Roses, Dragons, and Wonderland (Once Upon a Time in the Fairytale Forest)

The sun is up, and it’s so bright today that even my Rose Dragon’s big wings can’t shut it out. Her wings are just like rose petals: soft, red, silky, and very, very pretty. I open my eyes and I kiss my dragon’s wing. That’s how she knows I’m awake. She folds her wing up and looks down at me with her great big eyes, which are green and glittery just like her scales. “Good morning, darling,” she says, and kisses me back.

The Rose Dragon is my mother. I used to have a human mother, and a human father, too. But they died. Another car was going too fast and hit their car too hard, and they died. I don’t like to think about it, because I cry whenever I do. I think about how I wish that they had never gone out that night, because then the fast car wouldn’t have hit their car, and they wouldn’t have died. But it’s too late now. I love my Rose Dragon, but I love my mother and father too. I miss them.

There are no cars here in Wonderland, and I’m glad, because cars scare me. Wonderland is where I met the Rose Dragon, and now I live here. When I was really little, like five years old, I fell in a big hole in the ground while I was playing outside. The Rose Dragon caught me, and I was crying, so she kissed me and patted me and told me that I would be all right. When I stopped crying, I hugged her and I told her that she was a very kind dragon. That’s how we met.

The Rose Dragon introduced me to Wonderland on that day, and it really is a wonderful land. There are gardens with flowers as big as mountains and mushrooms as tall as trees. There are birds that talk and butterflies that sing and recite poetry. The Rose Dragon comes from a rose forest where all of the animals are rosy just like her. There’s a pretty white castle made of pearls, sitting in a garden full of white roses and white daisies and shiny white roads. Blanc, the queen of Wonderland, lives there. She’s our friend, and she lets us visit her castle whenever we want to.

Today I am going there to meet my friend Usagi for a game of croquet. I’ve never played croquet before, but Usagi is going to teach me. My dragon makes me some sweet flour pancakes for breakfast. We bathe in the pretty brook that runs through the rose forest. I dress myself and she combs my hair gently with her claws. Then I climb up on her back and I hold on tightly as we lift up into the sky.

Usagi is waiting for us in Queen Blanc’s great big yard. She looks at her pocketwatch, and I hope we’re not late, because Usagi cannot abide lateness. But when we land, she smiles at us and curtsies. “Good morning, dear Aliss,” she says to me. “Good morning, dear Rose Dragon,” she says to my dragon. “Good morning, dear Usagi,” I say. I curtsy too, and my dragon bows her head most respectfully.

Usagi hands me a funny looking hammer that’s almost as tall as I am. “What’s this silly hammer for?” I ask her. “It isn’t a hammer,” Usagi says. “It’s a croquet mallet.”

“So you hit croquets with it?” I ask her.

“I don’t think so,” she says. She shakes her head, and her big white bunny ears bounce all around. “I don’t have any croquets, only balls and hurdles. Do you play croquet with croquets?”

“You know I’ve never played croquet before!” I remind her.

“Well, then you just hit the balls through the hurdles with the mallet,” says Usagi. She demonstrates, but instead of hitting the little red ball, she only gives it a light little push. “You’re doing it wrong, Usagi!” I tell her.

“No, I’m not!” Usagi says. “This is how you’re supposed to play!”

“You told me you’re supposed to hit the balls with the mallet,” I say. “You didn’t hit it, you just pushed it.”

            “Oh! Well, forgive me,” says Usagi. “This is the way I’ve always played, and I’m accustomed to it. Maybe it’s because I’ve only played with balls and not croquets. Do you think that you can show me the right way?”

            “I only know what you told me, Usagi,” I tell her, “but I can certainly try.” I walk up to a little yellow ball. I swing the mallet with all my might and give the ball a mighty hit.

It flies through the air and strikes a hurdle so hard that the hurdle falls right to the ground!

“Oh! I did it! Did you see that, dragon? I hit it so hard that I knocked the hurdle down! Did you see that?” I squeal and bounce and dance and laugh in celebration of my victory!

            “I saw,” says the dragon, and she nuzzles my face. “Good girl.” Usagi pats me on my head. “Aliss,” she says, “I’ve played croquet for a long, long time and I have never seen anybody play as beautifully or as interestingly as you.”

            “You flatter me, Miss,” I say as I take my bow.

            Queen Blanc has invited us to tea today. It isn’t really tea, because I don’t like tea. It’s hot chocolate. Usagi likes tea and she drinks it all the time with her pinky sticking up. She said that’s what you’re supposed to do when you’re drinking tea with a queen. But Queen Blanc doesn’t mind when I forget.

            The Rose Dragon doesn’t like tea either. She likes water, like roses. At tea, Queen Blanc fills up a little pond full of nice clean water for my dragon, right next to the tea table. She pulls out a chair for me and a chair for Usagi, and we curtsy before we sit down, like dutiful guests should.

            We have to wait for Queen Blanc to take her first sip of tea before we can start; the Rose Dragon says that it’s good manners and it’s respectful. She sips her tea and smiles at us over the glass, letting us know that it’s okay for us to eat and drink now. But just as I’m about to sip my chocolate, a little bread-and-butter-fly lands on my glass, and I’m so startled that I nearly drop it! I watch the little thing move its golden wings back and forth, back and forth. Then it takes off, and I jump up to run after it, but I quickly catch myself. I turn to Queen Blanc, nod my head, and say, “Excuse me, your majesty.”

            “Go on ahead,” says Queen Blanc with a smile, so I take off after that bread-and-butter-fly, following wherever its buttery wings take it. It lands on a big white rose and I stop and watch it flap, then it takes off again and I run after it. It leads me through hedges of red and white roses, past the yard where Usagi and I played our game of croquet, and around to the front of the castle. The guards are standing all in a row, with their heads held up high, and I am careful not to run into any of them. I follow the bread-and-butter-fly all the way to the castle gate, where it lands and flaps its golden wings some more. I stand up on my tippy-toes and reach out to catch it, but just as I’m about to close my hand over it, it flies away and over the gate. I am not allowed to go outside the gate without anyone knowing.

            How disappointing! Sighing, I go back to the tea table. The tea goes on as planned, without any more interruptions. 

            The Rose Dragon has promised that after tea I may visit the Butterfly, one of my very best friends in all of Wonderland. On our way to the Butterfly’s grove, we pass by a little conference of colorful birds, talking all at once about some dreadfully boring thing. These birds meet here every week to discuss what they call “a matter of utmost importance,” but the Rose Dragon and I can never make out just what is so important about it. They call themselves the Order of the Red Feather because each one of them has at least one red feather, though many of them have more than one.

            “Hello, ladies,” I say, nodding my head to them, “hello, gentlemen.”

            “Good afternoon, Aliss,” says the leader of the order, a scarlet macaw. “Good afternoon, Rose Dragon.”

            “Good afternoon,” says the Rose Dragon. “Are there any interesting topics of discussion for today?” I know she is only asking this to be polite, for their topics of discussions are rarely very interesting.

            “Indeed, there are,” says the scarlet macaw. “This afternoon, we are discussing the budding political alliance between the Lizotho lizards and the parrots of the Isla de Parrot (pronounced “par-ro”).”

            “That’s very nice,” the Rose Dragon says quickly. “I bid that it goes well. Right now, I am taking little Aliss to visit her friend the Butterfly.”

            “Oh, the Butterfly!” says a colorful lady-lorikeet. “What a character he is!”

            “Yes, he is quite a character,” I say. “Goodbye, now, and enjoy your discussion.”

            “Goodbye, Aliss, goodbye, Rose Dragon!” they all chirp as we walk away. They may be boring, but they are very nice birds.

            The Rose Dragon lets me ride on her back on the way to the Butterfly’s grove. The Butterfly’s grove is filled with colorful flowers the size of houses and big, red mushrooms the size of trees. The Butterfly himself is taller than I am, though only slightly. He was a caterpillar when we met a long, long time ago, and when he became a butterfly his big bug eyes scared me at first. But now I think that they are beautiful, just like the rest of him.

            “Hello, dear Butterfly!” I wrap my arms around him and kiss his pretty wings. He wraps his wings around me and nuzzles me with his long, curly nose, which he calls a “proboscis.” Then he flutters up on to the top of his favorite mushroom (the one he was born under and the one he transformed under). I do my best to climb up there with him, holding on to one of his long, gangly legs when I slip. Finally, I swing my legs over the mushroom cap and crawl over to where he is so daintily balancing on his legs. He folds his arms and asks, “What poetry do you have to recite for me today?”

            Uh-oh! I don’t have any poetry to recite for him today. The Butterfly loves poetry, so on most days I make it a point to learn a new poem for him for our visits. But today it’s slipped my mind, so I try to remember one that the Rose Dragon likes to say to me before I fall asleep:

“Oh!

Hush now, my baby!

The night is beyond us

And the black waters sparkle so green.

The moon and the waters look down to find us

In the holes all inbetween.

Where pillow meets pillow, there is the soft pillow;

A weary wee flipper curls at the knees!

The storm will not wake you, the sharks will not ache you

As you sleep in the waves of the seas.”

            The Butterfly listens quietly, looking very thoughtful with his head propped up on his arm. But when I finish, he says, “That isn’t right.”

            “Oh, it isn’t?” I say. “I’m very sorry. I tried.”

            “That is Kipling’s ‘Seal Lullabye,’ correct?” asks the Butterfly.

            “I think that’s what it’s called,” I say.

            “That isn’t how it goes,” says the Butterfly, shaking his head.

            “I’m sorry,” I say again. “I really didn’t have a poem to recite today, so I tried to remember one. But I guess I couldn’t remember it very well.”

            “You certainly could not,” says the Butterfly. “But I trust that you will have it memorized the next time you come to visit me.”

            “Oh, I will!” I say, glad that he isn’t upset with me for messing it up. The Butterfly is very serious, and he can be very cold, but he is still a very dear friend.

            And he is still quite a character!

            “Aliss, it’s time to come down from there.”

            I had hoped that the Rose Dragon would let me sleep in one of the rose trees tonight. “When will I get to sleep in a rose tree?” I ask as she lifts me down. “I think you’re much safer on the ground, my dear,” she says, giving me a kiss. “Now go wash up and get ready for bed now.”

            From my bathing brook, I watch the pretty stars twinkling all over the night sky. The moon isn’t out yet, but when it does come out the rose trees will look just lovely in its light. I put on my nightgown and rush over to my dragon’s side, crawling under her rosy wing. She places a rose at my head and a rose on each side of me, so that the fragrance may give me sweet dreams tonight.

            “Which poem would you like to hear tonight?” she asks me.

            “Please tell me the seal one again,” I say, “so I can remember it for the Butterfly.”

            As I listen to her gentle voice go on about sparkling green waters and the moon looking downward to find us, I wonder what we will get to do tomorrow. Maybe I will visit the dormouse, who lives in a hole taller than I am in the side of a house even taller than my dragon. Perhaps we’ll visit the seashore and play with the gold fish, whose scales are really gold. Or maybe we’ll stay in the rose garden and climb to the very tops of all of the rose trees, and I will finally get to sleep in one that night. There are always so many amazing adventures to have in Wonderland that I would never be able to have in my old home. I miss my old home, but I will never miss the boring afternoons.

            “Asleep in the storm of the slow-swinging seas,” finishes the Rose Dragon.

            “I love you,” I tell her as I snuggle under her soft, rosy wings.

            “I love you too,” she says, and she nuzzles my face. “Goodnight, my Aliss.”

            

Into the Land of the Elves: The Doll in the Fairy Tale Room

The Diary of Miss Aidyn Hall, elf friend

August 8

2:45 PM

The Doll in the Fairy Tale Room

            Apple Blossom has been confined to the palace for five days as punishment for sneaking out of the Greenwood, but she has not been forbidden to see me or her other friends. I’ve been utilizing the time indoors and taking some of my work with me during my visits, because I know that it’s the only way I’ll get any work done at all. Of course, I can’t take my laptop with me because there’s nothing for me to plug it into.

            Writing here feels a lot more comfortable than writing at home, and when I’m here I even feel the motivation to write. Part of the reason for this is the beauty of the room that I’ve been allowed to use for writing; it is hands down the most extravagant room I have ever set foot in (and in comparison to the rest of the palace, this room is considered simple!). The walls are ebony black, creating a stage for the brilliant image formed by the single stained glass window: a beautiful fairy-like woman in a sparkling white gown ( and you can see the sparkles in the panes!), sitting on a pearly throne, holding a pearl-hilted sword in one hand and a brilliant blue jewel in the other. She is surrounded by golden stars and silver moons. Apple Blossom told me that the image depicts the Princess of the Moonlight, a mythical character passed along from the lore of the mountain dwarves. She watches over the land on moonlit nights, the light of the moon radiating from that blue jewel. The way that she told the tale—about the emergence of the princess from the pearly white egg left by the Great Sky Nymph on the moon’s surface, about the sword carved from the finest white moon rocks (not pearls!), about the Celestial Elves and Lunar Fairies—made me want to believe it in spite of the science that I knew. What a wonderful world full of moon princesses and jewel-winged butterflies the Jadeites live in.

            Apple Blossom herself is the other reason for my newfound motivation. She sees me writing and her interest keeps me going; “What are you writing, Aidyn?” “Is it a pretty story?” “What’s that one about?” “May I read it, Aidyn?” She wants to read them even though they are only drafts, and I always oblige. When she reads them and falls so in love with the stories and the characters that it shows as plainly as the nose on her face, and she concludes by telling me, “You write the very best stories, Aidyn,” I realize then that I have a brand new reason to continue writing these stories. I want to write for her. I want her to hear the stories. I want her to draw closer to the characters and the worlds that she thinks are “the very best.” I want her to share them with others just as she had shared that beautiful moon princess story with me.

            And if it ensured that I could keep my job, well, that was just a very fortunate perk.

            I wrote until Apple Blossom was called to lunch and I was invited to join her. “We can eat in the garden today,” she told me, as her punishment did not extend to the garden or the many yards and courtyards on the palace grounds. I was glad. I preferred eating in the garden to the awkward feeling of eating in what Apple Blossom called “the nook,” where the judgemental eyes of servants often passed over me and where the king and the queen seemed entirely too tense with me there.  Our table out under the cherry trees—still in full bloom, thanks to the jade stones placed at their roots—was laid out with slabs of roast pork, sweetbreads, fruit preserves, and two buttery yellow peaches each.  

            Now we’ve returned to the moon princess room, and Apple Blossom is reading some more of my story about the fairy queen and the wayward knight who fell in love with her while lost in the forest. Even while keeping to the castle, it’s been a lovely day.

6:20 PM

            I wonder if Apple Blossom will ever let me transcribe that moon princess story. I feel as if I’d be shirking my duty as a writer if I neglected to share such a wonderful tale. I could label it as “a myth from the local forest elves” without going into any detail. No one has to know who or where the “local forest elves” are, or even that they exist.

            We spent the afternoon exploring the rooms in the back hallways of the castle. These rooms were dark, out of the way, and never used. I felt like Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden, exploring her uncle’s old mansion on a rainy day. I asked Apple Blossom if the rooms had ever been used before.  

            “I’ve never seen them used by anyone but me,” she said.

            “Are you sure we’re allowed to be back here?” I asked.

            “Oh, yes,” said Apple Blossom. “I come here all the time, and nobody minds as long as I’m careful not to break anything.”

            There was a room with deep blue walls that was filled with old masks and costumes that looked as if they might have been for a masquerade ball. We laughed as we tried on the various masks—a bright pink one with iridescent butterfly wings, a blue one with shimmery mermaid scales, a velvety red one with gold trim—and traded and swapped them out. I wished that I had my camera on me.  

After we finished with the masks, we moved to a room with pink walls that hosted a miniature fairyland, filled to the brim with figurines and toy buildings, trees, backdrops, and scenes. Apple Blossom called it “the fairy tale room.” “I suppose it was my mother’s when she was a little girl,” Apple Blossom explained as she played with the little figures. “Everything here is from a different fairy tale, myth, or legend.” I was delighted to find that there was a miniature Princess of the Moonlight sitting on her throne. As I looked over the different figures of Jadeites and tree elves and animals and creatures from the myths and fables that Apple Blossom had told me at the library a while back, I saw that there were scenes that held tiny humans as well; humans with angry red faces, hateful little slits for eyes, mouths contorted in perpetual shouts and grimaces. But amongst all of these ugly little portrayals, there was a woman with a pretty, doll-like painted face. Her long, black hair trailed out behind her like a bridal train, and she wore a white dress decorated with colorful beads and embroidery. She was smiling, and her arms were outstretched as if reaching out for some invisible thing. I set down the moon princess and picked her up. She was human, all right. I set the figure down in front of Apple Blossom and asked, “Do you know who this is?”

Apple Blossom picked her up, looked her over, and set her back down. “I don’t know her,” she said, “but she’s pretty. She looks like you, Aidyn.”

“No, she doesn’t,” I said.

“I think she does,” said Apple Blossom with a shrug.

“She isn’t like the other humans on this table,” I pointed out. “Did you notice that?”

“I don’t play much with the human dolls,” said Apple Blossom. “I don’t like the way they look. But you’re right, this one is so much prettier and more pleasant than any of the others. I can ask my mother if she knows the story.”  

“Please do that,” I told her. “Then we can find the other dolls and pieces that go with her. She makes me very curious, and I suppose you can imagine why.”

“I can,” said Apple Blossom with a nod.

After we finished with the fairy tale room, Apple Blossom took the little doll and scampered off to find her mother. “Wait for me in my solar,” she instructed me. A “solar” was a Jadeite’s bedroom, called that because of the skylight in the center of the ceiling. I had been to Apple Blossom’s solar before, but I didn’t know how to get to it from these back hallways. “You’re going to have to lead me there,” I told her. “I can’t get to it from here on my own. You know I’ve never been to this part of the castle.”  

She obliged, leading me through several long, winding hallways until we reached her solar, one of the most pleasant looking rooms in the castle. Images of deer, foxes, rabbits, and other forest creatures played in painted forests on the aqua-colored walls. Dolls, toys, jades, and small knickknacks were lined up in orderly arrays, courtesy of Briar, the maidservant I’ve yet to meet. I sat down on the rose-colored bedspread and watched the sky through the skylight. A few minutes later, Apple Blossom came running back with a look of disappointment on her face. “Uh-oh,” I said. “Let me guess, your mother doesn’t know what story she’s from?”

“She doesn’t,” said Apple Blossom. “She was as puzzled as we are. It’s a shame, because if there is a story out there about a good, pretty human, then I want to hear it! I have lessons tomorrow and I will ask Beryl. I asked Mother if I can hold on to this figure, and she said that I could. She really does remind me of you, Aidyn.”

Beryl, as it turns out, is Apple Blossom’s teacher. If anybody would know the story, it would be her. “That sounds like a good plan,” I affirmed.

“You know,” said Apple Blossom, sitting down on the bed beside me, “I haven’t heard any stories about good, pretty humans, but I am living in one.” She looked up at me with a smile. “If I were to write a book about all of our adventures together,” she went on, “it would be a wonderful tale. Other people would read it, and then they would know that there’s at least one good, kind, pretty human out there. And I wouldn’t let anybody forget that story. I’d make sure that everyone knew it well.”

It was finally time to tell her. “Apple Blossom,” I said, “what if I told you that I’m already writing a story about our adventures together?”

She looked up at me with her wide eyes. “Are you really?” 

“I sure am,” I said with a little smile. “Let’s go back to the moon princess room and I’ll read some of it to you.” 

Into the Land of the Elves: "They Fascinate Me!"

The Diary of Miss Aidyn Hall, elf friend

August 6

7:30 PM

“They Fascinate Me!”

           

I didn’t want Apple Blossom to get soaked again, so I let her use one of my rain shells. It was much too big for her to wear, so I had to wrap it around her like a blanket. She didn’t protest, and in fact she seemed to like being wrapped up so snugly in the warm jacket. “I wish we had clothes as warm as this,” she said, snuggling against it. “Even our winter pelts aren’t quite so warm.”

I had to carry her, and when I picked her up she wrapped her arms around my shoulder and pressed her head against me. It was a wonderful feeling to be so trusted and loved. “Will we see anymore humans?” she asked a little nervously.

“I can’t promise that we won’t,” I said truthfully, “but I can promise that they won’t hurt you.”

            But we didn’t see anybody as we made our way to the magnolia archway. As I waded through the mud that packed against my boots, I realized that no one in their right mind would be out here. Even the Grand Elder Guardian had taken shelter from the pouring rain, but I could see the other guardians watching us from under leaves and thick patches of brush. As we made our way through to the Greenwood, the trees shut out the rain enough for me to set Apple Blossom down. “All right?” I asked as I wiped her face with my slicker sleeve. She nodded.

            Someone was waiting for us on the other side of the bridge. My heart skipped a beat—I was terrified that it would turn out to be one of the palace servants, or a courtier, or Apple Blossom’s nursemaid (she did still have one, even at ten), or even the queen herself. It was hard to see through the rain, but when we got a little closer I saw that it was only Raindrop.

            “Hey there,” I said, giving her a little wave. “What are you doing out here in this nasty weather?”

            “I could ask you the same thing,” said Raindrop. “You never come around when it rains. And Apple Blossom, where have you been? Everybody’s been looking for you!” Oh great!

            “I was…” Apple Blossom began, but I interrupted her; “She found her way to my house…you know, in the human world. She wanted to see where I go when it rains, and she wanted to see what it was like. I found her at my door earlier this afternoon. We waited out the rain for a while, and then I decided that I didn’t want her going home by herself, and I wanted to make sure that everyone would know where she really was. So here I am.” By the end of my explanation, Raindrop looked as if she had seen a ghost. For a few moments, her mouth formed a perfect O shape until she was able to stammer out a response.

            “You…you were in the…the human world, Apple Blossom?”

            Apple Blossom nodded. “Yes, I was.”

            “Are you sure that’s the truth?” Raindrop asked. I could tell that she really didn’t want it to be. But Apple Blossom said, “It is the truth. I was going to make up a lie, but…” She looked at me. “I couldn’t ask Aidyn to lie, too.”

            For a few moments, poor Raindrop had been struck dumb. She kept looking up at the sky, shaking her head, as if she just could not—or would not—believe  what she heard even after being told it was the truth. Finally, she said, “Did…did you run into other humans?”

            “We didn’t run into any,” Apple Blossom said truthfully. “We saw one, only one. But he didn’t approach us. I don’t even think that he saw us.”

            “But suppose he did?” cried Raindrop, her eyes wide.

            “He didn’t,” I assured her. “I am one hundred percent sure of that.”

            Raindrop was silent again for a moment. Then she said grimly, “Apple Blossom, you know that you’re going to be in trouble.”

            “I know,” Apple Blossom said with a sigh. I squeezed her hand. The two of us followed behind Raindrop as she scampered into the village, shouting, “Apple Blossom is back! She’s here, and she’s all right!” The next thing I knew, we were swarmed. There were officials from the palace dressed in gold trimmed green cloaks. There were armored soldiers other than the green-clad civil soldiers, carrying long swords at their sides. There were palace courtiers and servants. There were ordinary villagers—men, women, and children. This, I knew, was only a fraction of the search effort. What amounted to the entire Greenwood must have been out there looking for her for who knows how long! And now a woman whose silks and velvets indicated a palace attendant was scooping her up and kissing her forehead. She kissed her about five times before wrapping her arms around her and rocking her gently, the way that a human might do with a lost child who had just been found. “Are you all right, dear?” the tearful woman asked.

            “I’m fine, Beryl,” Apple Blossom said. “Aidyn found me.”

            “Aidyn the human?” the woman asked, slowly turning to look at me. My god, if looks could kill! “Yes,” clarified Apple Blossom. “She took me into her house and kept me safe and took care of me.”

            “There’s more to it than that,” I told Beryl. “Where are her parents?”

            Beryl’s response was to continue to stare daggers at me before carrying Apple Blossom off into the increasing swarm. Raindrop followed, and I was close behind. The armored soldiers pushed ahead, calling, “The princess has been found! She is found, and she is safe!” The cloaked officials trailed behind them.

            “Why did Mother and Father send out all of these people?” Apple Blossom asked Beryl. “They know I go out when it rains sometimes.”

            “They also know that they can always locate you when you do,” Beryl said sternly. “Only this time, things seemed to go a little bit differently, didn’t they?”

            The king and queen arrived before Apple Blossom could say anything further. “Oh, Apple Blossom!” her mother cried, prying her out of Beryl’s arms and wrapping her own arms around her. She dropped a kiss on her daughter’s forehead, and Apple Blossom kissed both of her cheeks and said, “I’m all right, Mother. Really, I am.” Then she was passed to her father, who responded with more hugs and kisses before his face turned very serious.

            “Where did you go, Apple Blossom?” the king asked very sternly. “Don’t tell me you were here in the Greenwood, for I know that you were not. Remember that I can always tell when you are lying to me.” Tall for a Jadeite, the man surpassed my height and conducted himself in a very imposing manner. I wanted to say something, but there seemed no appropriate time. Apple Blossom looked at the ground and said, “I was in the human world, Father.”

            “The human world!” In an instant, the king turned his firey blue eyes on me. I wanted to shrink. “You brought her there!” he hollered.

            “I didn’t!” I protested, taking a step back.

            “She didn’t bring me there, Father!” Apple Blossom said. “She only found me there! I went on my own!”

            Now the king turned those firey eyes on his daughter. “Why would you do such a thing?!” he roared, but she didn’t recoil or even look away. She looked right into that blue fire and said, “I just wanted to see what it was like.”

            The king pressed his fingers to his temple in exasperation. Then he unleashed a barrage of nasty-sounding words in a language that I could not understand, though I figured that it must have been the tree elf language. I gasped, but whatever he was saying must not have been too bad, as Apple Blossom was not crying and the others were not expressing any sort of shock or disgust. Even Raindrop only hung her head as if she was familiar with this sort of display and felt ashamed. Just a parental lecture, I supposed.

            And just like a typical child, Apple Blossom interrupted this lecture. To each of her father’s laments, she had a willful response in the same language. Back and forth, the two of them argued, until Apple Blossom shouted in clear, plain English, “Because they fascinate me, Father!”

            Everyone was silent. The king took a step back and shook his head as if he needed to clear it to believe what he had heard. The queen’s eyes were wide, her mouth forming a small O shape. The crowd was struck dumb. My mind was working, wondering what on Earth she could have possibly meant by that. Who fascinated her? Then I realized: humans! Humans fascinated her. They did not frighten her the way that they frightened the others, they fascinated her. That’s why she wanted to see our world. That’s why she wanted to make sense of the books and find a connection. That’s why, except for when she saw my neighbor, she never showed any real fear of humans. On that very first day, she had told me that she had always wanted to meet a human, to play with a human, to befriend a human. She wanted a human at her birthday party, to entertain and to introduce to her friends and family. She had approached me that day without fear, and showed me off as if I was a thing to marvel at rather than to fear. She never thought that I was a monster. She never thought that humans were monsters, and all of the kindness that I had shown her and her friends only affirmed her viewpoint.

            The king spoke more softly now, and whatever he was saying sounded like a question. Apple Blossom answered with, “I’d like for us to speak in c…I mean English, Father. I want Aidyn to be able to hear.” The wagging tongues of the surrounding crowd became much more active. The king looked at me and then back at his daughter before nodding. I was astounded by how much power the little girl held over this king. Since Apple Blossom’s birthday, I had only ever seen the king in passing. But from what Apple Blossom had told me about him, his love for her came before all else, and he placed her on the pedestal of a mini goddess. I could see that now. The man loved his daughter so much that he gave her the power to talk him down.  

            “They do fascinate me, Father,” Apple Blossom went on. “They are so different from us, yet so much like us. They eat different foods, live in different homes, have lots of strange tools and devices, and have no ability to channel the jade essences. And yet they speak the same, have the same feelings, can do so many of the same things, and they even almost look the same. We are not so different. Somehow, I always knew that. I always doubted that all humans were the monsters I was taught they were. When I met Aidyn, I learned that I had been right! Now, I am more fascinated by humans than I have ever been!”

            A young lady in the crowd spoke up. “Princess, don’t you realize that she could be trying to trap you? She’s fostering that fascination, doing whatever she can to entice you, filling your mind with interest in her and her world…and then she’ll be able to lure you in! She’ll have you right where she wants you!”

            “She wouldn’t do that!” Raindrop cried.

            “I’d never even dream of it!” I chimed in.

            “How dare you say such things about Aidyn!” shouted Apple Blossom.

            “It’s dangerous to trust her!” insisted a man in the crowd.

            “She is my friend!” retorted Apple Blossom.

            “Mine too!” Raindrop said.

            “A human could never be the friend of a Jadeite!” an older woman cried.

            Finally, the queen called the crowd to silence. She clapped her hands together loudly until each and every pair of eyes was on her, and the soldiers commanded the attention of the few who weren’t so willing to give it. Apple Blossom scurried over to me and wrapped her arms around my waist. I laid my hand on top of her head.

            “This situation is certainly far from the ordinary,” the queen began, “and I understand your concerns, as any abnormal series of events will incite concern. However, we have no reason to believe that Aidyn is untrustworthy. My daughter has always shown good judgement when it comes to choosing friends, and from what I have observed, this is no exception. Aidyn is adored by my daughter and well received by her friends and their families. She looks after Apple Blossom and keeps her safe as well as entertaining her, and she has never indicated even once that she might lead her astray.” She turned to me then and nodded. “Aidyn, I thank you for bringing our daughter—our princess—safely home, and I apologize for the impulsive accusations of my husband and certain citizens of the Greenwood. Human or otherwise, you are our daughter’s companion, and you have given us reason to trust you. As such, we shall always accept you with open arms.”  

            I was so stunned. I didn’t know what to say. My arm was around Apple Blossom, who gasped and tugged at my shirt excitedly upon hearing her mother’s words. I simply nodded and said, “Your majesty, I…I thank you.” My voice had returned to me. “Yes, thank you. Thank you for your acceptance, for your hospitality, and above all…for your trust.” My heart fluttered so much that I was sure it was going to soar straight up into the sky. Apple Blossom had her arms around me, and in a sudden surge of emotion I scooped her up off of her feet and embraced her. I snuggled against her as she wrapped her arms around my shoulders. 

The Painted Darkness (Once Upon a Time in the Fairytale Forest)

Note: Thought it is never mentioned, the narrator's name is Lenore.

Darkness here, and nothing more.

            My wings do not pierce the darkness, but become a part of it. My entire body becomes one with the increasing blackness as I make my way through the night. I am moved by the peace, the solitude, and the hint of beautiful sadness that only the dark can bring. The blackness deepens and I know that the night is ideal; it’s the perfect shade of black, so silent, so secretive…and so treacherous. It’s the kind of deep black night in which weary travelers are led astray, those who wander are lost, and fools are swallowed up by the darkness. It’s the kind of night that gives way to thoughts of fear, of hopelessness, of unseen hobgoblins lurking in the shadows…and of tragedy.

            I find my perch on a branch completely enveloped by the dark. To the ordinary observer, I am nothing more than a spot of black paint in the image of the night. Such an ordinary observer could not know that I am watching, waiting, and anticipating the next unlikely visitor that the darkness will send to me. My feathers are ruffled by the winds of the early spring night and the chill strikes me so deep in my bones. The atmosphere is so perfect that it brings a tear to my eye.

            And then he comes to me, a spry-looking young man, his hands jammed into his pockets and his hair tousled by the wind. He tries to hide the fear in his eyes, as young men are apt to do. But there is nobody to hide from except for me, and it’s no use trying to hide fear from me. The young men are the most amusing, as they never realize that their fear is as plain as the light of the moon until you play with them a bit, and then they understand that they are not as tough and collected as they would like to be. I emerge from the darkness and perch on an old log just an arm’s length away from this young man. I call out to him.

            He glances at me for only a moment, but in that moment, I can see the terror. He’d like to think that I am only a bird, but I am a raven. Ravens are the harbingers of death and despair, the night birds that lead the lost to their doom. But he is not ready to reveal his fear. He passes me by and walks off into the night, and I follow him. I perch on a low-hanging branch and call out to him again.

            He will not look at me. He is a fool, with his head held high. He will not look at me until I abandon this form that melts into the darkness a little too well. First I shed my birdy talons, then the thick black feathers on my chest. I cast aside my wings and my beak, and a plait of long black hair forms from the feathers on my head. In a raven’s place now stands a woman, with skin as pale as the light of the moon.

            “Young man!”

            He starts, and then he turns to look at me. His eyes are wide enough to pierce the night, and so hopelessly confused that I cannot help but laugh. “Oh, what an amusing character you are!” I say, before tightly wrapping my arm around the young man’s shoulder. “I do believe that I am going to have my share of fun with you!”

            My, does the little imp ever struggle and fuss! The fool that he is wants to run off into the night. But I know the night and its ways much better than he ever could. “Stop your fussing!” I order him, and pull back on his arm when he attempts to tear away from me. “My company is preferable to the cruelty of the night! Run away, and the darkness will surely consume you!”

            “I don’t care!” he insists. “Just let me go! Leave me alone!”

            I wrap both arms around him to keep him from running loose, and I lift him from the ground as if he’s nothing but a mere toddler. He screams, but there is no one around to hear him but the darkness, which does not care. My arms are wrapped around his legs and he cannot kick. His arms are firmly pressed against my torso and he cannot strike out. I can feel him trembling like a leaf in the wind. Even in my firm grasp, the fool struggles, but it’s all in vain. When he realizes that he cannot escape, he begins to cry. Alas, his façade of bravery has been stripped away, revealing who he truly is! The foolish young man who was so sure of himself in the night is now nothing more than a frightened little boy, and I do not feel the least bit sorry for him. In fact, I am greatly amused by his predicament.

            Together, the young man and I proceed into the darkness. He looks up at me with his desperate eyes, still filled with tears, and says, “What are you going to do with me?”

            “What do you think I plan to do with you?” I inquire.

            “I don’t know,” he chokes out. “You’re kidnapping me.”

            “Am I, now?”

            “Of course you are.” I can feel him shudder.

            I don’t provide any further comment. One thing that the night has taught me is that silence can easily play with one’s mind; the mind is forced to fill in the blanks by itself without a voice or a sound to do so, and the mind cannot always be trusted. We are both silent for the rest of the way to my home, and I know that his mind is filling in the blanks.

            In the darkest area of the forest, where very little light reaches even in the day, we reach the secluded little manor that I call home. I carry my guest inside and gently set him down on the soft black couch. I am not worried that he will flee, as I have effectively eliminated his hope of escape. He looks up at me with the eyes of a frightened child. He is still trembling.

            I proceed to my piano, its white keys providing a subtle contrast to the rest of my black world. I place my fingers on the keys. The dirge comes so naturally to me that it’s as if it plays of its own accord. “Black is the color of the painted darkness in the picture of the night,” I say over the sound of the dirge. “It is the color of the unknown, that great beast so feared by all. It is the color of uncertainty, of the cold fear that strikes you in every bone, every muscle. It is the color of ebony coffins, mourning clothes, the hidden journey of the dead into places unknown…”

            “Why tell me this?” the young man asks.

            “But alas, black is the color of the comfort of sleep,” I continue. “It is the color of the feathers of the wise old raven; that clever bird knows that the painted darkness can be a thing of beauty, while others may call it an eyesore. The darkness cannot be good or bad. It cannot be your friend and it cannot be your enemy. Like the raven, you can never be sure of its intentions.”

            “What are you saying?” the young man asks rather defensively. “Are you talking about yourself? Are you talking about me?”

            “I speak of the night,” I elaborate, “and how beneath its painted blackness, it is an entity of pure grey. It must be respected, for you never know its true nature. It must be heeded, for you never know its motives. It cannot be tamed, nor can it be reasoned with. But it can offer you safety and comfort just as it can offer you peril and unease.” With that, my dirge ends and I shed a single tear.

            “I understand now,” the young man says. “I get it. You’re telling me to be more careful at night.”

             There is nothing more for me to say. One by one, I blow out the dim candles lined up along the polished stone wall. In the meager light of the final candle, I can see my guest’s eyes begin to fall. Enveloped by the uneasy darkness of a room, he will feel warm blankets wrapped around him as he falls into the comforting darkness of sleep. When he awakens, it will be light, and I will be gone.  

The Princess and the Soldier (Once Upon a Time in the Fairytale Forest)

      In this great big world, there are people who manage to be loved and wanted by just about everyone they know. Alas, not everybody can be as fortunate as this, and those who are not can get by just as well with being loved and wanted by a select and special few. It takes a truly poor, unlucky soul to be made to manage in this world with nobody at all to love and want them. I understand very well that though it is thankfully rare, these kinds of unfortunate souls do exist. I was one of them.

   Even the toymaker’s apprentice knew that I would not be wanted. I was made as part of a regiment of fifteen tall tin soldiers, all the same: clean uniforms of stony grey, cedar colored hair trimmed to our ears, rounded caps, rifles at our sides. The only differences were the number and order of medals pinned to our lapels…and me, Avaline, the only woman in an army of fourteen men. “This one’s a lady,” the toymaker’s apprentice said incredulously.

            “Yes, she is,” said the toymaker.

            “Well, these are soldiers,” said the apprentice, “soldiers for a war. There are no ladies in war.”

            “Well, now there is one,” insisted the toymaker, “and her name is Avaline.”

            But the apprentice shook his head. “The boy won’t want her. He’ll only want the men, and then you’ll have wasted all of that tin to make her. What will you do with her then?”

            “We’ll see what he wants,” said the toymaker, and he patted my shoulder the way that a father would. He did not see that I was holding back tears.

            “The boy” was the toymaker’s son. It was his birthday, and we were meant to be his very best gift. We were polished until our tin gleamed like silver in the light, and then we were instructed to march into the boy’s bedroom, where he sat surrounded by all of the other toys he had received. When he saw us marching in, a smile lit up his rosy face, and I was so delighted that I forget about what the apprentice had said. I wanted to smile back, but I could not while I was on duty. The boy looked over our stony faces, our clean uniforms, the imposing rifles at our sides. “These are yours, Walter!” the toymaker said cheerily. “Do you like them?’

            “I like all of them except for the girl,” the boy said. I nearly dropped my rifle and fell to my knees! I thought I felt my tin heart sink straight down into my stomach! I wondered if the men on all sides of me could feel that I was trembling. The toymaker hid the disappointment in his voice. “Really? You don’t want Avaline?”

            “No, just the men,” said Walter.

            “Are you sure you don’t want her?” the toymaker appealed. “She’s a major, you know.”

            “I’m sure,” insisted Walter. “I don’t want a girl major. So can I have the men?”

            Don’t you cry, Avaline, I ordered myself. You are a major in a respectable army, not a weeping maiden. “All right, Walter,” said the toymaker with a sigh. “You can have the men. I’ll keep Avaline. Come back here, Avaline.” I didn’t want to move. To leave my post was to go against everything, but it was an order from my superior. I took my place at the toymaker’s side, keeping my head held high though it felt too heavy to do so. I remained stone-faced as Walter led my men away, and they followed him dutifully without giving me even a glance. The toymaker took me by the hand. “I’m awfully sorry, Avaline,” he said. “I’m afraid that’s just the way that little boys are. But I won’t be getting rid of you. I’m far too proud of you for that.” He gave my hand a squeeze and led me back to his workshop. I was off duty now, and it was all right to show my tears.

            I could have stayed with the toymaker forever. He treated me like a daughter, and whenever I could I helped him around the workshop to repay his kindness. He never made me feel as though I was not wanted, but at the same time he was unable to make me feel as though I was. As much as he treated me like a part of his family, I knew that I was really an outsider who didn’t belong anywhere. My former army fought all of their battles without me and seemed to have forgotten that I ever was a part of them. Walter had assigned a new man to take my place as a major; the only indicators that I ever was a soldier were my uniform, my military-issue rifle, and the medals pinned to my lapel. I did not feel like myself anymore, and I had never gotten a chance to feel as though I truly belonged. So that is why I decided to set out and find a place where I did belong, provided that such a place existed. Late one evening, long after everybody—the toymaker, his wife and son, his apprentice, and all of the other toys—had retired to bed, I took a piece of paper and a pen from the toymaker’s desk. I wrote:

Went out into the world, as it is a soldier’s duty. Don’t worry about me, for I will be all right. Thank you for everything. Avaline

            I quietly crept into the toymaker’s bedroom, where he slept peacefully beside his pretty wife, who belonged to him and him to her. I set the note down on his bedside table, and I just had to look at him for a few moments before I could truly decide if I was willing to leave the man who had granted me life and treated me so kindly. I did not want to lose the memory of his face—his bushy, dark beard and his warm, lively eyes, his frizzy dark hair, his good-natured smile. He had treated me with love that I knew the world may never show me. But what good was love, I thought, if I did not truly belong? I kissed both of his cheeks and departed from the room. With only my rifle, my medals, and the uniform that bore the name I did not wish to forget, I stepped out into the great big world.

            I longed to find anybody that I could belong to, but I never dreamed that I could ever belong to somebody like Annabel. Who could have ever imagined that an old wayward tin soldier could be loved by a woman with all of the beauty and regality of a princess? In the morning, I look out the window and see her reaching out to the sun in greeting, illuminated like a wild divinity of the forest. She clasps her hands and twirls on her toes, flaring out her golden hair and her silken gown. Her eyes catch me smiling at her, and she smiles back. She rushes to the window and kisses my lips, and I know in my heart that this is love. Something I had never gotten a chance to experience seems so real and so effortless with her, and it’s astounding just how real a feeling that I’ve never felt before can be. I know that I could never love anyone as I love Annabel.

            Annabel had also been cast aside by a child who did not want her. The little girl had requested a lovely china doll to be her friend; one with sea-green eyes, rosy cheeks, long black hair, and a beautiful castle and garden for the two of them to play in. Well, the dollmaker worked long and hard for many days and many nights, but on the very last day of work she realized that she had no black hair and no time to find any. She had hoped that the little girl would be happy with long golden locks, but it was not to be. The little girl took one look at Annabel and burst into angry tears, and her mother cursed and berated the poor dollmaker for being unable to give her daughter what she had asked for. So Annabel was left all alone in her lofty castle, with nobody at all to make her feel loved and wanted.

            I loved Annabel the very moment I caught sight of her leaning her pretty golden head out of one of the castle windows. But I wouldn’t have dared to speak to her. I was an outcast tin soldier, wandering like a vagrant with no real purpose, and she was on par with a princess. Surely, I was unworthy to even look her in the eye, much less actually speak to her and ask if she would have me! I was frozen to the spot, so overwhelmed by her beauty that I did not notice the first drop of the first rain since my departure.  By the time I came out of my spell, it was too late to search for any sort of decent shelter. I felt the cold water seeping into my joints. It slowed me down, forcing me into a limp and then a pitiful crawl. Finally, brought down to my hands and knees, I managed to drag myself under an old willow tree—the closest thing to a shelter that I could possibly make it to at the moment. Of course, it wasn’t enough. Every part of me was all locked up, and the rain continued to pour upon me on all sides. Cold drops slipped off of the willow leaves and seeped into my shoulders, my head, and my neck. I was done.

            As a rule, Annabel and I don’t like children. How can we? Our experiences with them showed us that they are horrid, spoiled brats who only ever think of themselves. But every rule has its exceptions; my life would have ended that day, had it not been for two children. Their names were Laura and Hana, and though they were both older than ungracious little Walter, I did not trust them. It was Laura, the younger one, who found me all locked up beneath the willow tree. She was a pleasant-looking child with a pretty face, but I still expected her to laugh or kick me or throw rocks. I did not expect her to free me from my rusted prison.

            Laura and Hana’s kindnesses reminded me of the toymaker. Together, the two of them guided me until my body remembered how to move. Their careful, gentle attentions brought warmth and health back to me, and I began to feel like a soldier again, not an unfortunate pile of rusted tin. The two of them were good company, and it wasn’t very long before I considered them my friends—the only friends I had ever had since the toymaker. I forgot that they were children, and I forgot that children were not to be trusted.

And so I confided to my friends that I was in love with a beautiful china doll that lived the life of a princess, in a world so far from and so above my own. I confided to them that I could never love another as much as I loved her, and that she was the only reason I even understood that a thing called love existed. But I concluded by clarifying that there was no way that a beauty like her would ever love an old outcast tin soldier, and by the time I had finished, the assertion of this reality had driven me to very undignified tears.

Toys are not able to speak to children in the way that children are able to speak to eachother. So when Laura and Hana understood my plight, even in the very limited ability I had to get it across to them, I knew that they were my friends for sure. And in that moment, anything at all seemed to be possible, if it was possible that someone like me could have true friends.

           

            Thanks to those two girls, Annabel and I learned so much more than just how to love eachother. We learned that there are friends for us. We learned that the world is not necessarily as cruel as it seems. Above all, we learned that we were not meant to live in this world without the love of another. I realize now that even those poor souls out there, still wandering the world with nobody to love and want them, must have somebody out there who will someday learn to do just that. They may not know it yet, but it is there.

            This world is a good one, filled with so many wonderful things. I think about my old squad mates and I pity them; their life is a war, and battle is all that they will ever know for the longest time. By now, the only indicators of my past as a major are the markers on my uniform and the medals on my lapel. My squad mates, who have forgotten that I ever existed, will only know the brutality of fighting in pointless war after pointless war, led by a childish little tyrant. But I know what it is to be more than a soldier. I know what it is to be a knight to a beautiful princess, and I know what it is to love. If you ask me, this is far more valuable than medals or titles could ever be. 

Into the Land of the Elves: A Rainy Day Visitor

The Diary of Miss Aidyn Hall, elf friend

August 6

11:21 AM

A Rainy Day Visitor

It’s raining cats and dogs and there’s no sign that it will let up anytime soon. Usually I can get most of my work done on days like this, when it’s too wet to visit the Greenwood and there’s nothing to do but work, but it’s difficult to get anything done when you have no motivation.  I sit down to write, and end up doing more erasing, crossing out, and backspacing than actual writing. Lately it has been taking me entire hours just to finish up a few paragraphs at a time. Sometimes I sit down to write, pick up the pen, and forty-five minutes later the paper will still be blank. The stories just have no meaning to me anymore—they come out of my head, and when they do I am obligated to at least attempt to write them down, but the meaning behind them has disappeared. The only story that I have a genuine enthusiasm for writing is the one that will never be published. But perhaps a little journaling on yesterday’s elven adventures will give me at least a bit of the motivation that I need.

When I met Apple Blossom at the magnolia archway, she was all smiles about inviting me out on a picnic with her and her friends. “Can you bring some more grapes, Aidyn?” she asked, bouncing around on her feet. “Can you bring the same tasty ones that you brought yesterday? Oh, can you, please?”

“Of course I can, dear,” I said, patting her on the head. “In fact, I’ll bring another whole container of them. If you’ll let me go down to the store for a moment, I’ll go get some more right now.”

            “I’ll wait right here,” she said, and took a seat under the Grand Elder Guardian’s massive web. I headed home to grab my purse and car keys, thinking, How amazing is this? How many other people in that supermarket are going to be there to buy grapes for a picnic full of elf girls?

            There’s somebody at the front door, and apparently they haven’t heard of knocking or ringing the bell. It’s probably a friend of mine wondering where I’ve been, or else my mother coming over to check up on me. I have to go and answer that.

11:52 AM

            Oh my god.

            It was Apple Blossom! Apple Blossom was at my door!!!

            There she was, standing there with her hands clasped behind her back, drenched from head to toe. My heart beat so wildly that I had to clap my hand over my chest to calm it down. What was she doing here? How did she know where to find me? Did anybody else know that she was here? My god, had anybody seen her? I managed to choke out, “A…Apple Blossom?” I was sure that my worry was as plain as the nose on my face, but she was wearing her signature smile and did not seem even remotely swayed.

            “Hello, Aidyn!”

            Without really thinking, I grabbed her by the arm and pulled her into the house. She yelped, pulled back a little, and cried “Aidyn, what are you doing?” I slammed the door abruptly and peered out the window to see if any neighbors were around. There was no one out there. Good. As far as I knew, she had not been spotted. I waited for my heart to slow down, and then I turned my attention to Apple Blossom; “What in the whole wide world are you doing here?!”

            She gasped, taken aback by how I had raised my voice at her. “I…I only came to visit you, Aidyn. I just…I wanted to see where you go when it rains.”

            I exploded. “Are you completely out of your mind, Apple Blossom? Do you know how dangerous it was for you to come here?  This is the friggin’ human world! Did you see those other houses lined up alongside mine? Did you? Well, there are humans in each and every one of those houses, and who knows what they would have done if they saw you?!” Those haunting images from the picture books came back to me: grown men who beat little Jadeite children, humans attacking Jadeites with no discernible provocation, a boy throwing stones at a poor Jadeite woman just trying to go about her day. How was I to know that one of my neighbors, as nice and out of the way as they normally were, wouldn’t have turned out to be one of those monsters if they managed to get hold of Apple Blossom? My blood boiled, fear held on tightly to my heart, and to keep myself from bursting into tears and hysteria I converted the fear to anger. “Apple Blossom, this is no doubt the stupidest, most asinine thing that I have ever seen you do!” I hollered. “I mean, you’ve done some pretty dumb things before, but…”

            Now she was sobbing. Her face began to fall the moment I started going off on her, and by now she had completely erupted. She wrapped her arms around herself and trembled all over like an earthquake was taking place inside of her. Her tears fell like the rain outside as her sobs turned into blaring wails, and I realized that I was the only monster here.

            “Apple Blossom…?” I took a step toward her. She stepped back and turned away from me. “Apple Blossom, I’m sorry! I shouldn’t have…”

            She darted away like a frightened fox, scrambled into the darkness of a closet that I had left open, and crawled into a corner to hide away. I left her alone.

1:36 PM

            When I checked on Apple Blossom, she was still in the closet, sitting against the wall with her legs drawn up to her chest. She had finished crying, and her face was red and blotchy like a withered rose. I stepped over the old things lying on the floor and sat down beside her. “Hey.”

            She turned to look at me and said, “I’m sorry I made you mad, Aidyn.”

            My heart sank. “Oh, sweetie…” I put my arm around her. “You didn’t make me mad. You made me scared, and I shouldn’t have handled it the way I did.” I patted her shoulder and she rested her head against me.

            “I’m sorry, Aidyn.”

            “I’m sorry too.”

            I made lunch for both of us: a ham and cheese sandwich and a glass of milk for myself, a plateful of black grapes and a glass of milk for Apple Blossom. Though she gobbled up her grapes greedily, she kept glancing curiously at my sandwich, until she finally asked, “What kind of meat is that?”

            “It’s pig,” I told her. “Haven’t you had pig before?”

            “Not thin like that,” she said. “Can I try some of it?”

            I broke off a small fragment of my sandwich and placed it on her plate. She studied it for a moment, took a bite, and made a face as she swallowed. “I don’t like it!”

            But she liked her milk. After chugging it down, she held the glass out to me and asked, “Can I have some more milk, please? And can you tell me what animal it’s from?”

            “It’s cow milk,” I said, “and I’ll give you some more if you answer a few questions for me.”

            “Okay.” She folded her hands and sat back in her chair.

            “First of all,” I began, “how did you know where to find my house? How did you know I was here?”

            “It’s because of your tag,” she stated. Oh yeah! I’d stopped bringing my tag with me on visits to the Greenwood a long time ago. It rested at the bottom of a drawer on my nightstand, and I had forgotten that it even served a purpose at all. “Oh, that’s right,” I said. “So, you went straight to my house? You didn’t run into any other humans?”

            She nodded. “I didn’t see any humans,” she clarified, and I sighed with relief. “Well,” I went on, “does anybody know that you’re here? Do your mother and father know?”

            She looked at me for a good, long while like she had just been caught stealing from the cookie jar. I knew the answer then. Still, I said firmly, “Be honest with me, Apple Blossom.”

            “Well…” Her eyes shifted from my face to the ceiling. “If they knew that I was coming here, I wouldn’t have been able to get here.”

            I sighed and got up to pour her another glass of milk. When I set it down in front of her, she greedily snatched it up and began to wolf it down, spilling a little down the front of her tunic. “Slow down, please,” I told her. “Remember your table manners.” She nodded and obeyed. I folded my hands on the table and looked over at her like a stern but fair school principal making ready to lecture a student at her desk. “Apple Blossom,” I said, “you should not have come here. The fact that you had to hide it at all is a sure sign that you should not have come here. Not only was it very dangerous, but it was very dishonest. If your parents or anybody at the palace finds out that you’re here, I could end up in serious trouble! You know that they still don’t trust me enough for you to be able cover for me.”

            “But they never have to find out,” said Apple Blossom. “I’ll tell them that I was with the meadow fairies all day—they have good, strong stick houses that keep out the rain, and I very often visit with them when it rains anyway.”

            I raised a brow. “So you’re going to lie?”

            “Well…” She shifted uneasily in her seat.

            “Do you see what I mean, Apple Blossom? You shouldn’t have come here! First you had to cover it up, and now you have to lie—and technically, covering it up is already a kind of lie! Your coming here spawned a web of dishonesty!” I pressed my fingers to my brow and sighed in exasperation. “And now I’m caught right in the middle!”

            Apple Blossom was about to cry again. “I’m…I’m sorry, Aidyn.”

            “I know, dear. I know.” I sighed again. “But I think it’s best if we get you home as soon as possible. You won’t have to cover for me, because I’ll be coming with you.”

            “Mother will be angry,” Apple Blossom said nervously.

            “She’ll be even angrier if you lie,” I told her.

            “Can’t we wait until the rain lets up just a little?” she asked. “Mother never expects me back until mid-afternoon.”

            “I don’t think we should wait that long,” I said, “but I don’t want you to get soaked again. You can stay here for just a little while longer, and then we’re getting you back home.”

            I led her to the back screen door to see my garden. Even in the grey day, my flowers managed to stand out as bright and colorful as ever, and Apple Blossom was absolutely delighted by them. “Oh, Aidyn,” she cried, “how lovely your garden is! I never could have guessed that humans could grow such beautiful flowers! They’re so big and so bright! Oh, I wish it wasn’t raining, so I could go out there with them and get to know them. Do butterflies and flower fairies ever visit your garden? If I was a butterfly or a flower fairy, I’d love to visit a garden as wonderful as this!”

            We played indoor hide and seek for a while, and her short stature and small build gave her a very distinct advantage. I tried to show her a cartoon on TV, but after only a few minutes she decided that she was not interested. “What’s so fun about sitting and watching pictures move on a box?” she asked.

            “You’d be surprised at just how many humans spend entire days doing that,” I told her.

            After she got bored with the TV, I gave her some blank sketchpad pages and colored pencils to draw with. “These are very strange drawing tools, Aidyn,” she told me. “Are they meant to be painting pencils? Does paint come out of them when you…oh! This bright blue one is so vivid! It looks just like a line of sky on the paper! I’m going to see what the red one looks like…oh, it’s as bright as a flame! I really like these, Aidyn!”

            While she was drawing, I sat at my desk mulling over my writing. Suddenly, she yelped and dropped the pencil she had been holding. Immediately, I was at her side. “What happened?” I asked, thinking that perhaps a bug had gotten into the house and bitten her. But her frightened eyes were fixed upon the window, and I turned to look. One of my neighbors was outside. He was only wiping the rain and mud off of his car and he wasn’t even looking in our direction, but the sight of another human had Apple Blossom transfixed with fear. “It’s all right, dear,” I said, laying my hand on her shoulder. “He won’t bother with us. He’s got his own business to attend to." 

             But my reassurance fell on deaf ears. Forgetting about the drawing materials, Apple Blossom scampered away and crawled under my desk to hide. She’s still curled up under there right now, though she’s shaking just a little less than she had been before. I think now might be a good time to take her home.