Tykayla Wells sports a tiara and scepter for her role as princess in Vicksburg’s Main Street Program third annual Mardi Gras parade today on Washington Street.(Melanie Duncan Thortis The Vicksburg Post)

[2/21/04]Eight-year-old Tykayla Wells never thought she would wear a crown, dance to the sounds of a marching band or be the leader in a line of glamorous floats.

But today she will do all those things. She will truly be a princess, the princess of Vicksburg Main Street Program’s third Mardi Gras parade.

When the parade rolls on Washington Street beginning at 2:30 this afternoon, Tykayla will be riding out front, waving the pageant wave she practiced with her siblings this week.

“I’m gonna cry,” she said.

Her special place comes after a simple request from a child who has been battling leukemia since she was 5 years old.

Tykayla, a student at Sherman Avenue Elementary, was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia in November 2001.

It was while receiving treatment at the Children’s Cancer Clinic at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson that she met Vicksburg native Frances Anne Thomas Dallaire through the Junior League of Jackson’s outreach program.

“All of the patients are special kids,” Dallaire said. “But, when she smiles at you, it makes you warm all over,” she said.

Tykayla’s mother, Kim Wells, said her daughter’s smiles were seen less and less once chemotherapy treatments began shortly after her diagnosis.

“All of her hair fell out,” said Wells, a single mother of three. “She prayed about that pretty hair.”

Dallaire said when she found out the second-grader wanted to be in a parade, she contacted Rosalie Theobald at the Vicksburg Main Street Program, who made it happen.

“I thought to myself, if this will make this little girl happy, then we need to take it one step further,” she said.

It will be the first time the Mardi Gras parade has had a princess.

Kim Wells said through the kindness of others, her daughter has been able to do many things she never thought possible, like riding in a tea cup and taking pictures with Cinderella at Disney World. That trip two years ago was thanks to the Make-A-Wish program, which allows wishes to come true for ill children.

“I try to let her do everything while she still can,” Wells said.

The wide-eyed little girl is already thinking about her next wish.

“I want to go in the mayor’s house because it is so big,” she said of Vicksburg Mayor Laurence Leyens’ home on Cherry and South streets.

Though Tykayla is in remission, Wells said she will keep praying that her daughter’s road to recovery is a short one. “She is my little angel,” she said.

As for Tykayla’s expected nervous tears, her mother gave her the answer:

“They will be tears of happiness,” she said.