Based off a one word prompt: fragility. New to writing, all feedback and criticism welcome!

An eruption of laughter in the distance.

The sounds of whimsical, carefree joy echoing throughout the fenced-in yard, berating my senses while perched up on the balcony, overlooking the source of pleasant chaos.

Maya was laughing herself sick, running around and tackling the neighbor's Cane Corso named Dukey. Dukey the gentle giant, the neighborhood watchdog responsible for the safekeeping of our small community. He wasn't capable of hurting a fly, but one look at his stature and any would-be petty thief would shake in their boots and reconsider their life of debauchery. Allowed to freely roam the neighborhood, he typically did laps of patrol through the front yards of the houses, stopping to laze around on his owners porch in the shade whenever the Charleston summer sun was too unforgiving. However, the last few summers, it seems he spends more and more of his time in my backyard, rolling around and being chased by Maya.

Ever since she started walking a couple of years ago, there hasn't been a day passed where she hasn't found a way out of the house to go and play with Dukey. Almost double her height and quadruple her weight, jaws the size of her head and neck combined, paws that could end her short stint in this mortal realm so soon after it began. And her — not a single bone of fear in her body. All she sees is a gigantic fluffy friend, a teddy bear that she could ride on and feed and cuddle with, one who seemingly never runs out of energy and is always on board to jump in muddy puddles unlike Mom and Dad.

The gentle breeze picked up slightly, wafting the scent of swamp air and seafood boil seasoning up to me in my hammock. I looked away from my book for a few moments, doing my best to store the scene that was taking place before me deep into the creases of matter in between my ears; realizing that I was watching a core memory — a canon event, if you will — unfold before my very eyes. Dukey was postured low, rear legs loaded and ready to catapult his massive bodyweight in what seemed to be the direction of my daughter. Maya stood tall, Paw Patrol dress dancing lazily in the wind; armed with a bubble wand, trying and failing to contain her giggles in anticipation for what would happen next. She swiftly brought the wand to the ground, creating a large bubble of soap that wiggled and wavered itself into existence. As soon as Maya said "GO!", Dukey launched himself in an effort to dissuade this foreign assailant now floating a few feet above them. The bubble continued to rise, away from the imminent danger looming below. Rising, lifting, floating, until.... *POP*!! Gone forever is that bubble, disappeared into the ether without a trace.

Down below, Dukey had calmed his protective attack into a mellow, tranced sprawl, recuperating the energy he just expended protecting his best friend. Or not; you can never really tell with animals, it would be cool if they could talk back to us, relay their needs and emotions in another way besides body language. Maya's unbridled giggle fit also calmed down to a controlled babble, still as warm and as infectious as before, just less intense. She reclined against big Dukey, muttering "I love you, pup" as her image was swallowed up by the mountain of a dog in the grass beside her. That was one of their favorite positions; Dukey lounging on his side, legs sticking out to make space for Maya to crawl up and lean against his belly. Any time the house seemed a little too quiet or I couldn't find her, I'd check the backyard and more often than not there they'd be, cuddled up and napping out in the warmth of the sun. It's so funny, I thought, how quickly they can switch from a frantic, erratic state into calm and quiet, and oftentimes asleep. It's also very funny to me that bubbles of all things could turn a nonviolent excuse for a guard dog into a full blown killing machine, or at least make it seem that way.

My mind hung on the thought of bubbles for a moment. Bubbles; a great metaphor for anything fragile, really. They can be created intentionally or as a byproduct, like using a wand versus washing dishes or clothes. They move to the beat of their own drum; following air currents, or congregating in a foamy formation, or sloshing around as the spin cycle subsides. They can be destroyed almost as easily as they're created; erased from existence the instant that the conditions aren't perfectly favorable for them to thrive. A gust too strong, contact with an environment not saturated enough with soap, a shift in air pressure or temperature and \*POP\*!! Gone forever is that bubble, disappeared into the ether without a trace.

Is it the fragility of a bubble that makes it so desirable? So awe-inspiring? So easy to overlook? To underappreciate?

I think my love for Maya's mother could be likened to a bubble. An instantaneous, electric attraction instigated between us the moment we laid eyes on each other; dish soap poured into a shallow pan. Neither of us had the courage to investigate the spark, yet neither of us could deny the warmth given off from that singular initial spark. Both emotionally freezing, unconsciously clawing out in the dark for that spark, a modicum of something desirable and essential flashing before our eyes in the vacuous void of reality we resided. One spark turned into many; unintentional "I never expected to see you here"s turning into the calculated remapping of busy lives. A stir, a shake, a little finesse and flick of the wrist, and around us was a bubble, wiggling and wavering itself into existence. Neither of us any the wiser, neither of us well versed in the responsibility necessary to keep that bubble afloat and unpopped. But in the moment, none of that mattered. The iridescent scrambling of light waves scattered across the surface, reminiscent of the interruptions coming to invade our perfectly round, blissful bubble of love; interruptions bombarding from every single angle. Yet the interruptions never prevailed, they came and went in the same fashion that the sun seems to do from our perspective here on earth. Here then not-here, overbearing then nonexistent, momentary blindness then expansive nothingness. Passing glances turned to meticulous studying; random flares of emotion to a steady stew slow roasting over the hot coals of passion. A sensation of floating through problems, of rising above the gaze of society, of lifting ourselves toward the highest form of actualization; two lost souls separated at the inception of time and space and being, finally allowed to rediscover each other and satiate the eternal famine for intimacy that once defined their every action. Allowed to lament and to grieve and to celebrate and to be merry, allowed to turn away from each other then fervently recombine, allowed to test the bounds and limits of that fragile bubble encapsulating our souls together. Until....*POP*!!

Maya's mother died in a car crash. I still remember the heaviness of my eyelids when I stirred that morning, slowly returning to my body from the realm of dreams I was inhabiting prior. I still remember the grin slowly encroaching on the corner of my mouth as I watched her careful movements around the dimly lit bedroom; she probably thought I was still asleep. The night that just ended was the first time that Maya slept all the way through the night, away from us in her own room, no middle-of-the-night swaddling or feeding or diaper changing needed. Although I was still battling with my stream of consciousness to stay awake, I still remember the unplaced excitement slowly rising from the bottom of my heart. I could slightly sense the beginning of a new chapter, a new life yet to be lived, a new set of challenges yet to be overcome. For so long I've toiled with possessing a will to exist, a want to stay here in this world. How foolish, how selfish, how stupid could I have been to flirt with the idea of non-existence when this is my reality! How blessed am I, to be able to see a storm in the distance and actually look forward to the damage that it'll leave in its wake?

For the storm will pass eventually, and in rebuilding from the wreckage is an opportunity to learn so much. What ideals you thought were sturdy and foundational, yet gave away the instant they were pressed under the weight of a crosswind; what pain and grief you haphazardly buried in an attempt to focus elsewhere, the cover of loose dirt blown away, a scab ripped off and wound reopened. That's one of the wonderful joys of life, I thought; you spend all this time and energy building and building up what you see as perfect, and when a devastating storm comes through to destroy everything you know, you have options. You can abandon the destruction and walk away, starting fresh elsewhere. You can sit in the destruction, jagged edges and dangerous pitfalls all around you, refusing to let go of what once was. You can rummage through the destruction, taking everything that's salvageable and repurposing it for later use. You can react in any way you see fit; just remember that your reaction is your decision and yours alone. No matter the outside influence, no matter the expectations to live up to, a decision that aligns with your heart will ultimately always be the right one.

The sound of an ice cream truck at the end of the street snapped me from my trance, popped the bubble that I had retreated to while churning my thoughts. My gaze was still fixed on Maya and Dukey; I saw a hint of movement and started laughing to myself because I knew exactly what was to happen next. "DAD!!" Maya blurted out, arising from her slumber in a speed that would make Olympic sprinters self-conscious about their reaction time. "THE ICE CREAM MAN!!!" Now it was my turn to let the joy escape the death grip of my soul, let it reverberate though my body and escape in all directions, flowing out as it should be; not bottled up the way I tend to keep it. "I'M TAKING YOUR WALLET, I'LL BE RIGHT BACK!!" With that last remark, she bounded off towards the back door of our house at a pace that would make Sydney Coleman feel her world records threatened; Dukey close behind, trotting and plotting on which neighborhood kid he'd chase in hopes of receiving a treat in the form of ice cream dropped on the ground out of fear.

The fragility of a bubble, huh? Who would've known that a topic so mundane could incite such vivid emotions, such raw visuals, such a tangible sadness.