When I was seven years old, I received incontrovertible proof that fairies were real.
It happened on a summer’s day. Midsummer? Maybe. I woke in the bed I shared with my twin sister to find a silver ring on my ring finger. I’d never seen it before. It was a fairy-like thing, delicate, incised with moons and stars. It had just appeared – magically, while I slept, without waking me or Gracie.
It was surely a sign I was a secret fairy princess. Or maybe that a fairy prince had fallen in love with me. I cherished my magic ring and told no one.
Then, the next day, I saw it became even more magical: the skin under and around the ring turned a delicate green. Surely this was a sign that I was changing, becoming a fairy myself.
I decided to reveal my secret to my older sister, Terrisa.
She took one look and said, “Oh yeah. I found that on the sidewalk and thought you’d like it. You wouldn’t wake up so I put it on your finger. If you paint the back with nail polish it won’t turn your skin green like that. That’s because of copper in the metal.”
And the armies of Oberon vanished.
I should have been grateful my older sister gave me a pretty ring. I wasn’t. I was depressed she’d popped the bubble of magical expectation I’d been living in.
The real gift she gave me, of course, were those few days of magic. And I still kind of love it when cheap jewelry turns my skin green.
by 
by 
