Fairy Tale

by Cyn Balog

  "I don't know. I can't tell."

  "Well then, I'm eating it all," I say, sho­ving a pi­ece in­to my mo­uth. Even if it did just co­me from his butt, I'm star­ving.

  He ig­no­res me, sha­kes the chops­tick in his hand. "I'm not very go­od with this thing yet."

  "This thing'?"

  "My wand."

  "Wand? Cam, it's a fre­aking chops­tick."

  "A chops­tick that can ma­ke for­tu­ne co­oki­es? Morg, think abo­ut it."

  I ins­pect it, then say, dumbly, "But wands are pretty, and gold. With a star at the tip." At le­ast, the one I got at Dis­ney World when I was fi­ve was.

  "It's a tra­ining wand."

  Okay, right. So now he is just get­ting an­no­ying. "Why do you ha­ve a wand? Are you a ma­gi­ci­an? Is Dawn yo­ur as­sis­tant? And you ma­de her in­vi­sib­le?"

  "No, she's my gu­ide."

  "Yo­ur… gu­ide? Li­ke a to­ur gu­ide? For whe­re­ver you're be­ing ta­ken?"

  "Right."

  "Okay: So whe­re are you be­ing ta­ken?"

  "I'm not su­re. To whe­re­ver it is that fa­iri­es go."

  "You me­an, li­ke. Mid­dle Earth or so­met­hing?" I lo­ok down and see the bro­ken re­ma­ins of the for­tu­ne co­okie, and I can't ke­ep the sar­casm from cre­eping back in­to my vo­ice. "So, um. So­me fa­iri­es want to kid­nap you. Why? Do you ha­ve the one ring to ru­le them all?"

  "They've co­me to ta­ke me ho­me " he says softly.

  "Oh." This wo­uld be the ti­me that I'd ex­pect a ca­me­ra crew to co­me burs­ting thro­ugh the do­or, sa­ying this is all a prac­ti­cal joke. But Cam do­esn't joke li­ke that. He's a ter­rib­le li­ar. I study the do­or, wil­ling for it to open, for so­me peppy TV host to thrust a mi­ke un­der my no­se and ask me how it fe­els to know I fell for the stu­pi­dest and most un­be­li­evab­le prank ever, but it ne­ver hap­pens.

  "Wa­it. Are you sa­ying you're a fa­iry? Li­ke Tin­ker Bell?"

  "Well, not exactly. Tin­ker Bell was a pi­xie, and she isn't re­al."

  I'm sud­denly awa­re that my mo­uth is han­ging open. I clo­se it and firmly pla­ce my hand on his sho­ul­der. "Lis­ten to yo­ur­self. That's nuts. You got hit too hard last night, and-"

  "I know it so­unds crazy, but what abo­ut the for­tu­ne co­okie?"

  "Big de­al." I po­int to the pimp­le bud­ding from my chin. "Ma­ke this go away, and may­be I'll be­li­eve you."

  "I can't. I told you, I'm not so go­od with the wand yet. I wo­uldn't want to turn you in­to anyt­hing."

  I roll my eyes. "Fan­tas­tic. So, whe­re are they ta­king you?" Sin­ce Cam has ne­ver wig­ged out on me li­ke this be­fo­re, I ke­ep my lips zip­ped as to whe­re I think he ne­eds to go: the ne­arest men­tal ins­ti­tu­ti­on.

  "It's this king­dom, this who­le ot­her world" he says, his vo­ice wa­ve­ring. "I'm not su­re. Dawn told me it exists along­si­de this world. I know, it's to­tal­ly whac­ked, but I ha­ve to go the­re on my six­te­enth birth­day-"

  "What do you me­an by 'ha­ve to'?" My vo­ice starts to do the sa­me lit­tle dan­ce that his is do­ing, ri­sing and fal­ling bet­we­en a whis­per and a ner­vo­us shri­ek. "Be­ca­use we ha­ve this party, and ever­yo­ne's go­ing to be the­re, and…"

  He's sta­ring at me, and I know exactly what he's thin­king: I just fo­und out I’m not hu­man, and you're wor­ri­ed abo­ut yo­ur swe­et six­te­en?

  And yes, it may be a lit­tle cal­lo­us of me, but ple­ase. A fa­iry? I know everyt­hing abo­ut this boy. He's al­ways be­en comp­le­tely le­vel­he­aded, ne­ver one to be­li­eve the la­test gos­sip, no mat­ter how true it se­ems. And the­re isn't anyt­hing abo­ut him that is a mystery to me. I know when he's angry, I know when he's ner­vo­us, I know when he's… lying.

  And, lo­oking at him now, I can tell one thing for cer­ta­in.

  He be­li­eves every word he is sa­ying.

  'This is crazy," I say, my vo­ice ho­ar­se. "You're tel­ling me that a we­ek from now, a bunch of fa­iri­es are go­ing to ste­al you from me?"

  He nods.

  "For how long?"

  He do­esn't ans­wer, just lo­oks away. I ta­ke that as a "fo­re­ver."

  I bi­te my ton­gue. "This has got to be a dre­am. Wa­ke up, Mor­gan," I mumb­le, pinc­hing my arm thro­ugh my cash­me­re swe­ater.

  He ig­no­res me, stands up, opens the do­or a crack, and pe­ers out. "Lo­ok, we ha­ven't got much ti­me. Are you go­ing to help me or not?"

  My he­ad is still throb­bing, but I sit up and pull my kne­es un­der me. "What do you want me to do?"

  He re­la­xes a lit­tle. "Do you re­mem­ber how we le­ar­ned, a few ye­ars back in world his­tory, abo­ut tho­se wo­men in Chi­na? How the men li­ked small fe­et, so the wo­men used to bind them?"

  "Uh-huh," I say, flas­hing back to an ima­ge of a po­or Chi­ne­se wo­man with fe­et that we­re no big­ger than bal­led-up fists. They'd ac­tu­al­ly be­en ab­le to stunt the growth of the­ir fe­et by wrap­ping them tightly. Gross. "So what?"

  "I fi­gu­re it's worth a shot." He re­ac­hes in­to his bag aga­in, and this ti­me he pro­du­ces a roll of whi­te ban­da­ge. He lo­oks aro­und ca­re­ful­ly, then, pul­ling up his T-shirt, whis­pers, "Will you wrap my wings?"

  Chapter Fourteen

  THE REST OF the day is a bit of a ha­ze to me. I end up mis­sing bio and most of lunch be­ca­use of Cam. When I fi­nish wrap­ping up Cam's wings-yes, you he­ard me right, win­gs-I skulk out of the shed, kno­wing so­met­hing big, so­met­hing li­fe-alte­ring, is hap­pe­ning but not be­ing fully ab­le to comp­re­hend what that so­met­hing is. I find myself so de­ep in con­fu­si­on that I'm ba­rely ab­le to walk a stra­ight li­ne.

  My boyf­ri­end is a fa­iry. Cam has al­ways be­en ta­len­ted, al­most su­per­hu­man, so I'd fully ex­pec­ted him to do so­met­hing fan­tas­tic, li­ke one day end up on the co­ver of SI, but flying aro­und, pa­in­ting ra­in­bows, ta­king te­eth away from un­der child­ren's pil­lows in the night? I saw the wings, the for­tu­ne co­okie that ma­te­ri­ali­zed out of now­he­re, and yet… I've known this boy sin­ce we we­re in di­apers. I know him and his fa­mily in­si­de and out. It isn't as if he sud­denly ap­pe­ared in a flo­wer bed one day af­ter a thun­der storm, or as if his pa­rents are myste­ri­o­us el­vish ro­yalty. And he burps and farts li­ke any go­od hu­man-in fact, qu­ite a bit mo­re than I'd li­ke.

  As I was wrap­ping the ban­da­ge aro­und his sho­ul­der bla­des, trying my best not to co­me in­to any con­tact with the growth, he told me that the wings are ac­tu­al­ly just for show; that, ac­cor­ding to Dawn, he can fly. Which exp­la­ins his Su­per­man on the fo­ot­ball fi­eld. Dawn had told him to be very ca­re­ful, be­ca­use the re­ason he blac­ked out last night is be­ca­use his po­wers are not fully de­ve­lo­ped. He is just a new­bie now, but on his six­te­enth birth­day, when he fully in­he­rits his po­wers, he will ha­ve to le­ave this world.

  Fo­re­ver.

  But if he is a fa­iry, and if he do­es ha­ve to le­ave, that wo­uld exp­la­in why I hardly ever see him in any vi­si­ons of the fu­tu­re. His best fri­end Scab, is my big­gest fan and best cus­to­mer. I've se­en al­most all of his next fi­ve ye­ars: the ga­me whe­re he dis­lo­ca­tes his sho­ul­der, the gra­du­ati­on party whe­re he eats sixty hot wings in twel­ve mi­nu­tes, his col­le­ge ye­ars in Mi­ami. One wo­uld ex­pect Cam to be so­mew­he­re in the backg­ro­und, but he ne­ver is. I hadn't re­ali­zed it un­til to­day, but I ha­ven't se­en him in any vi­si­ons furt­her out than two we­eks from now. As for my own fu­tu­re, I've tri­ed to ima­gi­ne it only a hand­ful of ti­mes, and it's al­ways be­en too fuzzy to comp­re­hend. It's a clo­se-up of my nost­ril, or a big shot of my butt, and the "ca­me­ra," which ob­vi­o­usly has a sen­se of hu­mor, ne­ver pans out. Still, I've al­ways felt li­k
e Cam is so­mew­he­re ne­arby. He just has to be.

  But may­be he isn't.

  Oh, God.

  After that re­ali­za­ti­on, I end up spen­ding much of my ti­me in the third stall of the mu­sic-wing bath­ro­om, ha­ving a mi­nor men­tal bre­ak­down and vo­wing ne­ver to we­ar my oran­ge-sher­bet-co­lo­red flip-flops aga­in. If it we­ren't for them, Si­er­ra Mar­tin wo­uldn't ha­ve re­cog­ni­zed my fe­et and be­gun pep­pe­ring me with qu­es­ti­ons abo­ut her fu­tu­re whi­le I was trying to stem the ti­de of te­ars that we­re ma­j­orly schlub­bing up my comp­le­xi­on.

  "No comp­ren­do" I say in the best ac­cent, my two ye­ars of Spa­nish will al­low. "Soy una…" How the hell do you say "ESL stu­dent"? "Urn. Soy una bib­li­ote­ca mas gran­de. "

  Clo­se eno­ugh.

  "Hel­lo, Mor­gan? Are you the­re?" she asks, af­ter a mo­ment of si­len­ce. I think the flu is easi­er to avo­id.

  "No! No Mor­gan. No comp­ren­do. Ba­ja en el asc­ne­sor" I say com­ba­ti­vely.

  "Mor­gan, stop," she whi­nes. "You're to­tal­ly fre­aking me out. I just ne­ed to ask you a te­ensy-we­ensy fa­vor."

  "Fi­ne." I gi­ve in. I flush a te­ar-so­aked wad of TP and open the do­or, ho­ping that my fa­ce do­esn't lo­ok as red and blotchy as a vol­ca­nic erup­ti­on. If it do­es, she do­esn't se­em to no­ti­ce. Of co­ur­se, I think she may be ob­li­vi­o­us to anyt­hing ot­her than her stu­pid fu­tu­re. "Gre­at ti­ming."

  She exa­mi­nes her ha­ir in the mir­ror and fluffs this gi­ant, flu­ores­cent-pink fe­at­her thing that's hol­ding up her pony­ta­il. "Well, what do you ex­pect? I've be­en in agony. And you didn't re­turn my calls."

  "Calls?" I ask in­no­cently, even tho­ugh I prog­ram­med my pho­ne to play "Su­per Fre­ak" whe­ne­ver her num­ber pops up so that I can let it go right in­to vo­ice ma­il. Which hap­pe­ned, in the past twenty-fo­ur ho­urs, aro­und fifty ti­mes.

  "Ye­ah. This is im­por­tant stuff."

  "I know. I've just be­en…" I ta­ke a lo­ok in the mir­ror and gasp. I've just be­en audi­ti­oning for The New Ad­dams Fa­mily? I think the scho­ol ad­mi­nist­ra­ti­on pur­po­sely ins­tal­ls flu­ores­cent ligh­ting that wo­uld ma­ke He­idi Klum lo­ok li­ke the un­de­ad be­ca­use they want to smo­ke us out of the­re as so­on as pos­sib­le. But I lo­ok mo­re un­de­ad than usu­al, and I am not exag­ge­ra­ting. In the less than two ho­urs sin­ce get­ting whop­ped on the he­ad by that de­men­ted mos­qu­ito, I've trans­for­med in­to so­met­hing Fran­kens­te­iny I rub a smud­ge of black eye­li­ner that has so­me­how mig­ra­ted to my lo­wer che­ek away. "Busy."

  "Well. You know yo­ur 'vi­si­on'?" She says this with a roll of the eyes.

  I nod, grab­bing on to the co­mers of the sink for sup­port, He­re it co­mes.

  "Well, I most de­fi­ni­tely think you we­re thin­king of the wrong per­son."

  "I know. You told me that."

  She holds up her fin­ger. "I bro­ught sup­por­ting evi­den­ce. If I am go­ing to ever be an at­tor­ney with one of the top firms in New York, I sho­uld be ab­le to ar­gue this. Ex­hi­bit A." She re­ac­hes in­to her stack of bo­oks and pulls out a stub of pa­per. "Do you know what this is?"

  God, no.

  "It's a tic­ket from my trip to the Me­tuc­hen Fa­ir. I went the­re this we­ekend. And I stop­ped by Ma­da­me Ba­bus­ka's tent. And gu­ess what she sa­id?"

  I sigh-. At le­ast Ma­da­me Ba­bus­ka is smart eno­ugh to char­ge twenty bucks for her for­tu­nes, "That you're go­ing to Har­vard?"

  "Yes!" She shrugs. "Well, no. She sa­id that I am go­ing to find the lo­ve of my li­fe next ye­ar and his na­me is Har­vey. I fi­gu­re that's pretty clo­se."

  "Pretty…," I say. How can I think abo­ut this when my boyf­ri­end is gro­wing wings as we spe­ak?

  "But that's not all. Ex­hi­bit B." She wa­ves her hands in front of her. "I to­tal­ly wo­uldn't even go to MCC if my li­fe de­pen­ded on it. Li­ke, if every ot­her col­le­ge in the world tur­ned me down, I wo­uld just kill myself. See? It's vir­tu­al­ly im­pos­sib­le for you to ha­ve en­vi­si­oned that."

  "What if yo­ur su­ici­de at­tempt fa­iled and left you bra­in da­ma­ged?" I ask. "It co­uld hap­pen. I saw it on­ce on Op­rah."

  Oprah. Cam and I used to watch it to­get­her when he wasn't at prac­ti­ce. I wo­uld cry du­ring all the ins­pi­ra­ti­onal sto­ri­es, and he wo­uld ma­ke fun of me. Ah, the go­od old days. Si­er­ra starts to pull out Ex­hi­bit C just as anot­her te­ar starts to for­ce its way out.

  I stop her. "Ye­ah. You're right. I gu­ess I was wrong!"

  She smi­les. "Re­al­ly?"

  No, not re­al­ly, but I can't ta­ke it any­mo­re: At this po­int, my mind is fo­cu­sed on only one thing. Well, three things. Cam. And his wings.

  Anyway, so­met­hing in my li­fe go­es right Si­er­ra gi­ves me an ex­ci­ted hug and pran­ces out of the ro­om, tri­ump­hant.

  I mi­ra­cu­lo­usly ma­na­ge to ma­ke it ho­me wit­ho­ut get­ting hit by a scho­ol bus. When I get the­re, tho­ugh, I don't fe­el li­ke go­ing in­si­de. Ins­te­ad, I get this we­ird idea to lie on the grass and sta­re up at the sky. May­be be­ca­use this is so­met­hing Cam and I used to do a lot when we we­re gro­wing up, and I've be­en thin­king abo­ut our past a lot to­day, trying to re­col­lect if the­re had be­en signs of him not be­ing of this world pri­or to last night. No, he had al­ways be­en so nor­mal. I can re­mem­ber sho­uting out,

  "Lo­ok! I see an an­gel!" and Cam, al­ways prac­ti­cal, wo­uld say, "That's just a cu­mu­lus. The­re's a front mo­ving in." I'd al­ways tho­ught he'd grow up to be a we­at­her­man.

  Well, to­day cer­ta­inly threw a wrench in­to tho­se plans. Fa­iri­es don't pre­dict the we­at­her. I think they ma­ke the we­at­her. Or so­met­hing.

  I crawl in­to the grass, cat­li­ke, then flop over and sta­re. The­re are mo­re clo­uds than pe­eks of blue sky, tho­ugh I co­uld re­al­ly, re­al­ly use that blue sky right now.

  I he­ar the en­gi­ne of a car, then lo­ok past my fe­et, to see my fat­her's mi­ni­van ro­un­ding the cor­ner in­to our dri­ve­way. A do­or slams and his vo­ice calls, "What co­uld be so bad that it's worth mis­sing Ge­ne­ral Hos­pi­tal for?"

  My fat­her lo­ves the so­aps. He watc­hes Ge­ne­ral Hos­pi­tal re­li­gi­o­usly and has mol­ded his work sche­du­le at the hos­pi­tal so that he go­es in at fo­ur in the mor­ning and co­mes ho­me right in ti­me to watch his shows. Every Sun­day, he re­ads So­ap Ope­ra Di­gest and ine­vi­tably will gi­ve me the la­test up­da­te on his "re­ti­re­ment co­unt­down," when he will fi­nal­ly be ho­me to watch them all. What a glo­ri­o­us (for him) and al­to­get­her mor­tif­ying (for me) day it will be when my dad can sit at ho­me in his bo­xers all day, watc­hing the so­aps. I am cer­ta­in the gar­ba­ge in the ho­use wo­uld ne­ver get ta­ken out if he knew that Ti­Vo exists.

  "Daddy," I comp­la­in, twis­ting a bla­de of glass bet­we­en my fin­gers, "Ms. Simp­son is pro­bably go­ing to call you abo­ut me mis­sing bio. And Cam's a fa­iry. What do I do?"

  I he­ar the scre­en do­or open and clo­se. "It's on! It's on!" he sho­uts from in­si­de.

  I gro­an and clo­se my eyes. "I'll be in, in a mi­nu­te."

  I he­ar the swish of grass as so­me­one col­lap­ses next to me li­ke a wo­un­ded cow. My sus­pi­ci­ons are con­fir­med when I lift my he­ad an inch from the gro­und and see the scuf­fed Keds, to­es po­in­ting to the sky in a V. Not exactly so­me­one I want to talk to right now, but, for so­me re­ason, I can't mo­ve.

  "What is the pur­po­se of rec­li­ning he­re?" he asks me gently.

  "Be­ca­use I can't bre­at­he. I think I'm go­ing to die." I sit up, pull my kne­es to my chest, and lo­ok down at my ru­ined cash­me­re swe­ater, spat­te­red with sticky pink
sta­ins. "Are you a fa­iry, too? Is that why you ap­pe­ared out of now­he­re?"

  He sha­kes his he­ad. "I am the Brow­nes' son."

  "You me­an, you're Cam's brot­her?"

  "No." He lo­oks at the sky as if se­arc­hing for the right words. "Fa­iri­es li­ke to play tricks on hu­mans. They're je­alo­us. They li­ke to ste­al hu­man ba­bi­es. On the night I was born, the hos­pi­tal must ha­ve left a win­dow open, be­ca­use the fa­iri­es to­ok me and left Cam."

  "Why? Why wo­uld they le­ave him?"

  "Cam was a chan­ge­ling. A sickly fa­iry. He was sup­po­sed to die of il­lness be­fo­re he re­ac­hed adult­ho­od."

  "But he's not sick. Well, not any­mo­re. He used to ha­ve bad asth­ma when he was yo­un­ger, but he’s fi­ne now."

  "They do not un­ders­tand why he re­cu­pe­ra­ted. And they ne­ed him, as the­re has be­en a ter­rib­le tra­gedy. So they've co­me to ta­ke him back."

  "Tra­gedy?"

  "Yes, Ca­me­ron's ol­der brot­her, Azizl, has be­en kil­led, and now his fat­her has no true he­ir."

  "So they want to tra­de you for an he­ir?"

  He nods.

  I ex­ha­le de­eply. "Well, why are they- still he­re, then? Why didn't they just ta­ke him and get the hell out, li­ke they- did the day he was born?"

  "The­re is a por­tal bet­we­en the two worlds," Pip exp­la­ins. "Fa­iri­es-or an­yo­ne, for that mat­ter-may al­ways pass in­to this world. But the por­tal to the fa­iry world is open only at mid­night on Day of Birth and Day of Be­co­ming."

  "Day of who?"

  "Be­co­ming. The­ir six­te­enth birth­day."

  Bla­des of wet, gre­en grass prick at my legs, but I can't fe­el a thing be­ca­use I'm numb. "So you're the Brow­nes' con­so­la­ti­on pri­ze for lo­sing Cam? That's-inhu­man." I pa­use, re­ali­zing that, duh, it's pro­bably in­hu­man be­ca­use they're not hu­man. "I me­an, it must fe­el hor­rib­le."

  "It did co­me as a shock to Mr, and Mrs. Brow­ne."

  "Well, ob­vi­o­usly. But I'm tal­king abo­ut you. It must fe­el hor­rib­le for you."