An Awfully Big Adventure

Hour Ten: Chim Chim Cheree

10. Write a chapter based off of "Chim Chim Cheree."

Wendy and Dale's heads are still stuck in the clouds somewhere. However, they both are jolted from their bonded daydream when Chip opens the car door. They are confused and disoriented from looking at the dazzling sun, so they have to blink a few times to clear the sunspots from their vision.

"Good morning, Sleeping Beauty," Dale says as Wendy scoots towards him to make more room for Chip. Naturally, Wendy jumps at any chance to be in closer proximity to Dale.

Chip stretches his long arms and rises on tip toe, further elongating his form and flexing his calf muscles. He realizes now that he has been cooped up for the past six or so hours and he begins to feel a little antsy. "What time is it?"

Wendy glances at her phone, cupping her hand around the screen to eliminate the glare and make reading the time a possible action. She squints at the horrible display, "6:25, I think?"

Chip lets out a long whistle, thinking if only he could manage to wake up this early on mornings he has football practice. Normally, he's mashing the snooze button on his alarm clock for the third time in a row and dead to the world. But he's so alive right now- awake and marvelling at the sunrise.

With a sight like this it is easy to be happy and feel blessed. Nonetheless, Chip is grateful; nothing will be raining on his parade today.

And he feels lucky, for he, a seventeen year old nothing is witnessing something so beautiful. Sure, he is inferior to the ball of light, but somehow he doesn't feel insignificant. It is as if he believes he has soaked up some of the brilliance.

He begins whistling to the tune of Chim Chim Cheree, but soon realizes he's caught the attention of his fellow Disney-goers. He never really enjoyed being looked at and he shies away in the sunlight, wishing there is a shadow to hide behind.

"Aren't we lucky to be seeing something so stunning?" he tries, hoping to revert their eyes back to the sun, "It makes me feel, I dunno, honored in a way. Seeing such a beautiful, if daily, phenomena."

Chip doesn't mind saying such things to the sun, for the light from its rays have already penetrated through him and nuzzled up close to his heart. People have yet to have such an immediate effect on him.

"Whoa there, Walt Whitman," Dale remarks, teasing his friend, "You sound like a romantic."

Chip sits up a little straighter and looks at Dale from the corner of his eyes, "Is there somethign wrong with loving nature and hoping for good luck?"

Dale squirms slightly, he had only been joking, but with Chip having at least three inches on him, Dale should have known better than to question his friend's manhood.

Wendy sighs beside him, and Chip notices how her eyes flicker between Dale and the sunlight, as if both are equally impressive. It is true, that she is blinded by both, but in actuality, when it came to the stars and Dale, there isn't much contest.

"I never really liked sunrises," she says crinkling up her nose, "they make me feel small and insignificant." Wendy leans back, placing her hands behind her and drumming her fingers chaotically on the hood of the car. "Sunsets are even worse," Wendy admits, looking at the sky with forced indifference, "Sunsets are endings."

"I know what you mean," Dale nods, "People make the sun up to be something carefree and happy, but it's all so superficial. After all, people tell their secrets to the moon."

"Excuse you, Walt Whitman," Chip murmurs. Dale hears his snarky reply and glances over at Chip, who is on the other side of Wendy. "Nice one," Dale says, too amused to be offended.

"Thanks?" Chip says, unsure why he is being complimented for parroting back pieces of conversation. He is further confused by the fact that both Wendy and Dale are not as fond of the sunlight as he. "Don't you like being anonymous?" He asks them, because he always found it comforting, to be forgotten in a certain way.

Wendy turns to him, and even with the sunglasses covering her eyes, Chip can tell that she is frowning at him. And not because the sunlight has penetrated through the tinted lenses. "Why would you want to be anonymous when the whole world can remember you? Don't you want to mean something? Have some lasting impact and not just fade away like everything does?" Her voice rises a few pitches, not extremely noticeable to those who weren't paying attention, but Chip has always liked sounds. Sounds tended to strike chords within people and they would light up in strange ways.

"I do want to mean something. But not to everyone, just a few select few. Everyone means something. I just want to be cared by the people who care about me. Quality, not quantity."

Dale snorts, "Not when you're talking about money, though. Then it's all about the quantity." He trails off for a bit, "But cool thoughts, man. Cool thoughts."

Chip looks at the sun, and he can feel it burn through him. And he thinks maybe this ball of energy, light minutes away understands him better than organic life forms. Is it bad to just want to simply exist? Observe. Live simply. Take things easily. Why not go with the flow instead of fighting the current?

Some things just seem pointless to him. What is the point of being remembered when your physical form fades away anyways? 

There are very few things that are eternal. Chip knows this. Nothing lives on. Everything evolves and changes and yet they still try to hold on to an imagined future. Things are always out of control.

"I just like being washed away in a crowd. Being part of it, like a gear in a machinery, but no one is quite sure about its function."

"That just sounds depressing," Wendy says, clinging on to remembrance that is to last through the ages. Chip decides that he will remember her regardless. To him it is enough. For her, she scarcely notices.

Chip shakes his head, knowing he is not getting his point across successfully, "But gears have a function. They're necessary to make things work. Maybe I'm just a team player. I can't explain it. Words aren't my thing." 

"What is Chip's thing then?" Dale asks him.

He can feel the answer creeping across his tongue, but he clamps his mouth shut. He shouldn't be going around saying those silly things.

"I don't know yet," Chip says, which is half the truth and half something else. The future is a complex thing. "The way I see it, I am a junior in high school. I'm currently residing on that thin little slice of life between youth and adulthood, and I can barely grasp either of them. I'll find something eventually. But right now, I have everything a junior in high school needs. I'm lucky, and happy. Society may frown upon our recklessness because of this halfway state that we're in, but it doesn't matter. Time doesn't stand still and neither will I. Right now, things aren't chaotic and adventure's in the air. Things will be okay. I can feel it."

Chip begins whistling Chim Chim Cheree again, and instead of watching them watching him, he watches the sun rise in perfect sync with the rhythm of the song.

---

oh my god, chip, u cutie.

I hate studying, so I wrote instead. This will bite me in the butt in the long run.