Previously, on Nerissa's Life:I went over to the armoire again, and leaned up against the wall behind it. Closing one eye, I attempted to peer between the chunky piece of furniture and the wall. Oops! Wrong eye. Hehehe... My bad. But never one to give up, I closed the other eye and took another peek. What I saw made me stagger backwards in shock. Turning around, my mouth hanging open, I said to my brother, "Rushy, you're not gonna believe what's goin' on back there. MOUSES!"
"Let ME see," and Rushy barged forward, pushing me aside.
I held him back by his tail. "It's probably better that I just tell you. Back there, in the wee little space between the armoire and the wall, is my ball of yarn and all that fur you were tellin' me about from your bein' combed last night, and..."
"Well how did my fur get back there? Who put it back there? Did YOU put my fur back there, Seville?"
"NO. Why would I do that? And why would I put my ball of yarn back there? I was lookin' for that, too, you know. But hang on, there's more."
Rushy waited with bated breath. Scratch that. Rushy waited with bated, fishy-smelling breath. Prior to comin' into the family room, he had obviously been into the tuna. MOUSES!
"There are a couple of garden fairies back there, too, Rushton," I explained. "That's right, two garden fairies sitting there, doin' some kind of needlework or somethin' like that."
Rushton looked confused which, to be honest, is not an unusual look for him. "Let me see," and he pushed me aside again, this time making his way over to the armoire. He reached his right paw into the space behind the piece of furniture and the wall, and when he withdrew it, dangling from one claw was one of the fairies.
"Put me down! PUT ME DOWN!" she squealed with the squeaky voice of a mouse. "You put me down right this minute."
I peered at the fairy as she angrily danced in midair. "What were doing back there?" I asked her.
"Preparing for winter," she said. "What did you think we were doing? And are you --" she was looking at Rushton, now -- "going to let go of my wings? You'll damage them, you big long-haired brute."
"Sorry," Rushton murmured, sounding a little ashamed. He set the fairy down on the floor. "But why did you steal Seville's ball of yarn, and the peep's laundry, and why-oh-WHY did you steal all of my fur?"
"It's not like you were using it," the fairy grumbled. "We only took what your human combed out of your coat."
I held a paw up before Rushton started to protest about his wanting to keep that lump of fur I knew full well the peep planned to throw out.
"But why?" I asked the fairy again. "WHY are you back there with our stuff? And why did you cut all those holes out of the peep's top?""We needed bed sheets," was her reply.
Rushton and I looked at one another, dumbfounded.
"Bed sheets?" I asked.
"Yes, bed sheets. And blankets, too. That's why we needed your ball of yarn. My sister and I have blankets to knit. And as for your loose fur," and she looked pointedly at my brother, "it makes for quite good insulation."
I shook my head to clear it. "What? Why? I don't understand."
"Of course you don't," snapped the fairy. "You cats and your humans NEVER understand. You meddle in the affairs of others, never thinking about the damage you're doing."
"But I..."
"Don't interrupt," the fairy scolded me. "We fairies were perfectly happy living in nooks and hollows in old trees in forests and gardens, moving underground when winter approached. But humans couldn't allow that. OH NO, humans had to go around putting out fairy houses and building entire fairy villages all over the forest floor, luring us into them with the promise of pretty surroundings, and..."
"But I..."
"I said, DON'T interrupt," and she scolded me again. "NOW, there are fairies living in gardens all over the place, in houses with absolutely no protection against the cold. Those houses the humans built for us are made out of ceramic, for goodness sake. Do you have any idea how cold ceramic gets in the dead of a Canadian winter?"
I opened my mouth to answer, thought better of it, and closed it again.
"If my sister and I don't get these bed sheets and blankets made in the next couple weeks, we'll freeze our little wings off out there."
The fairy paused, and I waited for her to continue. When she didn't, I spoke up.
"Well... Well what if you were to just move back into your little underground hollows and stuff for the winter?"
"AND GIVE UP OUR LUXURY MULTI-BEDROOM FAIRY HOUSES WITH THEIR WHITE PICKET FENCES, GARDEN POOLS AND SWINGS?" she hollered.
I looked over at my brother, Rushton, who was furiously diggin' at his long fur, yankin' clumps out here and there; pretty much everywhere. "You had better get that ball of forest green yarn out of the peep's knitting bag," he told me. "The one you thought I might like. Go get it and paw it over to her, pronto."
As I passed Rushy on my way over to the knitting bag, he hissed in my ear, "The only way to get rid of fairies is to give them what they want. I'll give her more loose fur, you give her another ball of yarn, and later on, we'll find some more of the peep's cotton laundry."
Of course, my brother was right. If there's one thing I know, it's that the best way of gettin' rid of unwanted fairies is by meeting their demands.
MOUSES!
