To Hug A Cloud

20250723

Prompt from DailyPrompt.com

When I was little, I used to lay outside and reach my hands up to the sky above, convinced I could touch the great moving clouds if I just extended my arms a little further. I was sure they would be soft. Sun-warmed. That inside they would smell like the freshest wind-dried sheets.
As I grew older I’d spend hours climbing trees. Preferably on hills. Gazing down at my little town, trying to imagine how it’d look if I was high as the clouds.
One incident which my parents will never let me live down involved riding the sails of the windmill. It was thrilling, but not at all what I imagined riding a cloud would be like.
Then I learned about airships. How they harnessed living clouds to fly across the sky. I was smitten with the idea. Saved up to travel to the great sky harbour, ready to finally make my dream come true.
When I found out that airships won’t take you until you’re twenty-five, I took a job with one of the merchants who “harnessed” the living clouds.
I vividly remember the one hunt I went on. The cloud was fluffy, and warm, and smelt crisp and fresh. It was everything my young self had dreamed of.
And I’m certain it was screaming as the harpoons dragged it to earth and it was forced into the waiting balloon.
I quit that evening. Forfeited my pay, dashed my chances of getting a recommendation. I didn’t care. I no longer wanted anything to do with airships.
But I still dreamed of riding a cloud.
So I stayed in the mountains. Took odd jobs to get by. And studied living clouds.
They were skittish. Wary. Most skirted around the mountains, afeard of the hunters.
I learned, however, that they nested in the high-up valleys. Young clouds were fragile and couldn’t withstand strong winds.
A nesting cloud’s warning rumble is a fearsome thing indeed. I always heeded it. Sat at whatever distance they decreed to observe.
They ate mist and drank from springs. They loved hot springs in particular. But drinking seemed a struggle for them, especially the babies. A slow, laborious process. I saw possibility.
I built a crop-mister next to the most popular spring. Started pumping.
Within minutes I was swarmed with baby clouds! They were cooler than the adults, and felt as if they might melt against my skin. I didn’t dare pet them. But I rejoiced to watch them bob around me eagerly, without fear.
Once the babies were satisfied, full and wobbly, the adults drifted close to drink. My arms whined and trembled but I brushed this aside. The adults were more cautious and I didn’t dare stop for a moment in case they left.
They gulped down the mist with gusto until finally I could pump no more. I sat full of aches and righteous delight.
And the clouds lingered. Their tendrils licked the sweat from my face, left my hair dripping clean and my clothes smelling fresh. I wasn’t sure if they were expressing gratitude or if the salty water I produced simply tasted good, but either way I gently, gently petted them as they brushed past.
Every dawn and dusk, when the valley filled with mist and the clouds roamed furthest, I’d go to the spring and pump ladleful after ladleful of pungent water into the air. Every day I met new babies, and was allowed to pet more adults.
I expected as autumn passed and the babies grew into younglings I would get fewer visitors. But the growing chill didn’t put the clouds off. Now it was numbness which limited my labour more than exhaustion, my body having grown used to the exertion. Even with mountain clothing from my new neighbours I struggled with this frigid climate.
No matter. Hugging a cloud warmed me down to my heart. I couldn’t leave, even for a season.
Next spring there were more clouds nesting in the valley than ever. I was thrilled!
Then one day I found a Cloud Hunter inspecting my pump, and the throng of clouds who were floating at a safe distance from him.
My heart choked my throat. Memories of that soul-crushing hunt flooded my veins with panic and fury. I raised my walking stick like a club and he threw up his hands.
“Please whisperer, please, a moment of your time. And then I will leave peacefully. I promise.”
I faltered, the flash of rage quenched by his plea, and gestured for him to speak.
He told me that airships, while profitable, were doomed; clouds did not live long trapped in balloons. The ever-growing demand for new clouds were wrecking populations.
“We can’t go on like this. Everyone knows it but none of them will admit it.”
“So?” I leant on my stick and scoffed.
For a moment he was silent. Then he spoke of the learning which sprang from travel. Varied wisdoms meeting and mingling and produces wonders like medicines. How, having met the distant other, it was harder to call for war.
Now I was silent.
He looked at the clouds which circled above us. “You’ve gained their trust. Learned to interact with them. I want to work with you. I have plans for a harness which will let a cloud tow an airship without suffering. It will take work. A lot of work. And much learning. And the routes will be longer, slower, if we are sailing the cloud’s paths. But… I believe that if we wish to keep flying, we must learn to ride clouds, not use them.”
I thought of my young dreams, of hugging a cloud and riding it high into the sky until I could see the whole world. I thought of airship harbours filled, not with cloud screams, but clouds alighting for treats, carrying peace and medicine.
I put down my stick. I picked up the ladle.
“I’ll fill. You pump. And… we’ll see what we can do.”

Prompt was the first sentence.