Bats, Mud and Boys That Go Oink: A Fanny Nightsky and Zip Moonfall Adventure

Fanny Nightsky had finished up her tooth route and was on her way to check on Zip, her Fairy In Training. She had let him fly solo tonight, giving him a few houses on her route. He should be done by now, but he wasn’t at the agreed upon place for them to meet. She just knew he was in trouble. She had checked the first two houses on the list she’d given him, and everything seemed okay. Each child had their coin and Zip hadn’t gotten caught in the Fairy Trap one child had left. There was just one more house on the list… a boy who had just lost his first tooth. The first tooth could be kind of tricky. The children were always so excited to be getting a visit from the tooth fairy, sometimes they couldn’t sleep. Sometimes they even woke up while the tooth was being exchanged. It could be dangerous. She should never have let Zip go by himself. If anything happened to her F.I.T., it would be her fault.

“Watch out!” a voice yelled.

Fanny was so worried about Zip, she didn’t notice the bat that was flying straight at her, until the furry creature slammed into her and she found herself falling towards the ground.

“I’m sorry,” the bat yelled, “I can’t stop, I don’t know how. Oh goodness gracious… Watch out!” And the bat flew into the side of a tree. “Ouch,” the bat squeaked, landing in a mud puddle next to Fanny. “It’s stopping that always hurts.”

***

Zip Moonfall eyed the boy sleeping in the bed. The boy was clutching the pillow and drooling. He also was twitching a little and every time Zip moved towards the bed, the boy would swing his arm out, yell, “Oink!” and then laugh. Zip didn’t know what the boy was dreaming, but this presented a huge problem.  There was a tooth under that pillow and it was his job to get it.  He tried to think, What Would Fanny Do, but he was drawing a blank. W.W.F.D. was his standard for all tooth related problems, but this one… the boy was big , Zip was so small and each time Zip flew for the pillow he was sent sailing across the room.  How was he ever going to get that tooth? He wished Fanny was there. She'd trusted him to get the job done and he was going to let her down. He'd never become a full tooth fairy at this rate.

Zip flew up towards the ceiling and hovered overhead. The boy yelled “Oink,” giggled and then rolled over, facing the wall. Zip took the change of position as his opportunity and flew down towards the pillow. He was almost there when the kid turned again, threw his arm in the air and snorted three times. Zip dove towards the left but the boy still swatted at him, sending Zip spinning in mid-air. Then he landed. On. The. Pillow. The boy’s hands clutched the pillow less than an inch from Zip and a long string of drool spilled towards the frightened fairy.

“AHHHH!” Zip slid in the slobber, and tumbled off the edge of the pillow. “Yuck,” Zip moaned, wiping the saliva off with a dry spot on the pillow case. Well, at least now he was where he needed to be. Zip slipped under the pillow, steering clear of the big fingers that still grasped the cushion and lifted the tooth that was hid beneath it. It was a lower incisor… a first tooth. Well, that required a special payment. Zip placed the tooth in his pouch and pulled out a coin. It was extra shiny for an extra special tooth. He put it in the exact spot the incisor had been and then inched slowly out from under the pillow. His heart was pounding in his chest, but leaving turned out to be easier than he expected.

Zip slid down the side of the bed and tiptoed towards the window. He was almost home free. He flew up towards the glass and then screamed. Something was crawling into the room from the window.

Fanny glared at Zip. Her hair was a mess and her dress was covered in mud.  “Peanuts and popcorn! Was that really necessary.”

“You scared me, Fanny," Zip said, clutching his chest. "What happened to you?”

“I was on my way to check on you and I got knocked out of the air by a dizzy bat and landed in a mud puddle.” She looked at Zip, who still had a bit of drool on him. “What happened to you?”

“I slipped in a puddle of drool, but Pixisticks, Fanny, you didn’t need to check on me.”

“I heard Kenny lost his first tooth and I wanted to make sure you didn’t mess things up.”

“Gummy bears, I didn’t mess things up.”

“You got the tooth?”

“Right here,” Zip said, showing Fanny the incisor.

“And you left the extra shiny coin?”

“I did.”

Fanny looked around the room. “Sweet! Now let’s go before he wakes up.”

“That’s what I was getting ready to do,” Zip said, “before you came in and scared me.”

The two fairies swere slipping under the window when the boy yelled out another Oink. Fanny, who had just reached the outside, screamed and fell off the edge into a mud puddle.

“Fanny, are you alright?” Zip asked, flying down to help her.

“Yes,” she signed, wiping off a layer of mud, “but can we go home now?”

The next morning Kenny found a shiny new coin under his pillow and fairy size footprints on the windowsill.

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