I’m certain
you have at least once heart about Peter Pan and most precisely of his little,
mischevious friend Bell-the fairy. If so, well then you won’t be surprised at
all by the story I’m about to tell you.
The red
fairy lives in Tours and, as you can suppose, is extremely tiny, scarce and
well-hidden amongst the wonders of the city. It takes some time and good
targeting, for neither most of the natives have ever seen her, to spot the
dugout she’s hiding in. Actually she’s not hiding at all, on the contrary -
she’s open to visitors, wellcoming them hotly in her appartement in the very centre
of the city.
Many were
the ones who awared us not to approach her: extremely powerful, she was in
their words able to cause enormous damages to our fragile mentality and make us
remember, in a particulary naturalistic way, the content of our lastest meals.
However conscious of the risks, or at least believing so, we started our fairy quest
in the middle of the night.
As if to
protect us from an epic error, the wind was blowing with suppreme cruelty
against our armless faces, supported in his mission by the raindrops who, like
little but powerful bullets of acid, were cold-soacking our clothes (and skin).
Our hands, cadaverously blue, were hanging iddle as we were trying to warm up
runing down the street.
We were freezing. Still we could not notice the
beauty of the city by night… Tours, situated in the centre of France, is the
city of the castles, medieval architecture, colourful bulidings (three floors
old ones that seem to discompone if you push harder, narrow staircase and
little terrases-gardens on each level.. – like if taken out from a fairy tale…),
vast river that is halving it. During the day it’s a blast to take a walk by
the riverside and enjoy the landscape: nature and civilisation in synchrony;
during the night is even better – no street lamps on the bridges, so you can
perfectly see the reverberations of the moonlight in the water. City noises are
reduced (well Tours is not that big after all) and the only soundtrack you can
perceive is the symphony that waves and trees compose with the complicity of
the wind.
As you
approach the home of the red fairy, this idilical atmosphere tends to vary. New
elements, such as human voices, laughters, brighter lights, natural human
noises etc, are being introduced. You get to la place Plumereau, in the very
heart of Tours, you rush into the fairy’s loge and ask if you could have an
audience.
(I have to
mention I had eaten before I had the honnor to meet her. I was not hungry at
all…)
So, there
she was, waiting for us. Little, transparent I’d say, she didn’t seem…
dangerous.She was not even red, for fuck’s sake! So I followed the advice of my
companion and in a beck I was holding her in my hand and, absolutely willingly,
I gave her a shy kiss…
At first it
felt hot. But not in that unpleasant way (that would come latter, uh..), simply
nice and hot, I felt ok. I looked at my friend to confirm my hypothese of easiness
– “So people were wrong, she’s nice and gentle after all, isn’t she?”, I was
about to say - and then I saw him
crying. WTF?!?!?! “The piment, you munched it?!” – he nodded. I was about to
laugh. We went out, I was not cold any more, on the contrary, I was feeling pretty
well. Comm’on, that peper was so spicy?!
Why he was still crying?!
Then I felt
it. I felt that burning trace going down my gullet. Indeed, the fairy had got
into me and had studyed for a while the
place, living me with the impression that I was going to be fine. Then, out of
a sudden, once she felt safe and confident, she proceeded down to my stomac, smashing,
destroying, anihilating everything she was encountering on her way.
A fire, a conflagration was burning into me,
she was laughing, that serpigious little crature! No, it’s not the firely trace
she was leaving into my body what made me crave for the unconsciousness - that,
my friends, is supportable!; but the pain, that serpental pain in the stomac
and down my intestinеs,
as if she had introduced a solid, inhumanly big and hard incandescent metal
sword soaked in concentrated sulphuric acid into my digestive system and was taking
pleasure in twisting and twirling it, pushing it in and out… that pain was so damn strong
that my brain was about to switch off in an helpless attempt to protect me. I
felt dizzy, unable to control my movements, the only thing I wanted was just to
lay down somewhere and die as fast as possible!
My watering eyes fixed a chair and a table
(obviously part of some bar or restaurant with its clients comfortably
installed on) and I let myself fall over, my brain on the verge of shutting down.
“Non, non, pas ici, pas ici! Viens, viens !” – my still
crying companion ordered and pulled my lifeless arm. Unwillingly , I was forced
to stand up and taken into a small street. After I had head-convinced myself the wall was indeed made of solid
stone and thus perfectly capable of supporting me, I managed to lay my back
against it and sit down.
People were passing by; different languages,
laughters were echoing into my thoughts-abandonned head… Were they laughing at
me? I didn’t care (or I simply couldn’t, or both) I just wanted it to finish,
to faint, to die, whatever, just to make the pain stop… I thought about
vomiting, but, hey, you seriously?! Let that fairy climb back the whole way up
to my mouth?! Reexperience the whole nightmare once again?! No, no, no, no, no
way!!
Or yes…
I stood there, miserable and dizzy, while my
still crying companion was patting me caritatively. Now when I think about it,
for a passer-by we must have been a very, very bizarre and funny view… Or a
trivial one in this touristic town…
Anyway, in something like 2 min it all started
to pass. I could feel my head, my thoughts were reconquering it and the pain
was getting reduced. However, I could feel my stomac was painfully empty. As if
the anihilating fairy’s fire had engulfed my dinner. I tried to tell my friend
I was ok, but my voice was deafened in red flames.
A guy approached us and asked if we were ok.
Short explanation of the audience we had had and he nodds comprehensively. “Go get something to eat,
that’d help.”, “yeah, I was already thinking about that, thanX”.
And so there were I, safe and sound in a
fast-food restaurant, having the world’s tastiest kebap ever with the
chrispiest chips ever and the freshest sauce ever! The fairy had disapeared,
probably to say “Hi” to some other naïve
Tours’visitor, I don’t really know or care. My stomac was alive, that’s all
what mattered, damages seemed healable, meal was superb and the night so
beautiful and fresh! A hot shower, nice film and cozy bed – the perfect end of
the fairy soirée.
