Granting a Thief's Wishes

I had two siblings. Kylie and Laila Bell. When I was 10 years old, Laila was 9 years old and Kylie was just 6 years old. Laila had strawberry blond hair while Kylie had chestnut-colored hair. Both of them had the biggest blue eyes.

They were cute back then, sure, but when they grew up they became even more dazzling.

Anyway, back when I was 10. Many things happened that year. My dad died after battling lung cancer for 5 years in October. A couple of months before that though, in February, I was playing with Laila and Kylie. Kylie thought it'd be a good idea to jump off a tree in our backyard (this happened after we watched too much of Dumbo).

Laila panicked when she couldn't convince Kylie to not do it. When I realized that Kylie wasn't kidding, I started to stumble towards the house hurriedly to call mom. Before I even reached the door, I heard Laila wailing.

But Kylie was giggling.

I remembered turning around, feeling cold and even colder when I saw what was happening right before my eyes. Kylie already jumped alright. But instead of falling, she was suspended mid-air. And she had some kind of a translucent blue wings appearing on her back.

"Mom!" Laila screeched. "Why can Kylie get to fly but I can't? It's not fair!" she wailed. At that exact moment, my mind flew away from me. Disappeared. I was still a kid, but I had enough sense to know that humans shouldn't fly nor have wings. And staring at my sister breaking nature's rule threw me off balance.

When my mom tried to explain to me - a 10-year-old kid who once ate her booger - about all of the fairy stuff, I asked her if I was one too. She wasn't sure. She asked Laila to keep her mouth shut about flying and stuff.

"Mommy," I said, sounding sad. "Why can't I fly? Why can Kylie and Laila fly but I can't?"

Mom didn't know how to answer the question, so she didn't.

From that moment on, Kylie and Laila flew around the house all the time. Sometimes they annoyed me so much I started throwing things at them when they were up in the air. Or I'll just use the flyswatter to swat them away.

It was not until I was 12 years old that I've figured out I could grant wishes. Technically. I didn't know how it works. Frankly, I didn't think I want to know. I once made Laila wished that I was a fairy too, but that failed. But when she wanted that boy to like her back when she was 16, it worked.

It started when my mom's friend, who was a witch (wow, I know) gave me this charm bracelet. It looked a bit battered, but otherwise beautiful. She said if I couldn't fly, didn't have wings, didn't...I don't know, fucking sparkle probably, that there must be something wrong with me (no, duh).

Her conclusion? She said that I probably had other unexplainable 'power'. This power of mine, supposedly, was so great that it used up any fairy-traits I should have. And allegedly, this power could be brought out, stored et cetera by that bracelet.

So basically it'll magnify my wish-granting skills. All of the energy flow though, was in that bracelet. Without it, I would be a crap fairy again.

Long story short, the bracelet was practically a part of me.

We didn't know how the bracelet works. The witch once said that if the bracelet were to fall in a human's hand, it'll bring trouble. Naturally, I thought all of this power-talk were bullshit. The witch died before we could ask her anything.

Witches were never clear about these things.

I sighed, banging my head on the edge of my bed. I was sitting on the floor, clutching my cashmere coat for comfort. Nicole said it might help. It was called fashion therapy.

It didn't help. And all of that reminiscing about the past and that witch's technical talk was making my head hurt more. I didn't know what I was, didn't know what I was capable of either. And there was this little voice inside of me that said that the chances were, the witch didn't know either. God, I felt like such a failure as a fairy.

"Hey, we'll get you another bracelet," Nicole said. "You had that one for too long anyway."

"No." I shook my head. "I need that bracelet, Nicky. I need it. It was a...present from someone important."

"Well, alright then," she said. "Retrace your steps, where did you last see it?"

"I had it on when I was at those boutiques and stores, I'm pretty sure I had it on at Starbucks..." I trailed off.

Starbucks.

I thought long and hard.

Nicholas Peterson.

He was holding hand quite firmly then, right? Did he by any chance...?

"I think I know where it is," I said through gritted teeth. I'll ask the people who work in Starbucks if they had found a bracelet. And if they didn't, I'll hunt Nicholas Peterson down. I would freaking hunt him. With a rifle and everything.

Nicole face brightens up. "Well," she said, clasping her hand together. "I shall go on and make dinner. I wish that it won't screw up like the last time I made dinner for you guys!" Nicole said, nervously giggling.

"Right," I said. "You won't, really!"

We ended up calling the firefighters the last time, by the way.

"Oh god, she's cooking?" Madison asked. Her brown hair was tied up in a messy ponytail. She was wearing a wrap top and a pair of leggings. Her dark brown eyes were the size of a pair of Nicole's earrings when I told her Nicole was going to cook for us.

"Come on, she won't burn down the apartment," I chuckled.

"She did the last time!"

"Almost, Maddie. Almost," I corrected, grinning. "I actually ate her home-cooked meals a couple of times. She's actually a great cook--"

The electricity went out after Nicole gave a little shriek in the kitchen.

"You were saying?" Maddie whispered.