Disclaimer: characters belong to Disney. So, probably, does everything from here to the moon.
So Weird-Second Chances
Ep 6: Fairies
Fi read the magic book until her eyes ached from looking at the strange words, then marked her place and put the book away. She had not marked the REJOIN spell. It would be hard to find again; this book had no page numbers. Fi had noticed the next spell seemed to be a countercharm-despite the 'forever' in the first one.
Maggie and Miranda flitted in talking about fairies. Fi didn't pay much attention until they said they were going out to the 'dirthills' that night since it was a full moon and the fairies might be out dancing. That woke Fi up; a midnight outing in December was not a good idea! She said so.
"But we have to!"
"It's important!"
"Dinah's coming with us."
Fi hadn't noticed Dinah standing in the door of her room, but that was no surprise. Maggie and Miranda could have upstaged a full marching band and Dinah was always quiet. Today she was wearing her old pink coat and a scarf around her neck.
"Hey. You can come in."
"Thankyou." One word.
"You want to go look for the fairies too Dinah?"
"Yes."
Miranda jumped in, "Of course! We all believe in them!"
"Please come with us?" Dinah said hesitantly.
"Guys, it's really not a good idea. It's December, it's cold enough during the day. Besides you don't know what you might meet, there's people out there worse than bad fairies. You know?"
The girls nodded.
Fi frowned. There was something strange going on; the girls looked serious, not their usual M-and-M-up-to-something look.
"We know Fi. We'll wear lots of coats and take pepper for humans and garlic for vampires."
"Pepper?"
"You throw it in their face. I read it in a book."
"O-kaaaaaay." Fi said. "So why do you want me along?"
"Weird stuff likes you." Maggie told her.
"And what if I don't come?"
"We'll go anyway." Dinah said.
"Yeah, and if you tell mom, we'll go next time there's a full moon! Or the time after that or the time after that!" Maggie said fiercely-real fierce, not game fierce.
"Ok, what are you guys up to? Is it really fairies or something else?" Fi was just guessing, but the looks that went across three faces confirmed her suspicion.
"Do we tell her?" Maggie asked her sister and her friend.
"Yes." Said Fi.
The three little girls huddled and muttered together, then Maggie turned and said, "Only if you promise not to tell anyone. Absolutely a hundred percent promise no matter what."
"Ok."
"No, promise!"
"Ok, I absolutely a hundred percent promise I won't tell anyone."
"No matter what." Dinah prompted.
"No matter what." Fi repeated, "Now what is it?"
Dinah said, "I know fairies steal children. I want them to steal me."
"Why?"
"My mom... hits me."
Oh. My. God. Dinah often had bruises on her arms (she said she was clumsy) she'd never invited anyone over (she said her parents were always busy) Fi hadn't suspected. "You mean really? All the times you said you fell down?"
"Mmhm."
"We have to tell someone." Fi said without thinking. She was instantly swarmed with yells and accusing glares.
"No! You promised! They wouldn't believe me and if they did mom would just get in trouble!"
"You promised, Fi!"
"You promised, Fi!"
"I don't want anything to happen to mom! Can't I just go with the fairies?"
Fi was hearing them, but she was also hearing her mother say, "Is it a secret that could get someone hurt? Then you have to tell an adult." She tried to think of the right thing to say. "How about this? I'll go with you, we'll try to find the fairies. But if they can't take you or don't want to... there are lots of kinds of fairies you know, some don't steal kids at all and some are nasty... then we tell Aunt Melinda about your mom and see what she says. Ok?"
Dinah thought about it. Fi turned away to give them a chance talk. Her bookcase was half empty; they must have snuck in at some point to snatch more books. That was ok; Fi didn't care where her books went as long as they came back sometime. What really scared her was how Dinah was so set on a mystical answer to her problems that she didn't want a real-world answer.
"Ok." Dinah said finally, "That sounds ok."
"Yay, we're going tonight!"
"Maggie!" Miranda bopped her sister, "There's more important stuff than just adventures going on!"
"I know. Let's go get our gear!"
Maggie and Miranda left so fast they seemed to vanish into thin air. Dinah followed more slowly.
Fi flopped on her bed with her laptop on her tummy. She opened it and started an email. Annie, I can't tell you all the details but you won't believe what my cousins just brought me....
It was cold, and windy, and damp, but at least it wasn't raining. Fi pulled her scarf up over her face and her hat down over her ears. By daylight this had seemed like a bad idea; now it seemed like a terrible one! "You guys sure we want to do this?"
"Mmhm!" Dinah nodded. She was hugging herself and bouncing up and down to stay warm.
"You all have keys so we can get back in? And flashlights?"
"Yes."
"Got them."
Fi pulled the front door closed the final bit so the lock engaged, and they set off. The streetlights let them see where they were going, but it was eerie walking down a street of dark windows. The spaces between the houses faded into black gulfs. Miranda, Maggie, and Dinah huddled up behind Fi and Fi wished she was as brave as they thought. She had outgrown her fear of monsters in the dark, but then she'd seen the air come burning open and faceless dark things come pouring out... and now shadows held terror once more.
But this night, nothing came.
Nothing came.
A shadow detached itself from the dark behind a tree. The girls stopped.
"We see you. You can come out." Fi said. Flashlights trained on the figure, who shaded his eyes. "James?"
"Good evening."
"Fi do you know this guy?"
"Sort of. Good evening James. Sorry to tell you, but Annie and the tour bus left this morning."
"Ah." The vampire sighed, sadly. "Ah children, don't be afraid, I've fed tonight. I just wondered why you were here, and wanted to see Annie."
"I'll tell her you asked about her." Fi said lamely, then she had a crazy idea. "Do you know about any fairies around the park?"
"They're there. They don't speak to my kind but they might speak to you."
"Um, why are you so interested in Annie? Just because you like her?"
James hissed a laugh. "Everyone who looks at her knows what she is. Everyone of my world. But I won't tell you."
"Fi can we go? It's cold!"
"Yeah. We have to go."
James smiled and waved, "Have a nice night Fiona."
"Yeah, you too." But he had already vanished.
"Who was that?" Dinah whispered.
"James is..." Fi shrugged and told the truth. "A vampire. But I don't think he wants to hurt us."
They had started walking again. Fi shivered and realized James had been in short sleeves.
"You know some scary people."
"It was not my idea to meet him. Here's the park, where do we go now?"
"Through here." Maggie squeezed under the chain holding two halves of a gate closed and the others went after her. Fi hadn't been in here before but she remembered heaps of dirt and rocks and piles of moldering boards. "Be careful where you step."
"Ssh!"
"Sorry."
They sneaked forward, trying to walk quietly. Suddenly Fi smelled a warm breeze, smelled flowers. She pulled the scarf off her face for another sniff and then they heard laughter.
"It's them!" Miranda whispered and promptly forgot the need to be quiet, "Fairies don't be afraid! We won't hurt you!"
A voice with a strange accent that made Fi think of violins said, "We know and welcome to our fire Maggie and Miranda Phillips, Fiona Phillips O'Shannon, Dinah Crew."
"You got our names wrong," Maggie started but her sister hushed her.
They followed the scent and the music to a little open space well hidden in the middle of the lot. In this place it was warm, and tiny rainbow colored flowers sprouted from the ground. There were cats and fairies sitting all around. The fairies were about a foot tall as Maggie had said. They were dressed in green leaf clothes and they glowed.
But brighter than their light was the warm glow that came from a little cave cut incongruously into a heap of construction junk.
"What brings you to our gathering?" asked the same fairy who had spoken before. He sat on a rock like a throne.
"Go on, tell them." Miranda whispered.
Dinah sat down and the cats crowded into her lap. "I asked them to come with me. Are you fairies who steal children?"
The fairy stood up, and suddenly he was the size of a normal-very tall-human man. "We might be. Do you want to be stolen?"
Dinah whispered, "Yes please."
He reached out a long hand and unwrapped Dinah's scarf, revealing a hand-sized bruise on her shoulder. Dinah winced. Fi gasped. The other fairies muttered among themselves.
"Who did this?"
"My mother. Because I tried to throw away her-"
"Her mom does this all the time!"
"You have to take her!"
The fairy's green eyes looked over Maggie and Miranda's earnest faces and Fi's horrified expression. "Yes Dinah Crew, we will take you if that is what you want."
Fi said, "Wait. Tell us who you are, and what will happen to Dinah."
"Peace, Fiona. This is not the first time, or the last, that we will take a child from unworthy parents or one who has been forgotten by the world."
A little fairy stood up and said, "Sharin you're terrible at this. I'll bring the Queen." She ducked into the cave and returned a moment later with a tiny beautiful woman in a golden gown. The tiny woman became large but somehow the little space wasn't crowded.
"I am Alara and this is my son Sharin. Dinah-child you are welcome among us. There are only few other human children under the hills."
"And, you won't do anything to my mom?"
It was hard to imagine the perfect queen hurting anybody. "Only watch her, and see if she changes enough that you would want to return."
"I could come back to this world later?"
"Yes."
"What's it like down there?"
"Look for yourself."
Dinah scrunched down to look into the cave. "Oooooh! It's beautiful! And down there, even if I do bad things, even lots of them...."
"Not one of us would hurt a child."
"I want to go."
Fi said, "You sure? There are other things we could do."
"I'm sure."
Maggie and Miranda crowded to hug their friend. "Goodbye!"
"We'll miss you!"
"Good luck!"
"Can we see down there?"
Sharin said, "You can watch us go but you cannot visit. The three of you have families and friends waiting." Then he held out his hand to Dinah, "Shall we go?'
Dinah stood up spilling kittens off her lap, "Mmhm! Bye guys! Goodbye Fi, thank you!"
Sharin and Dinah walked towards the cave and space seemed to stretch so the cave was larger or they were smaller and the other fairies and the cats followed the two of them into a tunnel hung with lush green vines.
Queen Alara went last and waited just inside the cave as Fi and Maggie and Miranda looked.
Fi saw green hills, trees, and flowers everywhere like a land of eternal spring. Bright waterfalls glittered down mountains seen through air so clear Fi felt she could reach through and touch them. Between trees stood a pavilion of golden poles draped with white silk and around and inside it fairies danced and talked, and wove clothes of flowers and dipped their cups into the clear streams for a drink....
"Can we come visit? Please? Just for a minute?" Maggie begged.
"Oh please! We wouldn't bother you!"
"Just for a little while." Fi whispered. She thought she'd never wanted anything as much as she wanted to be part of that world, to touch it, just once.
The fairy queen's smile outshone even her world, "No, not even for a little while. But I'll give you the kind of visit you can have."
A sweet wind blew from the cave and Fi closed her eyes for a moment to savor the smell....
She half woke long enough to realize she was in her own bed, in her pajamas, and it was wonderfully warm. Fi snuggled her blankets closer around her and went back to sleep.
And dreamed of fairyland.
So Weird-Second Chances
Ep 6: Fairies
Fi read the magic book until her eyes ached from looking at the strange words, then marked her place and put the book away. She had not marked the REJOIN spell. It would be hard to find again; this book had no page numbers. Fi had noticed the next spell seemed to be a countercharm-despite the 'forever' in the first one.
Maggie and Miranda flitted in talking about fairies. Fi didn't pay much attention until they said they were going out to the 'dirthills' that night since it was a full moon and the fairies might be out dancing. That woke Fi up; a midnight outing in December was not a good idea! She said so.
"But we have to!"
"It's important!"
"Dinah's coming with us."
Fi hadn't noticed Dinah standing in the door of her room, but that was no surprise. Maggie and Miranda could have upstaged a full marching band and Dinah was always quiet. Today she was wearing her old pink coat and a scarf around her neck.
"Hey. You can come in."
"Thankyou." One word.
"You want to go look for the fairies too Dinah?"
"Yes."
Miranda jumped in, "Of course! We all believe in them!"
"Please come with us?" Dinah said hesitantly.
"Guys, it's really not a good idea. It's December, it's cold enough during the day. Besides you don't know what you might meet, there's people out there worse than bad fairies. You know?"
The girls nodded.
Fi frowned. There was something strange going on; the girls looked serious, not their usual M-and-M-up-to-something look.
"We know Fi. We'll wear lots of coats and take pepper for humans and garlic for vampires."
"Pepper?"
"You throw it in their face. I read it in a book."
"O-kaaaaaay." Fi said. "So why do you want me along?"
"Weird stuff likes you." Maggie told her.
"And what if I don't come?"
"We'll go anyway." Dinah said.
"Yeah, and if you tell mom, we'll go next time there's a full moon! Or the time after that or the time after that!" Maggie said fiercely-real fierce, not game fierce.
"Ok, what are you guys up to? Is it really fairies or something else?" Fi was just guessing, but the looks that went across three faces confirmed her suspicion.
"Do we tell her?" Maggie asked her sister and her friend.
"Yes." Said Fi.
The three little girls huddled and muttered together, then Maggie turned and said, "Only if you promise not to tell anyone. Absolutely a hundred percent promise no matter what."
"Ok."
"No, promise!"
"Ok, I absolutely a hundred percent promise I won't tell anyone."
"No matter what." Dinah prompted.
"No matter what." Fi repeated, "Now what is it?"
Dinah said, "I know fairies steal children. I want them to steal me."
"Why?"
"My mom... hits me."
Oh. My. God. Dinah often had bruises on her arms (she said she was clumsy) she'd never invited anyone over (she said her parents were always busy) Fi hadn't suspected. "You mean really? All the times you said you fell down?"
"Mmhm."
"We have to tell someone." Fi said without thinking. She was instantly swarmed with yells and accusing glares.
"No! You promised! They wouldn't believe me and if they did mom would just get in trouble!"
"You promised, Fi!"
"You promised, Fi!"
"I don't want anything to happen to mom! Can't I just go with the fairies?"
Fi was hearing them, but she was also hearing her mother say, "Is it a secret that could get someone hurt? Then you have to tell an adult." She tried to think of the right thing to say. "How about this? I'll go with you, we'll try to find the fairies. But if they can't take you or don't want to... there are lots of kinds of fairies you know, some don't steal kids at all and some are nasty... then we tell Aunt Melinda about your mom and see what she says. Ok?"
Dinah thought about it. Fi turned away to give them a chance talk. Her bookcase was half empty; they must have snuck in at some point to snatch more books. That was ok; Fi didn't care where her books went as long as they came back sometime. What really scared her was how Dinah was so set on a mystical answer to her problems that she didn't want a real-world answer.
"Ok." Dinah said finally, "That sounds ok."
"Yay, we're going tonight!"
"Maggie!" Miranda bopped her sister, "There's more important stuff than just adventures going on!"
"I know. Let's go get our gear!"
Maggie and Miranda left so fast they seemed to vanish into thin air. Dinah followed more slowly.
Fi flopped on her bed with her laptop on her tummy. She opened it and started an email. Annie, I can't tell you all the details but you won't believe what my cousins just brought me....
It was cold, and windy, and damp, but at least it wasn't raining. Fi pulled her scarf up over her face and her hat down over her ears. By daylight this had seemed like a bad idea; now it seemed like a terrible one! "You guys sure we want to do this?"
"Mmhm!" Dinah nodded. She was hugging herself and bouncing up and down to stay warm.
"You all have keys so we can get back in? And flashlights?"
"Yes."
"Got them."
Fi pulled the front door closed the final bit so the lock engaged, and they set off. The streetlights let them see where they were going, but it was eerie walking down a street of dark windows. The spaces between the houses faded into black gulfs. Miranda, Maggie, and Dinah huddled up behind Fi and Fi wished she was as brave as they thought. She had outgrown her fear of monsters in the dark, but then she'd seen the air come burning open and faceless dark things come pouring out... and now shadows held terror once more.
But this night, nothing came.
Nothing came.
A shadow detached itself from the dark behind a tree. The girls stopped.
"We see you. You can come out." Fi said. Flashlights trained on the figure, who shaded his eyes. "James?"
"Good evening."
"Fi do you know this guy?"
"Sort of. Good evening James. Sorry to tell you, but Annie and the tour bus left this morning."
"Ah." The vampire sighed, sadly. "Ah children, don't be afraid, I've fed tonight. I just wondered why you were here, and wanted to see Annie."
"I'll tell her you asked about her." Fi said lamely, then she had a crazy idea. "Do you know about any fairies around the park?"
"They're there. They don't speak to my kind but they might speak to you."
"Um, why are you so interested in Annie? Just because you like her?"
James hissed a laugh. "Everyone who looks at her knows what she is. Everyone of my world. But I won't tell you."
"Fi can we go? It's cold!"
"Yeah. We have to go."
James smiled and waved, "Have a nice night Fiona."
"Yeah, you too." But he had already vanished.
"Who was that?" Dinah whispered.
"James is..." Fi shrugged and told the truth. "A vampire. But I don't think he wants to hurt us."
They had started walking again. Fi shivered and realized James had been in short sleeves.
"You know some scary people."
"It was not my idea to meet him. Here's the park, where do we go now?"
"Through here." Maggie squeezed under the chain holding two halves of a gate closed and the others went after her. Fi hadn't been in here before but she remembered heaps of dirt and rocks and piles of moldering boards. "Be careful where you step."
"Ssh!"
"Sorry."
They sneaked forward, trying to walk quietly. Suddenly Fi smelled a warm breeze, smelled flowers. She pulled the scarf off her face for another sniff and then they heard laughter.
"It's them!" Miranda whispered and promptly forgot the need to be quiet, "Fairies don't be afraid! We won't hurt you!"
A voice with a strange accent that made Fi think of violins said, "We know and welcome to our fire Maggie and Miranda Phillips, Fiona Phillips O'Shannon, Dinah Crew."
"You got our names wrong," Maggie started but her sister hushed her.
They followed the scent and the music to a little open space well hidden in the middle of the lot. In this place it was warm, and tiny rainbow colored flowers sprouted from the ground. There were cats and fairies sitting all around. The fairies were about a foot tall as Maggie had said. They were dressed in green leaf clothes and they glowed.
But brighter than their light was the warm glow that came from a little cave cut incongruously into a heap of construction junk.
"What brings you to our gathering?" asked the same fairy who had spoken before. He sat on a rock like a throne.
"Go on, tell them." Miranda whispered.
Dinah sat down and the cats crowded into her lap. "I asked them to come with me. Are you fairies who steal children?"
The fairy stood up, and suddenly he was the size of a normal-very tall-human man. "We might be. Do you want to be stolen?"
Dinah whispered, "Yes please."
He reached out a long hand and unwrapped Dinah's scarf, revealing a hand-sized bruise on her shoulder. Dinah winced. Fi gasped. The other fairies muttered among themselves.
"Who did this?"
"My mother. Because I tried to throw away her-"
"Her mom does this all the time!"
"You have to take her!"
The fairy's green eyes looked over Maggie and Miranda's earnest faces and Fi's horrified expression. "Yes Dinah Crew, we will take you if that is what you want."
Fi said, "Wait. Tell us who you are, and what will happen to Dinah."
"Peace, Fiona. This is not the first time, or the last, that we will take a child from unworthy parents or one who has been forgotten by the world."
A little fairy stood up and said, "Sharin you're terrible at this. I'll bring the Queen." She ducked into the cave and returned a moment later with a tiny beautiful woman in a golden gown. The tiny woman became large but somehow the little space wasn't crowded.
"I am Alara and this is my son Sharin. Dinah-child you are welcome among us. There are only few other human children under the hills."
"And, you won't do anything to my mom?"
It was hard to imagine the perfect queen hurting anybody. "Only watch her, and see if she changes enough that you would want to return."
"I could come back to this world later?"
"Yes."
"What's it like down there?"
"Look for yourself."
Dinah scrunched down to look into the cave. "Oooooh! It's beautiful! And down there, even if I do bad things, even lots of them...."
"Not one of us would hurt a child."
"I want to go."
Fi said, "You sure? There are other things we could do."
"I'm sure."
Maggie and Miranda crowded to hug their friend. "Goodbye!"
"We'll miss you!"
"Good luck!"
"Can we see down there?"
Sharin said, "You can watch us go but you cannot visit. The three of you have families and friends waiting." Then he held out his hand to Dinah, "Shall we go?'
Dinah stood up spilling kittens off her lap, "Mmhm! Bye guys! Goodbye Fi, thank you!"
Sharin and Dinah walked towards the cave and space seemed to stretch so the cave was larger or they were smaller and the other fairies and the cats followed the two of them into a tunnel hung with lush green vines.
Queen Alara went last and waited just inside the cave as Fi and Maggie and Miranda looked.
Fi saw green hills, trees, and flowers everywhere like a land of eternal spring. Bright waterfalls glittered down mountains seen through air so clear Fi felt she could reach through and touch them. Between trees stood a pavilion of golden poles draped with white silk and around and inside it fairies danced and talked, and wove clothes of flowers and dipped their cups into the clear streams for a drink....
"Can we come visit? Please? Just for a minute?" Maggie begged.
"Oh please! We wouldn't bother you!"
"Just for a little while." Fi whispered. She thought she'd never wanted anything as much as she wanted to be part of that world, to touch it, just once.
The fairy queen's smile outshone even her world, "No, not even for a little while. But I'll give you the kind of visit you can have."
A sweet wind blew from the cave and Fi closed her eyes for a moment to savor the smell....
She half woke long enough to realize she was in her own bed, in her pajamas, and it was wonderfully warm. Fi snuggled her blankets closer around her and went back to sleep.
And dreamed of fairyland.