Back in the days when magic still worked, there lived four friends. There were two boys and two girls, and they grew up together in a far off land called the 1970s. They were very close, and spent all their time together. They learned to read and write, and about History, Geography and Science, in rooms designed especially for learning those subjects. They became taller, and stronger, and they came to know the world and all its Kingdoms.
One day, they learned how to get to Fairyland. Back then, this trip was much cheaper and *so* much easier. They needed only to find the magic beans, or the small squares of enchanted paper, to take them far, far away. In Fairyland, they danced all night to the music that didn’t stop. They watched the pretty colours and let their eyes roll back into their heads with joy. It was the most beautiful place, the most beautiful time.
There’s a moment in a child’s life, on the cusp of adulthood before wisdom has had the chance to catch up with the body. It’s the most dangerous place in all the Kingdom. When the children reached this age, there were all sorts of perils waiting for them. Their stars got crossed and there was plenty of falling in love. It didn’t help that they spent so much time in Fairyland, where it’s too easy to become enchanted, only to wake the next day and have a kiss break the spell.
It changes the way you think about things, spending time in Fairyland. It makes you feel invincible. As if you could step in front of a car, and it would all be fine. As if you could jump from a window, and take wing like a bird. At some point, logic flies out of the window ahead of you and you’re lucky if you don’t follow and crash to the hard, cold ground. DEAD>
And Fairyland can make you sick, in the end, if you have too much of it. One of the boys had too much. So much that he lost his mind. After a while, the magic no longer took him to Fairyland. It took him to Hell. But he couldn’t stop trying to get to Fairyland. He tried over and over and over again, but only ended up deeper back in Hell. His soul began to char. His flesh began to melt.
The other three hardly looked back. They didn’t notice what was happening to their friend. They didn’t care. All they cared about was their next trip over the Rainbow and back again. They moved on to Ivory Towers. They received great prizes, and applause for their work, and nobody knew that Fairyland had been one of their stops along the way. Nobody, that was, except the boy they’d left behind. He remembered them. He remembered *everything*.
One day, a grown man decided that this couldn’t be THE END of the story. He woke up, and fired up his computer, and began to write a new chapter. The three friends thought they could leave it all behind. They thought they could live happily ever after. But nobody lives happily ever after in real life. Nobody lives that happily, or for that long.
It’s time to wipe away those smiles. The rest is tears>
