Friday Flash Fiction #28 - The Magic of Spring

This one could've gone two very different ways. I'm not sure I like the one I picked *g* But I picked it because it would allow the story to qualify as Flash :) hahaha Let me know what you think! Enjoy.

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It was spring. Well not really, not technically anyways. The calendar said spring was still way off and the groundhog said it'd be even longer. My mother and I voted to have groundhog burgers for dinner when we heard that. Cause it was definitely spring. The first day that you could walk outside, braced for the cold, and then laugh in relief when you discovered it wasn't necessary.

Spring was the season of magic. Every season was magical according to my mother, but I knew better. Because only in spring could I see the Fair Ones.

Oh don't look at me like that. Just because I can see and hear people nobody else can does not mean I'm crazy. I'm simply more receptive; at least in the spring.

I imagine they're really here all year -- I mean logically that's all that makes sense right? It's just that I can only see them in the spring. It might be that New Year's senses are stronger -- with them I can see more than at any other time. Or it could be that they, like us, have an almost childlike glee when the world comes back to life each year, and are perhaps less cautious than otherwise.

Whatever the reason, I know it's spring because I saw the first one today: a young woman. I would've thought she was human were it not for the absolute perfection of her form and the telltale thread of gold running through her hair. She was gardening, and actually deigned to speak to me when I was so rude as to approach her. I was amazed -- they'll sometimes let me listen to them but they almost never acknowledge me. And why should they? Next to them I am, well, not much more than a slug I would imagine. And when was the last time you spoke to a slug? But she spoke to me, and the music of her voice held me enthralled. I sputtered a reply -- I can't even remember what -- but I think I held up my end of the conversation relatively well.

At least I did till we were interrupted. Some random person, their voice dripping with false concern, asking me if everything was ok. "No it's not ok -- you're too bind to see the magic that's in front of you, and because of that, now she's lost to me too." But I only thought the words; experience had taught me that there was no point to itterating my frustration. If they can't see, they can't be shown. Their loss.

But to me, a Fair One had spoken. Life couldn't get much better.

When I got home I had to hide my elation. My mother would understand; she could see the magic too. But the rest of my family could not, and they feared what they didn't understand. They made my mum take pills that blinded her to the magic. Ever since I was very young, when she realized I too could see the Fair Ones, she's warned me never to let them know. So I waited patiently untill she was alone to describe to her the magic she could no longer experience. But containing my excitement was nearly impossible; she could see it in my eyes. She and I offered to go pick up dinner so that we could talk. "They spoke to me today," I blurted the second I got in the car. "Really TO me. Not just around me. How amazing is that?!?" My mother's eyes lit with an excitement I rarely saw these days. She understood how important this was. And more importantly, she remembered. They used to speak to her too -- taught her so much the blind ones would never understand. Things I was only beginning to learn.

That night there was a whisper at my window. It sounded like tree branches rustling in the wind -- but there were no branches there, and even if there had been, there were no leaves. I opened the window and peered down -- the same Fair One who'd spoken to me this morning and her male counterpart stood below; they wanted me to go with them. I hurried outside, afraid to turn away for fear they would vanish but desperate for the unheard of opportunity being offered to me.

They each took one of my hands -- so soft were theirs it was like holding velvet. The golden strip each had in their hair sparkled in the moonlight. Their melodic voices made even small talk captivating. As I followed them I was so grateful for the opportunity that I never questioned where we were going. And when they led me across their lake -- where the stories said the queen lived --I knew their magic was strong enough to carry me.

It never occurred to me that where there's fair, there's probably foul. It never occurred to me they might leave me out there, where mortal legs could not stand. I didn't realize until that moment how much safer my mother was being blind. And I wished, too late, that I had never experienced the magic of the spring.