Fairy Friend

By Terry Corbett

An enchanting story about a retired woman and her talented granddaughter and their relationship to the fairy world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 20, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483508801

Book preview

EARTH

1

Here lives a retired woman named Myra. She lives in an adequate home in a blue collar neighborhood. While the front yard looks ordinary in a neat and tidy way, the back yard is something else. The whole back yard is a garden, a garden with narrow windy paths with flowers, vegetables, herbs, ornaments, whirligigs, fairy sculptures, and a group of musical gnomes in the corner, forever playing music only Myra can hear. This is her sanctuary, her refuge, her place where the world comes into balance; peaceful, productive, and well.....hopeful.

Her husband, long since passed, left her with two children to raise with little money to go on. She worked in a local factory to make ends meet. Her mother came to live with them to take care of her children, Nancy and Jeff, while she was at the factory. Many was the time in those long hours at the factory, she wished she was with her children, raising them in a way that she felt was important. But she partly surrendered that to her mother, who was a no nonsense kind of person. Maybe that was ok she thought, after all she felt she turned out pretty well. Of course that may have been due to being raised in part by her mother’s mother, Grandma Bridget, an Irish immigrant. Oh my, the stories she could tell, stories of giants and little people, of kings and princesses, and most of all, of the magical folk of the fairy world. Even now at times, she could hear herself as a little girl saying, Grandma, Grandma, take me there.

Jeff and Nancy moved to the coasts after college, Jeff to the west and Nancy to the east. While Nancy married a corporate lawyer, Jeff was still single, still chasing gold and girls. Myra knew he was a good kid and hoped he would find the right one someday soon. Nancy had a little girl, eight years old, named Bridget, the same name as her great, great grandmother. Oddly, it was the lawyer husband who wanted her named that. Myra didn’t know exactly why he wanted her so named, but his standing went up considerably in her eyes after that.

It had been some years now that Myra’s mom had gone to her reward after a sudden stroke. Living alone was something that took Myra a little getting used to. It was then that she began to pay more attention to her garden and by the time she retired from the factory, she had become quite the gardener. Actually, it was very natural for her given that her Grandma Bridget not only planted flowers and vegetables in her garden, but was also planted the love of gardening in her granddaughter Myra. And not only the love of gardening, but she was also planting the love of, as Grandma Bridget would say, the Fae, the fairy world. Grandma Bridget would show little Myra that to have a successful garden, one needed the help of the garden fairies. And to entice the garden fairies, one had to build a fairy bower in a corner of the garden. So they would carefully stake out an area for the fairy bower, using an old hollowed out stump with bird’s nests, stick furniture, feathers, pine cones, shells, and, of course, old discarded jewelry, and other shiny rings and things. Sometimes they would leave little treats, like candy or small cookies with frosting in or around the fairy house. In the morning Myra would run out to see if they had taken them. Sure enough, they would be gone or half eaten, and sometimes the jewelry would be moved. She would run back in the house shouting, Grandma, Grandma, the fairies took our treats and played with our jewelry and rings. Grandma Bridget would smile and then quietly say, Good, good, it’s going to be a good year for the garden, child.

Now, after a long day of working in the garden, memories like this would softly visit Myra as she sat at her ornate outdoor table that she had received when Grandma Bridget died, along with her gardening tools, and some curious fairy statues and the gnome musical group. She often thought what she loved about Grandma Bridget was that she allowed her to believe in things like fairies. She allowed little Myra to dream and imagine in a big way, not in a small, cramped, secretive fashion, or worse, not at all. One time when Myra was an adult visiting Grandma Bridget she was recalling those earlier times and said to her, I use to really think that fairies took those treats, when probably; a raccoon or a rabbit did it. You wouldn’t have gone out there at night and taken them or moved things around would you have Grandma? She remembered how Grandma Bridget slowly shook her head and said, Aw child, tis a shame. You’re getting all grown up and getting too big for the fairy world. You have to know I don’t love you less for it, but I have a feeling that you’ll be back, yes I think you’ll be back my dear one.

Myra was stirred from her reverie by a distant ringing. Oh my, the telephone! she said, as she jumped up out of her chair and then up the old steps and into the kitchen. Hello! She said, half out of breath.

Hi Mom! Are you alright?

Hey Nancy girl. Yeah, I was just in the back. How are you?

I’m fine. I wish you would let me get you a cell phone. It would make life easier for you....and me.

Oh that’s ok. What’s new with you?

Well, now that you ask and the reason I’m calling is, that Brad has some legal work to do in Spain and we thought it would be nice to spend some time together. We were wondering if you could take care of Bridget for a couple of weeks during her spring break. Her school lets out in about a week?

I’d love to. We’ll have a fun time and she can help with the garden. We can get to know each other a little better.

Oh great! Thanks Mom. And for what it’s worth, I overheard Bridget talking to her little friend saying that she hoped she could go to Camp Grandma’s for spring break.

That’s cute Nancy, I’d better get a whistle.

2

The airport was busy with a robotic voice echoing flight arrivals and departures. Myra was there waiting for her little charge. She found herself feeling a sense of anticipation as she surveyed the crowd for some familiar faces. All of a sudden their eyes met,