That evening, before dinner, Ziggy, Lily, Skye, and Dash were playing in the garden, making up silly little songs. Ziggy clapped his hands on an upside-down bucket, Dash blew into a straw, Lily shook a jar full of buttons, and Skye hummed along in her calm little voice. Together they made a happy muddle of sounds.

All around them, Ziggy's four cats were listening. Sofia, the little black cat, was purring. Dora, the brave tabby, pricked up her ears. Poldo, big and soft as a pillow, was dozing. Milo, skinny and springy, chased the notes as if they were butterflies.

"Do you hear that?" said Ziggy, laughing. "Each one of us plays in a different way, and together it's beautiful!"

Just then, from the far end of the garden, came a sound the children knew very well.

"CHOO CHOO!"

It was Toby the Magic Train! He popped out from the bushes with his little lights on and a smile painted on his front. Toby always spoke in rhyme, and he said:

"CHOO CHOO! Good evening, what a merry crew,
climb aboard for a magic trip, just for you!
I'll take you to a land that's sweet to lick and see,
where a different little voice will set your dreams free."

The four children clapped their hands and climbed aboard. The cats leaped on with a jump: first Milo, then Dora, then Sofia, and last of all Poldo, who took a little while because he was nice and chubby. "CHOO CHOO!" And off they went, into the night.

The little train raced among the stars and landed softly in a sparkling land. A light drizzle was falling from the sky, but it wasn't water: it was powdered sugar! It fell softly on the children's hair and on the cats' noses, and it made Poldo sneeze. "Ah-choo!" he went, and everyone laughed.

Dash licked his lips hungrily. "I smell vanilla and chocolate!" he said, and reached out toward a bush of jelly sweets. But Lily stopped him with a laugh: "First let's find out where we are, then we'll taste!" The four cats sniffed the sweet air too, their little tails straight up with curiosity.

"Where are we?" whispered Skye.

"In Sugarland," Lily read on a cookie sign. "And look over there!"

In front of them stood a big tent made of marzipan, a sweet, soft, cream-colored dough. Above the entrance, letters made of caramel spelled out: THE GRAND CARAMEL CIRCUS. There were licorice trapezes, a ring made of cookie, lampposts shaped like lollipops, and trees of cotton candy.

But something was strange. Everything was pale. Faded. Like a drawing left too long in the sun. The colors seemed to have disappeared, and even the cotton candy trees were gray.

The children went inside. Inside the tent, lots of little sugar creatures stood in a row, all exactly the same, singing just one note: "Laaaaa. Laaaaa. Laaaaa." Always the same one. Perfect, precise, and sad as a rainy Monday.

"Why do you all sing the same note?" asked Dash.

"Because it's the right one," the little creatures answered, without smiling. "The perfect note. All the others are wrong."

That was when the children heard, in a corner, a different sound. A little see-through crystal, sitting on a cushion of nougat, was singing a note all crooked: "Bloing-oing-oing!" And it laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

"There's the Out-of-Tune one!" the little creatures jeered. "Go away, peculiar crystal! Your note is wrong!"

"Peculiar?" asked Ziggy. "What does that mean?"

"It means strange, different from the others," explained Lily, who knew a few hard words.

The crystal looked down and stopped laughing. Ziggy came closer and gently stroked it. The crystal went "Bloing!" and, what a surprise, from its crooked note shot three tiny colored sparks: one red, one yellow, one blue. They flew up into the air and then went out.

"Did you see that?" shouted Ziggy. "When he sings differently, the color comes!"

"But the other creatures say it's wrong," said Skye, sad for the little crystal. She picked it up: it smelled of cotton candy and was warm like a cookie fresh from the oven.

Ziggy stayed quiet. He scratched his head. He looked at the crystal, he looked at the little creatures all the same, he looked at the sparks that had gone out. And all at once, in his head, a bright idea lit up, like a light bulb.

"Aha! I've got it!" he exclaimed, jumping into the air. "The colors don't come back with just one note. They come back when lots of DIFFERENT notes mix together! We have to build a great big music box!"

"A music box?" asked Dash. "What's that?"

"It's a machine that makes music all by itself," explained Ziggy. "A magic box full of little bells: you turn it and it plays a tune. We'll build a giant one, with all the sweets in the circus!"

The friends looked at each other. Then they all smiled together. "Yes!"

And here began the hardest part, because Ziggy didn't just have an idea in his head: he had to build it with his body.

He ran to the licorice trapezes and climbed like a squirrel. High up hung chocolate bells of every size. Ziggy struck one with his hand: "DONG!" It made a low, deep sound. He struck another: "DING!" A high, ringing sound. "Perfect!" he shouted. "Each one sounds different!"

But there were many bells, and they were far apart. Ziggy couldn't reach them all by himself. So he called his cats.

"Poldo, I need you for the big notes!"

Poldo, ever so proud, stood under the biggest bell and bumped it with his belly: "DOOONG!" A deep sound that made the caramel floor tremble. The children laughed.

"Milo, you take the high notes!"

Milo made super-high jumps from one little bell to another: "ding-ding-ding-ding!" It was like fireworks of high sounds.

"Dora, you keep the beat on the wire!"

Brave Dora walked along the licorice wire stretched across the tent, and with every step she tapped her tail: "tap... tap... tap...". A steady beat that held everything together.

All at once, Ziggy's foot slipped on a smooth chocolate bell. "Oops!" For a moment he swung in the air, his heart going thump-thump. But he stretched out his arms, grabbed a licorice trapeze, and climbed back up. "You need balance!" he said, catching his breath. And he started playing again, even more carefully.

Meanwhile Lily climbed up to gather the lollipops and lined them up like the keys of a piano, Dash ran quickly to tap them one after another, and Skye, with her sweet voice, helped the little crystal not to be afraid. "You are important," she whispered to it. "Wait for your turn."

Ziggy jumped from one bell to another, he climbed, he did somersaults, he hit the sugar keys with his hands and feet. Little by little, from the great caramel music box a song was born: a bit low, a bit high, a bit crooked, a bit sweet. And wherever that music passed, the gray disappeared and the color came back! Red, green, orange, purple. The tent began to shine.

But at that moment, from far away, came a rumble.

"RRRUUMBLE..."

It was a thunderstorm, still far off, grumbling in the sky like a big hungry tummy. The circus lights flickered and dimmed. The darkness was trying to creep back in.

"Quick!" shouted Lily. "If the light goes out, the color will never come back!"

Just one thing was missing. The music was beautiful, but not yet complete. Ziggy knew it: the crystal's crooked note was missing, the one nobody wanted.

"Now it's your turn!" said Ziggy to the little crystal. "Sing your note!"

But the little sugar creatures all began to protest at once: "No! His note is wrong! It's crooked! It will ruin everything!"

The crystal hesitated. It trembled. It looked at Ziggy with shiny eyes.

Ziggy jumped down from the trapeze and stood beside it. "It's not wrong," he said firmly. "It's just different. And your different note is exactly the one that's missing."

Sofia, the little black cat, rubbed against the crystal to give it courage and gave a soft "meow".

Then the little crystal took a breath, closed its eyes, and sang with all its heart: "BLOING-OING-OING!"

And that crooked, funny, different note dove into the music of all the others.

For a moment there was silence.

Then... BOOM! From the top of the tent a rainbow of sugar exploded! Waves of red, yellow, blue, green, and pink spread everywhere, like a sweet, shining waterfall. The gray ran away completely. And in the sky, with the storm clouds pushed away, a full moon appeared, big and round, lighting up the Grand Caramel Circus with its silver light.

The circus was full of color again. In fact, more beautiful than before.

The little sugar creatures stood with their mouths wide open. Then they began to laugh and sing, each one with its own note: some high, some low, some crooked, some sweet. And the more different they were, the more the circus sparkled.

"Thank you," said the little crystal, and every laugh of his was a spark of color. "I thought being different was a flaw. But it was a gift."

Skye hugged it. Sofia purred for it. And all together, children, cats, and creatures danced under the moon, inside the rainbow of sugar.

When it was time to go home, Toby the Magic Train arrived, with his little lights on.

"CHOO CHOO! Time to go, the moon waves you goodnight,
the strangest little note was the one that made it right!
Keep this in your heart as you snuggle into bed:
being different is a gift, so let your colors spread."

The children climbed aboard, with the four cats tired and happy. And as the little train flew home among the stars, Ziggy looked at his friends and smiled. Each one of them was different. And together, for that very reason, they were wonderful.

"CHOO CHOO!"