Emma didn’t want to go. As in, if the options were either to admit to her mother that it was really Emma who had broken the wedding picture framed over 15 years ago, not her friend, or to go on this trip she would pick the former. And she would pick the former without any doubts loitering in her nine-year-old conscience. She didn’t want to be stuck in a car with her older siblings who just didn’t do anything anymore. So long ago were the days filled with excitement because now road trips were similar to hearing a four hour lecture about what sort of carpet cleaner to use. Ellen, the middle schooler, was all school and reading. Edmund, fresh to high school, was even worse because, according to her mother, now he was mature. All Emma knew was that the car ride was going to be unfilled silences that she wouldn’t be allowed to fill because, as her father says, her mother is trying to sleep.
But it wasn’t just the five hour ride she was dreading, Emma was more aware of the morning of yelling, dressing, redressing, and “You aren’t really going to wear that, are you’s?” soon bound to leave the lips of her yogurt-parfait-consuming mother. The worst though, the absolutely most terrifying part about the morning would always and forever occur in her bedroom when her mother sat her down for the hair brushing. The knots and tangles that crept their way into her brown hair during the night always brought screams and tears the next morning when her mother sat down to the unavoidable task of combing them out.

Emma, could smell the vanilla in her mother’s parfait as she held a spoon in one hand, and a brush in the other. She was the youngest sibling of three, which of course meant that she had to be the first to endure the torture where strands of hair that were meant to be attached to a head were now a part of a brush. Blinking back tears, she looked out the window and towards the sky and saw the clouds, the sun reaching its peak in the sky, and the trees whose leaves were falling and making their way slowly to the ground. I want to climb a tree, Emma thought before quickly screaming when her agitated mother, with no patience, suddenly tugged.

Not only was the morning going to be terrible, just thinking about the arrival made her pull on the dress her mother had wriggled her into nervously. She only vaguely knew these people that she was wasting her entire day for. Not only that, but she wouldn’t be allowed to touch anything because everything was breakable. Especially those egg cups Emma had broken the last time, though really she had done them a favor. No one really wants an egg cup. Those brittle cups look as if they were made to hold the tears of young and unfairly punished children. Mostly, she wasn’t excited because sitting on the floor in a house where you weren’t allowed to breathe was not her idea of fun.

After the screaming, the yelling, the “Eat your muffin Emma, I don’t have time for this!” her father yelled as he threw on a sweatshirt, “If you are not out this door in five seconds I swear I’m going to-” the family of five were on their way.

Emma the youngest, wearing green Nike shoes walked to the door of the minivan, grabbed the paint-chipped handle, and join her sister in the car. Her brother, still not wearing the pants their mother had chosen for him, rather wore a pair of too-short (“Edmund I can see your knees when you wear those!”) jeans, unexpectedly stopped her and said, “I can sit in the middle if you’d like.”

She didn’t say anything for a moment. Emma was more than sure that this was a joke because she never got to sit by the window. Her mother responded before she could. “That’s so mature of you, Edmund,” affectionately pinching his already red cheeks as he entered the car.

Her brother smirked at her. Well that explains that, she thought, and stuck her tongue out in return. Still, she got in after him, shut the door and took care not to close it on the skirt of her disgustingly pink dress, and sat by the window for one of the few glorious times in her childhood.

Her older sister Ellen, who had refused her hair brushing and instead was clad in a Minnie Mouse hat, began speaking, “This week in school I learned all about clouds,” She announced as if the world had just been graced with divine knowledge only she could tell. “We learned about Stratus clouds, and Cumulus clouds, and Cirrus clouds, and-“

“Would you stop talking?” Edmund moaned. Emma didn’t say a word, but did shudder at the thought of Ellen’s running commentary.
Ellen let out a huff of air, crossing her arms and not looking at anyone because tears were very near, and no one was allowed to see Ellen cry. Especially not Edmund.

Edmund and Ellen, continued bickering back and forth, advanced to the tugging of blonde hair, while Emma ignored her siblings’ attempts to cause each other pain and quietly sang ‘Walking on Sunshine’ with her father. It was his favorite song.
“I bet you don’t even know anything about clouds,” Ellen told her brother. “I bet you’re just as stupid as Emma.”

Well now Emma, who had suddenly been brought into the conversation, was paying attention, stopping mid-lyric she turned to her siblings. “I am not stupid,” She reached over to try and pinch Ellen, trying to mimic the technique she’d seen used earlier that had caused a resounding “Ouch!” to echo in the car, but, straining against her seatbelt, she couldn’t quite reach. The window, she learned, did have some disadvantages.

“Of course you’re stupid,” Edmund said, pushing away Emma’s hand. “You’re in fourth grade. No one smart is in the fourth grade!”

Their mother slowly turned in her seat looking at her children, exhaustion from the morning had appeared on her face along with the splotchy make-up that had so recently and shakily been applied using the visor mirror. “Kids, don’t make your father pull over.”

No one said anything for a moment, and all activity had stopped until Emma said, “I’m not stupid. I’m not. I know multiplication and division.”

“So?” Ellen answered. “You don’t know anything about clouds, and if you don’t understand clouds, you obviously aren’t smart and that leaves only one option, doesn’t it?”

“W-Well, I skipped kindergarten, which makes me smarter than everyone.”

“You didn’t skip kindergarten,” Edmund rounded on Emma.

“Did to!”

“Mo-om,” Ellen moaned, “Tell Emma what happened.”

Their mother again turned slowly in her seat to look at them. “Emma, you studied when you were four, took a test when you were five, and entered first grade a year early. You didn’t skip it,” Emma pushed her body back in her seat with the intent to disappear, the beginnings of a pout forming on her face. “Ellen, not everyone cares about clouds as much as you do. And Edmund,” she sighed, “Would you stop egging them on? You’re the oldest, and mature. Be a good example please.”

“Whatever,” He muttered.

“What did you just say to your mother?” Emma looked into the mirror and saw her father’s eyes-narrowing, severe. Maybe it was the combination of the uneven mustache, the paint-covered sweatshirt, or the nearly untouched cowboy boots he’d optimistically purchased at the state fair years ago, but Emma wasn’t quite feeling the wrath.

“Yes, mom,” Edmund mumbled.

“What was that?” His father asked, again, his voice, matching his eyes.

“Yes, mom,” Edmund said louder, and drone-like.

Still slouching and pouting, Emma began to look at the window so near to her, closer than it ever was before. She looked at the sun all yellow and orange. It hurt her eyes. Emma wanted to ask about the different shapes that she saw the clouds were making but she knew Ellen wouldn’t stop talking about clouds if someone brought them up again.

She passed her time by looking at the pictures the clouds made for her- the different stories each of the shapes were telling her. She looked briefly at the trees that she passed and they began making her dizzy, so she thought it best to look up at the clouds that didn’t move by in a blur, rather than out, while she adjusted to sitting in the window seat. A turtle wading through a crowd of ants was trying to make his way to refuge with his turtle friend who was only a few short airplane lengths away. But before the turtle could even pass half way through the ants, the clouds adjusted themselves and Emma saw a whole new scene appear.

A rabbit hopped out of the blue sky chasing after a lioness who had stolen all of his vegetables! He chased after the lioness as fast as a rabbit made of water vapor, as Ellen had just informed her, could. He had nearly caught up to her when the lioness fell down, dropping all the vegetables. The rabbit went to grab the food that had been unfairly taken from him when he realized that the lioness was no longer there. He rejoiced for a moment, no longer would she take his delicious celery! But when the rabbit looked around again, his vegetables were no longer vegetables, just wisps of nothing. The rabbit knew what was about to happen with his panic stricken face, until there was a face no more.
There was a ship. Hippopotamuses had found their way on it. They had stolen it from a pack of wolves and cleaned it all up, repainting the worn wood. They’d had dreamed their whole lives of moving to a faraway place where they wouldn’t be picked on by wolves any longer. They decided to sail from New York to India. They received message of an unexpected chimpanzee in need of safe passage from Italy. He wore a tuxedo and really needed to get out of Italy, which the Hippopotamuses didn’t understand, Italy sounded like a wonderful home, why would anyone want to leave? They decided the Italian Chimpanzee mob was probably after the chimpanzee. That was okay though. The Hippopotamuses had always wanted to see Italy.
Unfortunately their direction was a little off. They ended up in Greenland (“Isn’t this place supposed to be green or something?” a Hippo asked). It was cold and difficult but they ended up ice fishing. They had caught all sorts of fish, as they huddled close together around a hole that Emma would just barely fit through herself. Piles of fish lay at their feet. After they finished placing all the fish in their ship, they set off again in search of the concealed country that was Italy in hopes of one day making it to India.
There was no such thing as a complete story, she just had to guess what came next. As she watched these clouds change their shape she wondered. What if the hippopotamuses never made it to India, and in fact stayed in Italy for the rest of their lives? Maybe they could have opened a bakery. Italy didn’t have enough pastries. Hippopotamuses love pastries.
Emma turned away from the window, not sure if she was enjoying the stories left unfinished. She looked at Ellen, whose eyes hid beneath her Minnie Mouse hat, reading a book about Sacagawea regardless of the motion sickness it would later cause. Emma saw the way that Ellen smiled at certain parts and then got really sad. Edmund was finishing his algebra homework instead of listening to the loud and obnoxious music like he used to. His nose would scrunch up every once and a while when he started working on a question that he didn’t quite understand. She moved her head to the front and noticed the way that her dad would bob his head to the music that was on at such a low volume, Emma was surprised he heard it at all. Her mother had finally fallen asleep in the passenger seat, her finally face relaxed, no longer were her lips pursed.

Emma’s gaze, which had navigated towards her brother and sister, shifted its way back toward the window and the sky. There she found a badger chasing after a collie and just before the badger reached out to land on top of the dog the cloud became something else entirely.