Chapter 6: Eleanor's Midnight Ride

Eleanor found herself still in her bed when her dream began. However, instead of the dark ceiling, she saw the night sky above as a tapestry of stars amid the dark blue fabric of the heavens. But when she looked down, there was no floor. Eleanor's bed was hundreds of feet in the air, covers and pillows and all, and Snow Bear was beside her.

Eleanor was afraid and clung tightly to her toy bear, expecting the bed to plummet out of the sky or tip over and send her falling, but to her great surprise, she seemed anchored to her bed by gravity. Looking to the sides, she found that her bed had sprouted a pair of wings and was carrying her around the clouds, and not once did she or her bed coverings slip off. Admittedly, Eleanor did feel her stomach turn when her bed flipped over to avoid one particularly big cloud, but her feet never left the covers. It was like she was buckled into a roller coaster car.

When she chanced to look down, Eleanor could see the lights of the city below and up ahead, she could see as far as California just below to Alaska in the far north. Suddenly, the blonde Chipette felt the wind blowing her pigtails back and she realized that she was riding her bed as if it were a magic carpet. At first, she was too happy to say a word, but Eleanor soon found her voice and said, "I… I'm flying!"

"That is because you are thinking of wonderful thoughts, Eleanor," came a small voice from beside her.

Eleanor nearly gasped when she realized she was holding the source of the voice. "Snow Bear? You talk?"

The little white teddy bear replied, "I can always be alive in your mind, sweetheart. Even in this dream, I can be your traveling friend."

Eleanor smiled and kissed her teddy on the forehead, and then resumed watching the stars pass overhead as her bed carried her through the sky. As she sailed through the open air, she felt the bed do aerial acrobatics as a cloud or two got in her path. The loop-de-loops made Eleanor a bit dizzy and so did the barrel rolls, but she marveled at the scenery of city lights and faraway mountains below and looked up thoughtfully at the stars. As she watched them, Eleanor saw them slowly form a picture in the dark sky. Right away, she knew what it was: Theodore, the Chipmunk whom she was closest to. The starry image of Theodore smiled at Eleanor and blew a kiss to her, and the twinkling dust tickled her nose.

A while later, Eleanor was sitting comfortably on her bed with Snow Bear in her arms when she saw a jet airliner rise from the clouds like a great metallic whale from the sea. With a friendly smile on her little round face, Eleanor flew close to the huge plane and waved to the people inside. When Eleanor waved to the pilots of that jetliner, she overheard the co-pilot say, "Captain, you're not gonna believe this, but I just saw a little girl with blonde hair riding a flying bed."

Eleanor was overcome with such a strong fit of laughter that she ducked under the covers and let her bed take her higher into the air so she could let out her giggles. Then as she emerged from her hiding place, she found her bed rising up over the clouds so high that the moon looked huge. Suddenly, Eleanor felt the bed floating directly on the cloud cover like she was on a boat in a river. Then she heard voices as high as her own call out to her.

"Hello, Eleanor," the voices called. "Miss us?"

To her great joy, Eleanor saw Brittany and Jeanette fluttering around her as angels. As Eleanor waved to them, she chanced to look for the man in the moon and saw something equally happy. The features of the moon's "face" shifted and took on the features of Miss Miller, who beamed at her as if to say "I love you, Eleanor."

Little Eleanor simply smiled and waved to the "Miss Miller" in the moon before she finally got under the covers of her flying bed and was tucked in by her two sisters, and she simply flew on with the stars shining above and her troubles left below.

A/N: What did you think of Eleanor's dream sequence, my readers? Let me know in a review if you wish, and before the story ends, one last brief chapter will be added. Enjoy!