§775

‘I was at a Walgreens very late at night waiting for a prescription to be filled, so I browsed around for a while. I remember thinking something on the radio sounded strange, but I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what and chalked it up to it being stupid-late at night and I was imagining things. I found a monster high doll I wanted to customize; the important thing to know here is that the hands and forearms are able to be detached and put together again, and sometimes get loose. The one I was looking at had an arm that had fallen out, and I decided to just be careful about it so I wouldn’t lose it out of the box itself. There wasn’t exactly a gap it could fall out of, but I was paranoid about it anyway. I was as careful as I could be, but when I got home and opened the box in order to make sure the hand didn’t disappear, it wasn’t there. I searched everywhere; I was more thorough about this search than anything else. I retraced my steps, checking every little nook and cranny. I went outside with a flashlight and looked, and I looked in my car. I even, and keep this in mind, checked all of my pockets several times. I went to the store and looked down every aisle I had been down, even looking under the displays to see if it had fallen under there. I spoke to the cashier as well; partially to cover all my bases, partially so that she wouldn’t think I was absolutely insane or drug-addled; I had been keeping up a steady half whisper asking whatever took it to give it back, because I was running out of ways it would have fallen out or gotten lost, and someone might have overheard me. At some point while I was in the process of leaving, I felt like my hoodie snagged on something, but it didn’t tear, didn’t stop me, so I went back to my car and decided to accept it as a loss. In my car, right before I went inside my home, I checked my pockets again, and there it was, in my left pocket, the side that felt like it had snagged. Again, I had checked my pockets several times! I didn’t have any memory of taking the arm and putting it in my pocket, I remember thinking to do that, but I for sure never did. I had and have no better explanation for what happened besides one of the folk were playing a bit of a prank on me, so I figured it was better to be safe than sorry and left some bread and honey out on my porch, and the next day I did the same at Walgreens. And then I didn’t go to Walgreens for a long while because I didn’t want to be recognized as the weird gal who was talking to herself and looking for a severed (doll) arm.’ ‘The radio sounded off in the store, not quite distorted, but just slightly to the left of normal. It was a while ago, so I can’t remember what.’ Why do you think your experience was a fairy experience, as opposed to a ghost or an alien or an angel or some other type of anomalous experience? ‘Because any other explanation I had didn’t fit. Because it felt like a prank, if anything, or like someone was trying to be helpful when they saw me struggling. Because there were no other outward signs besides me feeling a little off, and then hearing something odd and feeling a slight tug at my hoodie. It wasn’t a ghost because it wasn’t chilly, I didn’t feel spooked, none of the employees mentioned anything about ghosts, and nobody had died there in living memory. And I’ve worked somewhere that had a ghost; he liked to knock things over and was always accompanied by a chill and was just impatient for someone to do what they promised (boyscout store/main offices, an old-timer passed, wanted his ashes spread at a camp, we were holding onto him until we were allowed to do the thing). It wasn’t an alien because there was no outward sign of anything alien-like, and I’m skeptical of aliens. There’s too much science in the way of aliens being here and being so subtle and shit. Plus, it was a very minor thing, so why would aliens interfere? And angels… again, it was a minor thing, so why would an angel interfere?’ What are fairies? ‘Beings that are humanesque but not human-like, that are experts at evading humans when they want. There’s so much we don’t know about the world, it’s not impossible that we’ve overlooked something.’