At the Circus
The Lakes, England, 1880
"Bert, these are quite good!" Mary Poppins said when Bert showed her his drawings. He smiled shyly. After seeing the screever's artwork yesterday, Bert felt inspired to show Mary Poppins his sketchbook. A fresh drawing of their ferris wheel flight yesterday was the latest one. "Are these all places you have been to?"
"No," Bert replied. "Just in my imagination."
"So you have been to these places."
Bert wondered if she heard him. "No," he said again. "I have not."
"In what is imagined, there is always a seed of truth," Mary Poppins said, flipping through the pages of the sketchbook. "This one. You spent a lot of time on it."
Bert glanced at the drawing. "Yes, my mother told me she'd take me to the circus someday. She died before we could go together."
"Do you still want to go?" Mary Poppins asked.
The question unstopped something in Bert and longing flooded his heart. "Yes, I do."
"Tell me, Bert, have you ever seen a bluer sky?" Mary Poppins asked.
"What?"
"Have you learned nothing? Look up!"
Bert looked up and he saw what looked like the blue canvas of a circus tent. He gasped. "Are we at the circus, Mary Poppins?"
"You tell me!"
The air smelled of popcorn and spun sugar. Bert's eyes followed the slope of blue down to the red and white striped sides of the tent. Looking around him, he saw people filling bleachers and a menagerie of lions, tigers, elephants, and silver horses getting lined up for the show.
"We are at the circus!"
"Indeed you are, but it's such a shame that the circus won't actually happen today." Bert looked around for whoever said it. "Oh, I'm down here."
"A mouse!"
"He's an observant one, isn't he?" The mouse said to Mary Poppins.
"What do you mean the circus won't happen?" Bert asked.
"We have misplaced our ringmaster," the mouse sighed.
"How can you misplace a ringmaster?"
"The ringmaster is a flea. Oh dear, I hope he hasn't gotten himself squashed. But we can't have a circus without a ringmaster!"
"That just won't do," Mary Poppins stated.
"No it won't," Bert agreed. "Wait, Mary Poppins, you could be the ringmaster!"
"I could not!" Mary Poppins said. "I would be a ringmistress."
"Would that work? Mary Poppins would be a terrific ringmistress," Bert told the mouse.
"Why yes, I suppose that would work. And you could be her assistant!" the mouse said.
Bert started stammering. "Well, I-I…"
"It is decided! Start the show in five minutes. Thank you for saving the circus!" The mouse ran off-most likely to tell the performers.
"I don't know anything about being a ringmistress's assistant, Mary Poppins."
"The first step is to look like one," Mary Poppins said and then snapped. "There! I think that will do quite nicely."
Mary Poppins' usual hat stretched a little taller to become a top hat and her blazer dress transformed into a rich red velvet with a black bow tie. Bert's own outfit matched Mary Poppins' with the exception of his black slacks.
"The next step…" Mary Poppins thought for a moment and then shrugged. "Is just to be one."
"Ladies, gentlemen, and other sentient beings!" Mary Poppins called out to the crowd. "Welcome...to the most supercalifragilisticexpialidocious show on Earth!"
The crowd erupted into applause.
"Is that even a word?" Bert whispered to Mary Poppins.
"Of course it's a word! It's what you say when you don't know what to say." She started singing, "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious / Bert, call the lions over, proud and ferocious."
"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!" Bert sang, waving over the lions. The confidence he needed to be the ringmistress's assistant seemed to magically flow from the word. He waved the lions over and after them, the tigers, who all jumped through hoops Mary Poppins tossed in the air. And of course, they were all singing the wonderful word as they did so.
The elephants were next in line with trapeze artist monkeys zipping through the air above them and landing on the backs of the grey giants.
Finally, the silver horses trotted over to Mary Poppins and Bert, two of them bowing to let the ringmistress and her assistant on their backs. Mary Poppins, riding sidesaddle as her horse trotted around the ring, waved at the audience. The crowd roared with applause, giving her a standing ovation.
Bert's horse started out trotting, then it started sprinting, and then it started flying. He and the horse spiraled up towards the top of the Big Top.
"Bert! Come down this instant!" The crowd laughed, oooed, and awwed. Bert didn't know how to get down, and he wasn't sure he wanted to. In a world where animals talked, surely he could go see what life was like in the clouds. Perhaps he would find his mother there. He and his horse just had to go fast enough to burst through the canvas of the tent. The horse sped up and up…
Bert heard a snap. Pure white doves fluttered out from underneath him and he realized he wasn't sitting on the horse anymore. He almost screamed, but realized he was falling in a gentle, rocking motion, like a feather. It took a while for Bert to get down, landing safe and sound in Mary Poppins' arms. Mary Poppins spilled him out onto the ground and the crowd roared once again.
"The last thing we need to do is take a bow together," Mary Poppins said. "Bow on three, okay? One, two…"
Mary Poppins, Bert, and the animals took a bow. The mouse scurried up to them and squeaked his thanks again.
"Our pleasure!" Mary Poppins replied. She then snapped away their ringleader outfits and asked Bert if he wanted to explore outside of the tent.
"Yes, please!" Bert held Mary Poppins' hand and hummed supercalifragilisticexpialidocious to himself. Outside the tent, people were walking around taking in different acts and eating the treats he smelled earlier.
"Little boy!" a penguin balloon vendor called to Bert. "Would you like a balloon?"
"I'd love a balloon! May I have a balloon Mary Poppins?"
"Yes, but only one." Bert chose a green one and tied the string around his wrist.
"And would the lady like a balloon?" the penguin asked, blushing.
"No thank you," Mary Poppins said with a smile. The penguin turned a deeper red.
"Look at that!" Bert exclaimed. A man riding a unicycle on a tightrope caught his attention. "How is that even possible?"
"Practice makes perfect," Mary Poppins stated. "Like you practice drawing."
"My drawings are far from perfect."
"That is true. But they do transport you."
They gazed at the unicycling man together in silence, Bert still holding Mary Poppins' hand. There was something mesmerizing about watching the act of staying in balance.
"Shall we head back, Bert?" Mary Poppins asked.
Bert's eyes fell to the ground beneath the tightrope. "I don't want to go back," he whispered. "Mary Poppins?"
"Yes?"
"When I was flying on the horse, right before it turned into doves, I felt something, and I'm not sure what it was. It frightened me."
"Magic is difficult to control, and that's part of what you felt. I know how to control it though, and I will protect you."
"Thank you Mary Poppins." All of a sudden, Bert felt exhausted. The circus faded into the study at the Dawes' house, the sketchbook still open on Bert's lap. Bert yawned.
"Time for bed," Mary Poppins said. "Thank you for showing me your drawings. Go on upstairs, put your drawings away, and get ready for bed. I'll come up to tuck you in and turn down the lights."
Bert lingered for a bit, still trying to anchor himself.
"Spit spot!"
He nodded sleepily and walked through the parlor on his way to the stairs.
"Bert!" His father called out. "Come here, boy."
Bert reluctantly approached, looking at his father's shiny black shoes.
"Were you just with Mary Poppins? What do you do with her? I don't trust her…"
Bert didn't say anything.
"Well? Speak!"
Bert remained silent. He didn't know how to explain his adventures in a way his father would understand and wasn't sure he wanted to let his father into that part of his life.
"What is this?" Mr. Dawes yanked Bert's sketchbook out of his hands. "I thought I told you to not waste your time on these silly drawings."
"I was showing…" Bert choked up. He couldn't finish the sentence.
"Pathetic!" Mr. Dawes twisted Bert's nose.
"Ow!" Bert backed away from his father's hand, his nose throbbing.
"You're bad! An imbecile. Speak, boy!"
"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!" Bert blurted out. This stunned Mr. Dawes-so much so that he didn't bother to follow Bert when he ran up the stairs to his bedroom.