Ada woke up. She wasn't disoriented like the morning before, but her back hurt where the Velcro had rubbed it all night. She sat up and noticed that Lila wasn't in her bed. Ada went to go find Lila, but when she tried to fly out of her house, she found that she couldn't!
Ada had jumped out of her house, and now her wings were beating furiously, but she didn't rise. She plummeted to the ground and landed on her rump. It hurt terribly, and Ada stood up with a cry of pain. She touched her wings. They weren't wet, so she didn't have any idea why she couldn't fly. She hopped up, but came down again on her feet. She sat down on the ground, ignoring the pain in her bottom, and began to cry. Where was Lila? What had happened to her wings? Would she ever be able to get back to her house?
The door to Lila's room swung open, and Lila walked in, carrying something.
"Lila, help! I'm down here!" Ada cried.
Lila walked over to the dollhouse and gasped. "Ada, where are you?" she cried.
"Lila! I'm here!" Ada yelled.
Lila looked down and saw Ada. "What happened to you?" she asked, picking the fairy up and setting her on Lila's bed.
Ada said, "I fell out of my house, and my wings wouldn't work!"
Lila looked Ada over. "Are you hurt?"
Ada nodded and pointed to her back end and her wings.
Lila looked at Ada's wings. "They look fine," she said.
Ada shook her head. "I can't fly!"
"Go back to your house, you'll be fine," Lila said.
"What part of 'I can't fly' do you not understand?" asked Ada. She jumped and flapped her wings, then came crashing back down onto the bed.
"Oh," Lila said. "You're out of pixie dust. It's alright, I have some more."
"Pixie dust?" Ada asked. "How often do I have to put it on?"
Lila took a bag of dust from her closet and poured it onto Ada's wings. Then she said, "There. You can fly again. You will need some more tomorrow. Each day you need some more pixie dust. You can last two days at the most, but after that you won't be able to fly and you'll need some more."
Ada nodded in understanding. She didn't know why she had known the word before Lila had told her about it. It was just there, part of the vocabulary she'd had when she was born. But she could see that it was very important now.
Ada fluttered her wings and found she could fly again. She flew over to Lila and looked at what she was holding.
"Oh, these are clothes for when you go to bed," Lila said. "Tonight you can try them on." Then she picked up the little one and put it in Ada's hair, close to her forehead. Ada was surprised, and Lila said, "It's a flower for your hair."
Ada smiled and touched it. She liked the feeling of it, and she asked, "Where did it come from?"
Lila didn't answer.