19 November 2012
"What?" I gasped out, laughing and clutching my tea tightly so I wouldn't drop it.
My neighbor, Kyle, just looked at me.
"The fairies, you know, those little things that fly around and live in flowers and stuff."
I looked down at my tea as I tried not to laugh again. Kyle was my next door neighbor. I had known him for a year, and we had just started going to the same high school, as he was a year younger than I and was just starting his freshman year. Since we now walked the same route to school at the same time every day, I decided it was necessary to get to know him better. That is why he was now sitting on my porch drinking tea with me. Our conversation had been fairly formal at first, but in the last few minutes he had started to rant about his "annoying" little sister.
"She has a new obsession," he had said, irritated. "She goes on and on about it. It's annoying."
"What is it?" I had asked.
"She believes in fairies," he told me.
That's why I was now nursing a burn on my hand from the hot tea that sloshed out of my cup when I almost dropped it.
"I know what fairies are," I said to him. "So what's the problem?"
"She walks around 'talking' to them," he said, rolling his eyes. "Constantly. It's getting on my nerves. If I tell her to stop she gets all upset and says I'm evil. I told her they're not real so she couldn't possibly be talking to them, but she thinks they're there."
"You think she's not actually talking to them?" I asked. He looked at me like I was crazy.
"Of course not."
"How do you know she's not?" I countered as I took a sip of my tea.
"They're not real," he responded and shrugged, as if it was no big deal.
"Not real..." I echoed quietly and fingered the rim of my tea cup.
Kyle took several big gulps from his cup. I wondered how on earth he wasn't burning his mouth.
"I don't see why you seem surprised," he went on. "Everyone knows they're not real. We all heard about them as kids. You know, 'fairy tales'? They're just in stories, a figment of the imagination. Something to tell little girls about before they go to sleep at night."
I sighed. He wasn't going to be an easy one.
"Well, what if I told you I DO believe in fairies?" I said with another casual sip.
"You've got to be kidding me," Kyle heaved a big breath. "You can't. You're how old, sixteen?"
"Fifteen," I corrected, "and so what?"
"Well, it's something everyone's supposed to grow out of, like believing in Santa Clause, or the tooth fairy." He paused. "Oh, no... you don't believe in the tooth fairy then too, do you?"
"No, of course not," I laughed. "Fairies don't have anything to do with teeth, they only work with nature and light."
"Oh my gosh!" Kyle groaned. "I'm trying to tell you my sister's being obnoxious and you're basically backing her up! And besides, I thought all fairies supposedly did was wave wands and grant wishes."
I laughed. "Well then, Kyle, you have a lot to learn about fairies."
Believe It Or Not | Chapter 1 • Opuss № I