Hey y'all, my beloved readers! I was in the middle of doing my homework when this idea just kind of popped in my mind. Since it won't let me go, I decided to at least write the first chapter once and for all. It's quite relief, I may say. And because this is done, I can now study MATH! (which is, BTW, the subject area I am totally flunking. .)
Anyway... I must make one thing clear before I go on yapping over here:
ME = BEGINNER
I'm sure you'll understand. :) Now, on with the story.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Tinker Bell. Obviously.
Chapter One – The Letter
Autumn. It is indeed a season swathed by an ambiance filled with combined mystery and excitement. It is the time of the year when the birds release their sweetest melodies and the moment wherein green nature gives off her unsurpassed beauty; before disappearing completely in the thick blanket of milkiness that is yet to come. When autumn arrives, all fairies and sparrow men in Pixie Hollow will no doubt feel the tranquility and relaxation that the season shouts, amid their busy schedules and countless work that are still left undone.
The flawlessness of the occasion is perfectly reflected by the mood of a certain Water fairy peacefully daydreaming inside her wooden house, which settled at the heart of the crystal-clear Lilypad Pond. She just sat there, looking through her window, as she silently admired the splitting sunlight that pierced through the red and brown maple leaves, dancing and humming with the wind's soft breeze. Closing her stunning brown eyes, she allowed her mind to race back to random memories that occurred earlier that week.
She could remember: those talks, those stares, those smiles…all of them just kept giving her unexplained feelings that she opt, but couldn't, ignore. Just like how a hawk zooms in to capture its prey, her inexplicable emotions haunted her mercilessly just as it tried to torture her fear-bounded heart.
Twirling her midnight locks, the water fairy wondered out loud, "Will he ever ask me?"
Just then, three short knocks shyly resonated from her wooden oak door. The raven-haired girl then ceased her imaginings and fluttered gently towards it. After turning the knob, she came face to face with a brown-haired sparrow man that she vaguely recognized.
"May I help you?" she questioned; her voice as polite as ever.
The sparrow man, who obviously turned anxious all of a sudden, looked around before letting out a stammered sentence. "G-good morning, Miss Silvermist. I—*cough*—I'm Blane; fast-flying talent." He subsequently offered his right hand, which the water fairy shook eagerly.
"Nice to meet you, Blane," Silvermist replied cheerfully. "So, what brings you here? Do you need something?"
Blane shyly scratched the back of his head. As if hesitating to say something, the fast-flying sparrow man started murmuring while his eyes shifted rapidly from one direction to another. It was either he was practicing what to say or he was just giving himself words of encouragement.
Silvermist tilted her head a bit in confusion. "Is there something wrong?" she inquired worriedly.
"No! I mean…no. I just came here to—" Blane paused for a while, and with an exaggerated sigh, he continued. "—to ask you to be my date for the upcoming Blue Magic Ball."
Silvermist's eyes, which some anticipated to be filled with shock and disbelief by now, retained their usual glow and understanding aura. The Blue Magic Ball—she had heard that before. In fact, that's all what she had been hearing since the beginning of fall. According to the Queen herself, the Blue Magic Ball is a tribute to the heavens for all the blue Pixie Dust it bestowed upon Pixie Hollow last year. Although there will be a formal ceremony and a string of rituals, the Blue Magic Ball is still a normal get-together where everyone is allowed to enjoy themselves.
The water fairy is pretty much used to these kinds of invitations by now. Quite frankly, Blane is the 5th sparrow man who asked gentle Sil to be their date this week. The earlier ones hadn't been so lucky, because Silvermist turned them all down.
"Blane, listen," Silvermist said calmly, trying her best to knit up a sentence that would at least sound sympathetic. Yes, she was going to refuse his invitation. It was never her intention to hurt anybody or anything, but, she could not afford saying 'sure' yet to someone that she wasn't even looking forward to. She was still waiting for someone else, even though the chance of him asking her is still pretty unsure.
"I'm sorry, but—" she stopped when Blane suddenly cut her sentence with a nervous laugh.
"It's okay if you don't want to," he grinned at her, his hands fiddling with the edges of his shirt. "I completely understand. No need to worry about me! Ha-ha!"
After his awkward response, Blane hastily bid the black-haired girl goodbye and apologized for all the dilemma. He then flew away, so fast, that it made Silvermist wonder if that was the full-potential of a fast-flying talent.
Silvermist poised herself to close her door. Sighing, she focused her gloomy eyes on the direction where Blane flew off. She clutched her hands on her chest as she struggled to soothe herself from the stinging feeling that had infected her just now.
"I did it again," she mused aloud. Though her sentence seemed to have a hint of triumph and accomplishment, her voice sounded like it was expressing the exact opposite. Perhaps, it's because she hated turning people down.
Maybe she should just let the next sparrow man knock, and then pretend she's not home? That way, she could stop hurting someone. But that still wouldn't be right, would it? Because if she does that, the sparrow men would just keep waiting.
"Hey!" a shrill feminine voice brought a halt to her reverie. "Silvermist! Wait!"
"Fawn?" she looked up and saw the familiar braided fairy zooming towards her.
"Sil!" Fawn interjected, breathing deeply before saying anything more. "It's Tinker Bell! She told us to come to her house, ASAP! She said it was an emergency!"
Silvermist tried to calm Fawn down by rubbing her back. "Hey, don't panic. Maybe she just wants us to test her new invention."
"No, she said it was different this time. And when she told me earlier, I could see that she was panicking," Fawn stated.
Wait, Tink was panicking? If it was Iridessa, Silvermist would've just laughed about the whole thing. Iridessa panics even with the most trivial stuff. But, it wasn't her this time. It was Tinker Bell. Sure, Tink could be moody and hot-headed in general, but it was really unlike her to freak out like that.
"What do you think this is about?" Silvermist asked.
"I don't know. Let's go; no time to lose," with that, Fawn speedily grasped Silvermist's arm and dragged her towards the tinker's place.
Later, at Tinker Bell's kettle house…
"What's going on, sugar?" Rosetta asked, quite relieved to see Tink safe and unharmed inside her house. "You told us it was an emergency."
"Are you hurt?!" Iridessa, who just arrived, whooshed to where the tinker sat and keenly examined her face for any traces of injuries. As she always does, she kept tilting Tink's body parts while recalling some of the first aid techniques she had learned back in summer. "Did you break something? Your leg, perhaps? Guys, what are you waiting for? Let's take her to the infirmary!"
The others laughed while Silvermist made her way to pacify her light talent friend.
"Dess, you're squishing her," she giggled, gently pulling Iridessa away from Tinker Bell. "So, what seems to be the problem, Tink?"
Tinker Bell, who looked a bit confused from the moment the other fairies got there, first gazed at them without a word. She afterwards took a green envelope from behind her and handed it to them.
Fawn took the letter from inside it. "What's this?"
"I'm not sure," Tinker Bell said. "I received it this morning."
"A death threat?" Iridessa shrieked before the others hushed her down.
"No," Tink giggled. "It is not actually a big deal. But, I decided to show you because I don't know what to do."
With that, Rosetta swiped the envelope out of Tink's hand opened it quickly. The three other fairies crowded around her, their eyes so big that they seem to be bulging out of their eye sockets. Fawn read what's written on it aloud.
"Dearest Tinker Bell," Fawn, restraining herself from bursting out laughing, said as she scanned the entire letter before continuing. "I know this is all too sudden and you'll probably freak out when I ask you personally…"
Iridessa took a turn to read. "…so, I decided that giving you a letter would do just the trick. You know, I have always found you rather attractive."
"You might think this is creepy, but, I secretly follow you everywhere." As Silvermist read this part of the letter, all of her other friends gasped in surprise. Sil laughed afterwards and continued, "Don't worry, I only do that when you're outside your house."
"It has been a long time that I held back these emotions because I didn't want to ruin our friendship," Rosetta smiled, heaving the letter closer to her eyes as she read. "Tink, I cannot express all of what I needed to say in my letters alone—"
"Letters?" Fawn butted in.
Rosetta rolled her eyes and continued. "—so, I decided to be straightforward this time."
Iridessa stated the last sentence of the letter. "Tinker Bell, will you be my date for the Blue Magic Ball?"
"Love, your secret admirer," Silvermist, after reading the signature, giggled with the others as she handed wide-eyed Tink the letter back. Soon after, Tink's friends rushed towards the tinker fairy and all cuddled for a group hug.
"We're so happy for you, Tink!"
Failing to escape her friends' tight embrace, Tinker Bell struggled to blurt out a statement. "Girls, I—I can't breathe!"
They all break loose after that.
"So Tinker Bell, are you going to agree?" Fawn asked excitedly. "We'll help you pick a dress."
"And help you look pretty!" Rosetta cried blissfully.
"No, wait," the blonde gestured everyone to stop. "I don't even know who that is! Secret Admirer here had been sending me letters since the beginning of autumn. But it is only until now that he asked me about the ball. I'm not sure what to do."
"Do you have any idea who the source might be?" Silvermist stated as she approached Tinker Bell. She actually had someone in mind, but she still asked her tinker friend for confirmation.
"I—I'm not sure," Tinker Bell sighed, closing her eyes in deep thought. "No. It's impossible."
"Who, buttercup?" Rosetta spoke. "And why is it impossible?"
Tinker Bell looked up at her friends blushingly, trying with all her might not to smile. A little while later, though, she failed doing so. All the others looked at each other understandingly.
"Oh, I get it," Fawn smirked as she placed her hand on her chin. "Maybe, it's that Terrence guy."
Everyone started cheesing and poking Tink around.
"No, guys, stop it," Tink said between her snorts. "It can't be him. He's one of my best friends."
"But the letter did say 'I didn't want to ruin our friendship'! It has to be him!" Iridessa beamed.
"I still don't know…"
"But, if it is him, you'd agree?"
Tinker Bell paused for a while. "Maybe? He's my friend right? So, I guess agreeing to go with him wouldn't hurt, would it?"
"Tinker Bell, you're so naïve," Fawn tapped Tinker Bell's back. "Yes, he is your friend. But, if he is the letter-sender, going with him would not be a friendly affair anymore. It would be more of a—um—boyfriend-girlfriend thing or whatsoever. He already confessed, and you approved."
"But if you don't, however," Rosetta whispered. "It's either you'll lose your tightness or you'll actually drift apart."
"What?" Tinker Bell laughed at the bizarreness of her friends' ideas. "Terrence is not like that. We will always be tight."
"I'm afraid that isn't the case Tink," Iridessa spoke up. "This is the real world, after all."
"So, what am I going to do?"
"Well," Fawn stated. "Do you like him?"
Tinker Bell just laughed in response, but the others knew very well what that meant.
"Then go for it! But make sure it really is him, first. As for now, don't reply!"
Silvermist, with her lips still twitched into a gorgeous smile, patiently watched as her friends continue bringing up more and more topics about the issue. So, she was right. Tinker Bell does like Terrence.
She was happy for her, she really was. The water fairy always knew Tinker Bell as someone who is really poor in decision-making; someone that easily gets carried away with her bursting emotions. In fact, she was really surprised to see her tinker friend so laid-back when she handed the letter to them, because, before she even got there, Sil was expecting Tink to explode all of her emotions out or cry on their shoulders. That is what she usually does after all. The raven-haired girl was just kind of surprised to see a different Tink right now.
Maybe that's the side-effect of liking someone—she thought—one unknowingly lets loose a whole different side of his or her personality the moment he or she feels something different. Though Tink didn't say (and she probably never will) that she does, the water talent can clearly sense the tinker's strong like for Terrence. It wouldn't be impossible for Tink's feelings to turn into love, if she isn't careful.
With her bronze eyes flickering with an unusual glow, Silvermist shifted her strong gaze towards Tinker Bell. There she is, her tinker friend, laughing aimlessly as she releases her insights to her and her friends. She and Silvermist had always been close. They had been like sisters. They shared almost everything, from the smallest, disposable stuff to the greatest memories the both of them made. Who would've thought that they also shared the same feelings towards the same person?
Just like how the river gushes to seek the answers hidden in the vast ocean, the water fairy's mind drifted far, forming up possibilities that could arrive within her and her friend's way.
"Tinker Bell," she thought, still intently looking at her fellow fairies, "I am so sorry. I didn't know that you were my competition."
Smiling, she tucked the stray strands of her hair behind her ear and faced downwards. "But I will not lose. Not this time."
Sorry for any grammatical lapses, wrong spellings, typos or whatsoever. It was like, midnight last night when I wrote this. I had to stay awake because of the, you know, homework.
I have to admit, it's pretty freaky sitting inside your dark room during Halloween midnight. I get this feeling that someone's staring at me. From the window. Brrr.
Anyway, TTFN! God bless! :D HAPPY HALLOWEEN!