As she reached the door of the hotel room, it opened inward and a slight blonde figure with a black baseball cap stepped down onto the sidewalk. The door started to swing shut behind her, but she caught it with her foot. “Morning, Cassie! Good day for it.” Carol smiled and let Cassie walk past her into the large hotel room.

“Feels like. How are the winds?” Cassie smiled back and held the door for a moment.

“Good, good. I’m looking forward to my flight. We all should go far with northerly winds.”

Cassie nodded and tucked the information away into her ballooning knowledge file. She had fallen completely in love with ballooning after her first flight, not that she could afford her own rig, but she knew she wanted to be a part of the ballooning world. Crewing for Captain Bob was the next best thing.

In the hotel room, a flurry of activity was occurring, each step occurred with precision. “Cassie, love, go get us some breakfast, if you would. Get six boxes and see if Carol wants any for her crew.” Captain Bob brushed past her and patted her on the arm. “Good day for it.”

“Aye, aye, Captain. See you in a minute or two.”

Cassie ran into Carol on the way back with her own armful of breakfast boxes, each filled with a juice box, a wrapped donut, a piece of fruit and a napkin. She snacked on a hardboiled egg for energy and gathered her own stack of breakfast and headed back toward the rest of the bustle. Jon was driving the truck with the balloon rig in the trailer around the hotel closer to the door for final loading. He waved at her but she just nodded, her hands full.

Captain Bob and Arlene grabbed their breakfast box from her arms when she got to the room. She was left with breakfast for the crew, including her own breakfast and Jon’s. Stacking them by the door, she grabbed the other handle of the champagne cooler and helped Arlene tote it out to the truck. Jon grabbed the cooler from her and swung it up into the bed of the pickup, with a grin.

“Thanks, Jonny. Breakfast by the door.” She smiled back and headed back toward the room. She thought it was really too bad that Jon was already married. Oh, well, weren’t all the good ones taken? The other two volunteers, a married couple Mark and Linda or Glenda, Cassie hadn’t figured out which, pulled the rest of the things out of the room and loaded them into the truck bed. She grabbed the rest of the breakfasts and handed them out at the truck as everyone piled in.

The sun was still beneath the horizon as they drove into Albuquerque and the Balloon Festival. A large pink pass rested on the windshield under the rear view mirror. When they came to the park, Captain Bob said, “Check out this guy, he always dances as he directs the traffic.” They pulled forward and the traffic director grinned and pranced on his sneaker covered feet in the early morning dust. His flags pointed them toward the field.

“Good morning to you!” Captain Bob called out the window, waving his free hand. They drove out to the marker with their number designator and stopped the truck.

“Passengers will be ready about 6:30 to pick up at the main tent. Have some breakfast, and stretch your legs for a bit, we’ll be ready to start in 15 minutes.” Cassie and the other volunteers clambered out of the pickup and stretched. Although the trip was only about 10 minutes from the hotel, there were enough people in the cab to make it a snug fit. Cassie camped out on the pickup bumper, with the trailer hitch between her feet. She checked her hair to make sure the braid was holding.

After everyone had breakfast, Cassie made a dump run with all the boxes and random detritus from breakfast. By the time she got back, the trailer was open and Jon and Mark had the rails up and the basket was on the way out into the cool morning air. It was a large wicker basket, five feet on a side, with three compartments, two for passengers and the last for Captain Bob and the six tanks of liquid propane.

The basket was set on the grass. The frame came out next, the square of metal tubing with the braces covered in thin soft leather strips. “Cassie, come over here, I need you to hold this,” Jon called over to her. She stood by the basket and held up half the frame, arms wide, as Jon climbed on the basket, putting the other half up against the first. Soon the frame was together, and Captain Bob got out the burners and handed them one at a time to Jon who attached them securely. The basket went over on its side for a few final adjustments.

When Cassie looked around, she noticed that the sun had finally broken over the horizon and they were surrounded by people wandering around and looking at the different balloons. Their nearest neighbors had their envelopes out and some were even filling with air.