Lacy was a not-so-bright fairy girl who was about to turn sixteen, and, much like declaring a major in college, it was time for her to declare her title. Her friends had all chosen titles like “shampoo goddess,” “cooking queen,” “duchess of nail polish,” and so on, but while her friends’ futures were set in hair products, household chores, and beautification, Lacy was undecided, and she was running out of time.

She had tested out different venues for herself. She had tried being a mascara fairy, but she kept on hurting peoples’ eyes. Her similar attempts at being a waxing fairy, an eye shadow fairy, a flute fairy, and a shoelace-tying fairy had all ended in disaster: As a waxing fairy, she made the wax too hot and burned several people; as an eye shadow fairy, she kept on knocking over the makeup and breaking it; as a flute fairy, she partially choked a flutist; and, as a shoelace-tying fairy, she tripped all but one of the people she helped. Of course, none of the humans she tried to assist had any idea that she was there, for humans were clueless about the fairy world. As far as they knew, sometimes wax overheated, eye shadow slipped, people inhaled weird things, and shoelaces became untied. Unless a fairy spoke out loud, a human would be unable to see, feel, or hear it. It frustrated Lacy no end that she just couldn’t help humans properly.

Lacy got a lot of “looks” from the other fairies at her school. Yup, it was that type of look that says, “Well, here comes Miss Loser.” It made her miserable to know that her friends were all smarter than her and were set for life in a career path. So, she carried on in school, hoping that some career might come up by chance. She had no idea that exactly that would happen.

One day, as she was silently gliding home, she happened past the window of a young girl, who was crying softly. Lacy alighted on the windowsill, peeked in, and saw a strange sight indeed. A little redheaded girl with beautiful ringlets was halfheartedly tugging on a string that was attached to one of her teeth. As she made each little yank, she cried a little more, but after the eighth pull or so, the tooth just popped out.

“Oh!” gasped Lacy. She’d had no idea that teeth were ever supposed to come out since fairies kept their teeth for their whole lives. As Lacy watched, she saw the little girl’s father come in. He calmly took in the scene: daughter holding tooth, blood on her mouth, bloody string on the floor. Then, he pulled out a tissue and praised his daughter while helping her clean up.

“My, Stacia, you’ve certainly grown up. You pulled your own tooth!” He flashed her a proud smile. “You’re the bravest girl I know.”

His daughter smiled a gap-toothed smile back at her dad. Then, she held out her hand and exposed a blood-encrusted tooth. “Daddy? What do I do with this?” she asked. “I can’t eat with it now, can I?”

Her father laughed. “Oh no, deary, you can’t eat with it. But I’ll tell you what,” he said, a look of confidentiality coming into his eyes. “There’s something special, secret even, that you can do with that tooth.”

“What?” his daughter asked, eyes wide.

“Well,” he said, winking at her, “if you get rid of your tooth, it will throw away all of its magic. But, if you keep the tooth for one night and then get rid of it, you’ll have good luck.”

“Really?” cried the girl.

“Yes,” said her father. “Now let’s show Mommy the tooth!” He picked up his daughter and put her on his shoulders, and then they left.

Lacy sat down on the windowsill. This was the strangest thing she had ever seen! A person pulling her own tooth out? A legend of good luck?

Suddenly, she got an idea. Quickly memorizing the location of the little girl’s house, Lacy sped off, pale, silvery wings rustling softly. She arrived at her house fifteen minutes later and raced up to her room. Quietly closing the door, she opened up her piggy bank of fairy money. I’m brilliant, she thought happily.

She then began the laborious task of finding all the fairy pennies in her piggybank. It was not very easy to sort fairy money: there were coins and only coins for all the different money values. Besides the human coin values of one, five, ten, and twenty-five cents, the fairies had coins for two, three, four, eight, twelve, fifteen, thirty, forty, seventy-five, and eighty cents. Lacy, who was trying to separate the one cent pieces from all those other coins, ended up spending about an hour and a half before her coins were sorted.

At eight o’clock, she was ready to go. Her black hair was braided into a crown over her head, her money was in a bag over her shoulder, and she wore warm clothes that were perfect for battling the night chills. Her sapphire eyes twinkled in excitement as she gracefully leapt from her window and began gliding in the direction of the little girl’s house. I hope she’s asleep, thought Lacy.

There it was! The house was right there, waiting for her! Lacy alighted on the windowsill to catch her breath. Peeking through the window, she saw the little girl asleep in her bed. Good, thought Lacy. She won’t see me at all.

Swiftly, Lacy flew up to the roof, down the chimney, and into the halls of the house. After stealing glances into several rooms, she found the girl’s bedroom. Quietly sliding under the door, Lacy took stock of the room: there was a desk, a chest of drawers, a toychest, and a bed that overflowed with stuffed animals and pillows.

Lacy went to work trying to find the tooth. She looked on the desk, in the drawers, in the toychest, under the bed, all across the floor, and in a little jewelry box, but the tooth just wasn’t to be found. Lacy was about to give up when she realized that she’d forgotten to check under the girl’s pillow. So, when the girl turned over, Lacy was able to go over and search under the pillow for the tooth.

“Voila!” shouted Lacy. “I found it!”

All of a sudden, Lacy saw that she’d made a huge error: as long as humans didn’t hear fairies speak, they couldn’t see them. Now, however, the little girl was looking at Lacy with wide eyes, hardly believing that such a tiny, glowing figure could be standing there, holding a human’s tooth. Curse my stupidity! Why did I talk? thought Lacy desperately.

“Umm… Who are, who are you?” said the little girl.

“I am,” said Lacy, “I am, um, I’m the Tooth Fairy!” She looked at the human child inquisitively. “Can I have your tooth? I have something to give you in exchange.”

“My tooth? Oh, okay, I guess…”

“Great!” said Lacy. She quickly flitted over to her bag of fairy pennies. After she put the tooth in the bag and had removed one penny, she flew back to the little girl. “Here,” she said, “this is for you. It’s real fairy money.” The girl’s eyes grew wide with excitement, and she reached out and took hold of the penny carefully.

“Can I keep it?” she asked.

“Yes,” replied the fairy. “It’s for you! Now,” she added confidentially, “I think you should go back to sleep now, but if you keep that coin there, I will always know how to find you. I think we could be good friends someday!”

The little girl grinned. “My name’s Stacia. Come back soon! I like you!”

Lacy laughed. “Will do, Stacia. I’ll be back.” She put her bag of pennies and the tooth over her shoulder and carefully scooted under the door. Soon, she was out the chimney and flying home.

The next day, Lacy visited the principal of her Fairy School. “Miss Bubbles,” Lacy said, “I have found myself a title.”

“Hold on a moment, child,” said Miss Bubbles, who was dialing the phone. “We’ve been hearing all these rumors from the human realm about a new fairy, but we’ve no idea who it is.”

Lacy went silent. Could it be her, the “Tooth Fairy”? She frowned inwardly. Well, I won’t know unless I ask. “Miss Bubbles? Was it the Tooth Fairy, perchance?” The principal went stock still, phone halfway to her ear. “Because, if it is,” continued Lacy, “that’s what my new title is.”

Miss Bubbles promptly fainted, and Lacy was faced with the task of dragging her into the hallway for the secretary to take care of. Then, as Lacy went about her regular day at school, she noticed people whispering and looking in her direction. What’s all this? thought the little fairy. Then, she looked down and noticed that she had, indeed, taken her title to heart, for there was a little white image of a tooth on the back of each of her hands.

Lacy grinned. This is the best day ever!





Epilogue: Lacy, also known as “The Tooth Fairy,” became a well-known figure in human society, eventually surpassing all her schoolmates in fame. Soon, children all over the human realm were placing their teeth underneath their pillows, hoping for a visit and a fairy coin from the Tooth Fairy.
After a while, Lacy began leaving human money in place of fairy money for the children. Despite her busy schedule, Lacy remained a good friend of Stacia, and they visited often. Lacy eventually had the privilege of collecting Stacia’s wisdom teeth.
Currently, Lacy is saving all the teeth she’s collected in hopes of building a place called “Tooth Castle.” She lives in a fairy city called Sapling Village that most humans never find.