I float above the sky, holding a beautiful lace umbrella in one hand and my mother's soft, nurturing hand in the other. "Come now, Clarice, we must find your father before nightfall"
"I wonder what profession he is today..." I say softly, thinking of my loving, often grimy father. "I hope he wasn't a chimney sweep again, it always makes me sneeze..."
My mother laughs as we begin to descend and then we land lightly in front of the park gates. My father is at his one-man-band routine and I breathe a sigh of relief. "Mary, I wadn't expectin' ya fer a good week or two! And Clary, yer lookin' more lovely by tha day!"
A tall man about 10 or so years my senior laughs and shakes my mother's hand warmly. "Hello Mary! Remember me?"
My mother smiles warmly. "Michael, how good it is to see you"
"I missed you, I really did!" He says with such enthusiasm that I can easily see him as a child. "I have children of my own now, a pair of twin girls! Unfortunately, they run out of Nannies like Jane and I did before we met you."
"Like father, like child, I always say." Mother chirps cheerfully.
"Mother, I'm going to sing with Father" I interject, folding my umbrella.
"You got married? Congratulations!" The man says to mother as she purses her lips.
"Oh no, of course not." I walk over to father and join him in singing to the bystanders. I can clearly hear my mother talking to her former charge. "Michael, you should know that practically perfect people have no time for marriage. Bert and I are... er... complicated... and Clarice is just a result of our relationship, is all..."
I clear my throat and sing a verse. "Chim chimney chim chimney, chim chim, chiree, as lovely as lovely as lovely can be, chim chimney chim chimney chim chim chiree, and this is the story of my family and me~" the crowd pushes closer to me, I have peaked their interest. "There once was a girl, as fair as can be, her hair was the color of dark ebony. There once was a boy, smart as the best, he never let the fair girl have any rest~" The crowd laughs. "The two were a pair, inseparable and grand, they never had something they left to demand. My mother and father, the pair I speak of is they, a jack of all trades and a nanny of fey~" the crowd is still, waiting for the end of my song. "They are bound to each other, but not in your way, the stories of Mary and Bert a secret they stay..."