, her feet kept going up, up, UP! Her curly hair was floating like it was weightless, pulling her toward the sky.
"Whoa!" Lily shouted, running right onto a fluffy white cloud. She bounced across it like it was a trampoline made of cotton candy. Her hair reached toward the next cloud, almost like it knew the way.
Soon she was cloud-running all over town, racing birds and waving down to bewildered squirrels. But when she saw her friend Leo crying on a bench, she stopped.
"What's wrong?" she asked, floating down gently.
"My kitten Mittens is stuck in that tree," Leo sniffled, pointing to a tall oak. "She's been there all morning."
Lily's hair perked up, stretching toward the highest branches. With a running start, she bounded up the clouds, snuggled the scared kitten, and cloud-jumped back down.
"You saved her!" Leo cheered. "Your hair is amazing!"
Lily looked at her bouncy curls in a shop window reflection. They weren't messy — they were magical. The cloud vitamin hadn't just given her powers; it had shown her that the things that made her different were the very things that made her special.
"Want to come cloud-running with me?" Lily asked Leo. "I think my hair has room for two!"