Jazzberry and Fidget
By Chris Mason
Copyright 2012 by Christopher A. Mason
Cover art by Katherine Blackmore, Copyright 2000
Used with permission
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any persons living or dead, businesses, incidents, or locales is purely coincidental.
For Nancy
Chapter 1: The Dream
Annie Rust dreamed that she woke up and found a fairy and a dragon sitting at the foot of her bed. It was still nighttime. Moonlight spilled brightly through the open window onto the model horse collection on her dresser, and the horsey shadows seemed to prance as the curtains shifted in the warm breeze.
For a dream, it was very clear. The fairy was about four inches tall, hovering over Annie’s feet with slow beats of her butterfly wings. She was dressed in a short gauzy dress, and her dark hair was spiky like an angry rock singer’s. This convinced Annie that she was dreaming: everyone knew that real fairies had beautiful long hair that blew loose in the wind. It would take a hurricane to ruffle the dream fairy’s knotted tresses.
The dragon was the same size as Aunt Helen’s toy poodle, but much less fuzzy. He had bumpy, scaly skin, big eyes over a pointed snout, and icky-looking wings folded back against his shoulders. He sat on the bedspread, up on his hind legs like a dog begging for baloney, scratching one pointy ear with the tip of a sharp finger-claw.
Nothing happened. Annie sat up and fluffed the pillow behind her back.
“This is a strange sort of dream,” she said. “Aren’t you going to do something?”
The dragon leaped straight up into the air, turned a somersault just below the ceiling, and landed on his nose, bouncing off the blankets onto the floor, then sprang back up onto the bed and spread his arms wide. Annie laughed and clapped her hands. The dragon opened his mouth wide to show needle-sharp teeth, bowed, and sat down again as if nothing had happened.
“That was great,” she said. “Can you breathe fire?”
He lifted a leathery hand and rasped his claws together. A small flame darted up from one of his claw-tips, burning blue and yellow and flickering in the puffs of wind. The dragon winked at her and blew on the flame. She expected a gout of fire, but instead the little blaze winked out.
“Sorry,” the dragon said in a surprisingly soft voice, “I can breathe or I can be on fire, but not both.”
“Who are you?” Annie said.
“Fidget,” the dragon said.
“Why do they call you Fidget?”
“I don’t know,” he said as he gently scratched his belly with one foot.
“And who are you?” Annie asked the fairy.
“My name is Jazzberry,” she said, in a voice that was high and tinkly, like a little girl’s laugh. She twirled in a mid-air pirouette, spinning faster and faster until her skirt stuck straight out, stopping so abruptly that Annie’s eyes hurt. She bowed.
Annie bowed back. “Nice to meet you. I’m Annie.”
“We know,” Fidget said.
“How do you know?”
“We know a lot,” Jazzberry said. She settled onto Annie’s knee and sat down, crossing her legs. Her wings shivered softly.
“Where do you come from?”
“That’s a mystery, isn’t it?” the fairy said.
“Yes,” Fidget said. “Where does anyone come from?”
“Well, I’m from Leftover.”
“Where’s that?”
“Right here, silly. Leftover, Illinois.”
“You call this place Leftover?” the fairy said.
“You said you knew a lot,” Annie said, “but you don’t even know the name of our town?”
“We don’t spend much time in towns,” Fidget explained, rubbing his forehead with the thin tip of his tail.
“Well, where do you live?”
“We live in the Haunted Woods,” the dragon said.
“The woods are why we’re here,” Jazzberry said. “We need your help. Will you come visit us?”
“In the Haunted Woods? When?”
“Tomorrow after school.”
Annie thought this was the strangest dream she’d ever had. But she didn’t have anything planned after school tomorrow, and she had never been afraid of the Haunted Woods. Some kids said that monsters lived there, or ghosts, but Annie didn’t believe in those things. She said she would come.
Fidget opened his mouth wide again, showing her his teeth and his long, black tongue. That must be how he smiles, Annie thought.
“Annie,” Jazzberry said, “you’re dreaming, aren’t you?”
“Of course.”
“Will you promise to keep this dream a secret? Don’t tell anyone about us.”
“Why not?”
“It’s dream magic,” Jazzberry said.
“I love magic,” Fidget said, and he pulled a mouse out of his ear.
“How did you do that?” Annie said.
“Fidget!” the fairy scolded. “I’m trying to talk to Annie.”
“Sorry,” the dragon said. He put the mouse back in his ear.
“How does he do that?”
“It’s not magic, that’s just his pet mouse. He keeps it in his ear.”
“I don’t have pockets,” Fidget explained. It was true: he wasn’t wearing any clothes at all.
“Annie, will you promise?” Jazzberry said. “Promise not to tell anyone about this dream, and come to the Haunted Woods tomorrow after school.”
Annie liked them both, and she liked this dream a lot, so she promised.
Jazzberry fluttered off Annie’s knee and hovered in the air above the bed. “Time to go, Fidget,” she said.
The dragon jumped into the air and unfolded his wings. They looked like bat’s wings, and they were wider than he was long. He beat them twice, folded them again, and dove out the window.
“See you tomorrow,” Jazzberry said. She floated out after Fidget.
Annie smiled. She lay down again and dreamed that she went back to sleep.
* * *
When she went downstairs for breakfast the next morning, her parents were sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee and sharing the newspaper.
“Good morning, sleepyhead,” her father said. He ruffled her hair as she walked by him to get her cereal. She stopped for a moment to straighten her scrunchy.
“Raymond, do you always have to muss her hair?” her mother said.
“Children need traditions and rituals,” her father said happily. “I’ve been mussing her hair every morning since she could walk. Right, Annie?”
“Right, Dad,” Annie said automatically.
She poured a bowl of cornflakes and sliced up a banana on top with a table knife. The milk was already on the table. She reached for the sugar shaker.
“Not too much,” her mother warned her.
“Not too little, either,” Annie said.
Her mother frowned at her, but not seriously, and poured her a glass of juice.
“I had the—” Oops. Annie had almost told them about her dream, but just in time she remembered her promise to Jazzberry.
“You had what, dear?” her mother said.
Why shouldn’t she tell them? It was just a dream. Did a dream promise even count?
Maybe it did. Maybe it counted even more than a daytime promise.
“I had a hard time with my homework last night,” Annie said instead.
“Geography again?” her father said.
Annie nodded with her mouth full of corn flakes. She liked the way they crunched before they got soggy.
“Maybe we need to get her a better globe,” her mother said.
?
??No, we just need to travel more,” her father said.
“We don’t travel at all.”
“That’s my point.”
“I wish we could. But we can never seem to coordinate our vacations with Annie’s school term.”
Her parents both worked in St. Louis, about twenty miles away. Her mother was a software engineer and her father was a civil engineer. Annie found it easier to understand her mother’s job; her father always talked about weight loads and stress fractures, while her mother talked about bugs. She understood bugs pretty well, especially dragonflies, which were her favorite.
They waited with her on the porch for the school bus. The sun was out, but the spring air was still a little cool. Annie looked back as the bus pulled away and saw her parents walking back into the house with their arms around each other.
School was bad, as usual. She liked English—her teacher, Mrs. Longsnout, was reading them Sherlock Holmes, even though they were only in the third grade—and she loved math class, but all the rest were so boring she could barely stay awake. Mrs. Longsnout called on her in geography again, even though she knew Annie didn’t know the answer, and everyone laughed when she said the Himalayas were in Montana with the rest of the mountains.
When the long day ended, the bus let her off in front of her house, and Annie unlocked the front door and went in. She always got home before her parents did.
She remembered her promise to come to the Haunted Woods after school. That might be fun, even if nothing happened. Annie ran up to her room and changed into jeans. After locking the front door again, she got her bike out of the garage and rolled down the driveway.
Otto was lurking at the corner, riding his bike in circles in the middle of the intersection. He was seven, a year younger than Annie, but she liked him, even if his face was almost solid freckles.
“Where you going?” he called out as she approached.
“Nowhere.”
“Can I come?”
“You want to follow me to nowhere?” Annie said.
“Uh...”
“I’m just going for a ride.”
“I’ll come with you,” Otto said.
He snapped out of his turn and fell in behind her. Since they were friends, she couldn’t think of how to stop him. It didn’t matter, anyway. She wasn’t going to find anything in the Haunted Woods except trees and bugs.
They rode a mile out of town onto a country road. Straight ahead was a hill that bumped up out of the ground as if someone had hit the earth’s head with a hammer. It was covered in trees.
“You’re not going to the Haunted Woods, are you?” Otto said.
“Sure, why not?”
“Because it’s haunted.”
“Don’t be silly, there’s just a lot of owls in there. People think they’re ghosts, but the only reason to be afraid is if you’re a field mouse.”
“I’m no mouse,” Otto said bravely.
“Me neither,” Annie said, and she pedaled faster.
At the base of the hill the road turned to gravel and a big sign stood in a field. It said, “Coming Soon Enchanted Woods A Modern Subdivision.” Annie had seen this sign so often she barely noticed it.
They rode on the gravel for a while but it was scary the way rocks shot out from under the tires. Annie stopped and got off her bike.
“What are you doing?” Otto said.
“I want to walk up there,” Annie said, pointing to a footpath that led uphill into the woods.
“Why?”
“I just want to.”
Otto was not enthusiastic about this idea, but he set his kickstand, stood his bike next to hers, and followed her.
The path was narrow and sometimes hard to see. It was overgrown on both sides with leafy shrubs, some of which were taller than Annie. Almost all of them were taller than Otto. But after a few minutes the trees got bigger and thicker and there was hardly any underbrush at all, and the path was much easier to follow. It was very shady under the tall trees. Annie saw some deer tracks on the trail and pointed them out to Otto, who got excited that they might actually see a deer up close.
“Maybe it will let me pet it,” he said.
“It’s not a petting zoo,” Annie said. “Deer are wild animals.”
“I know that.”
“It might bite you.”
“Deer don’t bite people,” Otto said.
“Are you sure?”
Otto didn’t look sure. He began looking back as they walked, as if afraid that a deer might sneak up behind him and bite his rear end.
They hadn’t seen or heard any owls, but Annie supposed it was too early. She thought they mostly hooted at night. When they had been walking under the trees for about fifteen minutes, Otto started lagging behind.
“What’s the matter?” Annie said.
“Maybe we should go back,” he said. “I don’t want to get lost.”
“How can you get lost? There’s only one trail, and you’re standing on it.” It was impossible to get confused about what direction you were going: downhill was home.
“It’s getting dark.”
Annie looked up. The sun was flickering through the leaves high overhead. It wouldn’t set for another couple of hours. She was about to say something rude about mice when a loud shriek filled the air. Otto jumped and whirled around to look behind him.
“Maybe it’s the deer,” Annie said jokingly.
Another shriek made them both jump. It sounded a lot like the peacocks at the zoo.
“That sounds just like—” she began, but stopped when she realized that Otto was running at full speed down the hill, back to the bikes. “A peacock.”
“Thank you,” a voice said, right beside her ear.
She turned, but no one was there. She turned all around, but saw no one. Then, out of the corner of her eyes, she saw something flash out of a tree, and she turned again, thinking she would see an owl at last. But it was a dragon, about the size of a poodle but with a long, thin tail and wide, outspread wings, swooping down to land at her feet. It sprang up into the air so they were nose to nose, fell back, and did it again. The third time, it said, “Hello, Annie.”
“You’re real?” she said in wonder.
She felt something land on her shoulder and jerked her head to see Jazzberry the fairy sitting there, smiling and kicking her legs like a kid on a dock.
“You’re real?” Annie said.
Jazzberry just smiled, and Fidget bounced so high up into the air that he needed his wings to land.
Chapter 2: The Haunted Woods
Two thousand and two questions fought to escape from Annie’s mouth. For a moment, in confusion, she couldn’t speak at all. Her legs felt weak, so she sat down on the leafy ground, leaving Jazzberry sitting in mid-air, hovering with slow strokes of her iridescent wings.
Despite the shade, Annie noticed things that she hadn’t been able to see by moonlight. Jazzberry’s hair was not just spiky, it was deep violet, but it was not as knotted as she’d thought. It seemed to be waving, but when she watched it closely, it didn’t move.
Fidget’s scaly skin was green with black spots, and stray beams of sunlight made it glisten as if it were wet. He had a tiny crest running down the center of his back to his tail, which was almost as long as his head and body together. In the daylight his wings didn’t look so creepy.
Annie finally got her brain in order. “Will you come and live with me?”
The fairy laughed. “What would your parents say?” she said.
“They’d let me keep you. They wanted to give me a little brother, but mommy says her job won’t let her. You could be my little sister and brother.”
Jazzberry settled to the ground and sat down in front of Annie. Fidget stopped bouncing on one leg and sat beside the fairy.
“Thank you for asking,” Jazzberry said, “but we can’t.”
“Why not?”
“We’re not allowed to live with little girls. We’re not even allowed to talk to them.” r />
“Why not?”
“Rules,” Fidget said glumly.
“But you’re talking to me.”
“Yes, we’re breaking the rules right now.”
“We’re going to get in big trouble,” Fidget moaned.
“So why? Why are you talking to me?”
“Should we tell her?” Jazzberry asked Fidget.
The dragon looked up at Annie for a moment, then started pulling on his ear. “Not yet,” he said.
“Tell me what?” Annie said.
“We can’t tell you what we can’t tell you,” Fidget said. “Not yet.”
Annie pouted until another question bubbled up out of her brain and burst out of her mouth. “The Haunted Woods really are haunted, aren’t they? By you.”
“Yes,” Jazzberry said.
“I never scared anybody before,” Fidget said. “It was fun.”
“Are there more fairies and dragons?” Annie said.
“There are more of us,” Jazzberry said. “Not all of us live in the Haunted Woods, though.”
“I thought fairies only lived in England,” Annie said.
“I would never live in England,” Fidget said. “I don’t like fish and chips.”
“You’ve never eaten fish and chips,” Jazzberry said.
“I’ve never eaten mud, either, but I know I don’t want to.”
“How long have you lived here?” Annie said.
“All our lives,” Fidget said proudly.
“Well then, why haven’t I ever seen you before? I come here all the time.”
They vanished so suddenly that Annie blinked and shook her head, thinking that her eyes were tricking her. A single leaf fluttered to the ground. They were really gone.
“Come back!” she cried.
Jazzberry floated down from a branch in the big oak tree above her. Fidget poked his nose around the trunk and scampered back to sit at her feet.
“No one sees us unless we want them to,” Jazzberry said.
“Is it magic?” Annie said.
“I love magic,” Fidget said. He flicked a hand and a deck of cards appeared in it. He fanned them out. “Pick a card.”
“Not now, Fidget,” Jazzberry said.
Fidget shrugged and made the cards disappear.
“It’s not magic,” the fairy said. She landed on the tip of Annie’s sneaker. “There’s no such thing as magic—”
“Yes there is,” Fidget said. “Want to see me make an elephant disappear?”
“Those are magic tricks,” Jazzberry said. “Not real magic.”
“What do you mean, there’s no magic?” Annie said. “You’re a fairy. You’re a dragon. You’re magic.”