Tales and Other Drugs

“Up for a fairy tale?” he asked. I looked at him. For three seconds, that is, and then looked away. Experienced a bizarre déjà vu. I remember the time I was still a kid and the most adorable woman I know would ask me that question. My mother. Back then, not only was I in the mood for fairy tales, I would literally beg her to read me more every time. Like no sleep for me. Who would have thought, things would change as I grew older? Adulthood they say. I say crap, I say a pile of dinosaur shit. Things took a wrong turn.

Used to hear stories about knights, cursed frogs, sleeping beauties, and beasts, and I would literally transform into a fairy myself. Flying over my bed waiting for my Peter to Pan the hell out of my night. Now, to the sound of the word only, I feel terrified. What is a fairy tale anyway? Is it an evil weapon, is it a shield for the romantics? I am confused. And the more I get confused, the longer he waits for an answer… “I am fed up with those, no!” I'm thinking… should I tell him that and get it over with?

On the other hand, God, this yearning… can’t help it, it's like a nasty drug. Like I know it will harm me, shape dangerous carnivorous dragons around me, but I still want a taste of it. Oh, the lies we tell, those sweet lies about love and death and hope and immortal creatures and guardian dogs and sensual echidnas and so many many more… How can you not want a piece of that? How can you not want to be swept away with the spirit of the moment? That one moment, when your body becomes a pair of giant lips ready to be kissed by the most revolting yet loving beast? Hmmm, yes, it's true. Can’t deny it. Still a tale lover, despite the times I got hurt, the times I got disappointed, the times I got to see man’s true colors. There was always something inside of me, frisk? Don’t know how to describe it. Like something driving me to madness. The madness of make-believe. A biological urge. An almost erotic attraction to the unreal.

Cause fiction is all we got. Reality cuts off your leg, fiction creates another. That’s what man is, no? A vessel of hope. A generator of beauties and beasts. “So?????” he asks for one last time… “OK, I’m up for it” I say, “…only this time, please, don’t tell me how it ends.” You see, there is one thing I could no longer bear. The joy of the ending.