Sugar Wings

The urge to write always hits me like a ton of bricks during the night. Its within those galloping seconds between sips of YooHoo and Green Day that the urge to write takes my mind. Problem is, there's never anything to write about. Plus it was 11:07 PM on my clock and I had school in the morning. So it probably wasn't a good idea to stay up any later, but good ideas in my mind don't usually make it past the idea-and-nothing-more stage. 1

Between the dogs snoring away on my pillows and the rampant insomniac monkey in my head, I figured the Sandman has his work cut out for him. 2

Outside, the city slept to its metronome of late night television shows. It was too late to find a path to sleep and much to early for the scum of the city to come sloshing in from under seas of vacant lots and empty alleyways. Lilly growled at me as I lifted my head off of her (ahem...my) pillow and lean for the light switch. I reached for my black frames while I tried to remember where I had stuffed my bag of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups the last time I had "cleaned".  Hmmm...why was it that I could always find what I wanted when my room was messy but never when it was clean? Confident, I strode over to my ancient printer and stuck my hand down its bulky jaws. The thing was useless, and I was guessing it had seen better days; ones with computer games  like "Pong" that answered the question "Using a monotonous noise, how do you keep an idiot occupied safely?" 3

I felt around until I pulled out a little plastic bag. Hah! Victory in the form of Gummy Worms! Good, but not Reese's. Oh well, beggars couldn't be choosers especially on a school night. I grabbed a fist full and shoved them into my mouth, hoping to god sugar was a formidable anti-depressant. 4

I had one of the little guys' tails dangling from my mouth when I heard a very strange noise: like a large rock was being thrown at my window screen. I froze a minute wondering if the Gummy Worm Police had come wanting their "Do Not Feed The Insomniac!" sign back. Cautiously, I hobbled over to my window. There was a baseball sized hole in the screen. I froze. Could this be God finally giving my religiously confused self evidence of a greater power? And that's when I saw the faerie. Instantly I dropped my bag of forbidden jellied fruits and choked on a half eaten worm.5

"Holy shit!" I said. Great I thought I got rid of this stuff in therapy.6

The little creature's head was about the size of a nickel. It had a short, heart shaped face, punctuated by a dainty point of a nose. It's eyes sparkled with some kind of glimmer in the irises, and it had snowy white hair that I could only describe as being like a distorted crystal. It was wearing some type of light blue gauzy material that hugged its body and ended in a beautiful veil like fin of a skirt. Attached to its back, were azure butterfly wings lined and dotted with black spots. 7

"Help me!? It cried reaching its little hands out for me. Strange, it seemed more like an order than a plea. "Come on, don't just stand there!"8

I noticed its fall had been cushioned by a springy bed of spider silk, weaved into an intricate web. I stared in disbelief and dumbly reached my hand out to it. It grabbed my thumb and pulled itself free just as the ebony spider clambered down to investigate her intruder. The faerie held tight to my left thumb as I lifted it close to my eyes.9

"Icky! Your thumb is sticky!" She said disgusted. "What is this stuff?"10

"Umm sugar" I replied monotonously.11

She looked up and down my face with her frosty irises and narrowed her eyes.12

"What are you looking at" She snapped.13

"I was a little taken aback. "You?"14

"Well what did you expect? Tinkerbell?"15

"What are you?" I asked, beginning to regain my speech.16

She looked at me incredulously. "I'm a faerie, what are you?" She said rolling her eyes.17

"I'm a human...I think. Hey wait! Are you my faerie godmother? Do I get to go to the ball and meet Prince Charming?"18

She arched an eyebrow at me. "What ball?"19

"I don't know...I was just saying..."20

"Do I look like a faerie godmother" she asked exasperatedly. 21

"Well" I said slowly, " I don't know...don't all faeries look the same?"22

She closed her eyes. "I'm going to pretend I didn't just hear that" She said, her white glitter bound lashes sparking in the light.23

"So...why are you here?" I asked.24

"I crashed. Okay, so my night vision isn't the best, what with all of the Unseelie nonsense at night...and if you so much as THINK of putting me in a glass jar I'll bite your pinkie off!" She said as if she remembered to be hostile.25

I stood there, taking it all in for the moment. Faerie crashes through my window in the sleeping hours of the night, demanding I make my "Duh" questions limited. So, after thinking this all through, naturally I said the first and only thing that came to mind.26

"Want a Gummy Worm?" I asked.27