The Dying Tooth Fairy

Samuel stared at the iridescent light above his bed as he twiddled his loose tooth with the tip of his tongue. He was seven years old and had yet to lose his first tooth. He was a child with a wild imagination who believed in the impossible. Jackson, his older brother, was vile according to Samuel. A literal “fun crusher”. Jackson kept telling Samuel that the tooth fairy does not exist. Samuel, being a child of pure faith and belief in the unknown, laughed in his brother's face. Unable to wait for his tooth to fall on its own, he yanked his wobbly tooth out of the socket with his bare hands. As the blood gushed out of his mouth, his brother came and clocked him in the head for dirtying the carpet as he knew he would be responsible for the mess. Samuel, carelessly, stumbled to the bathroom and washed the blood off his hands and face. He ran his small tooth under the cold water: watching the blood-stained tooth regain its pearly white hue. Bubbling with excitement, he ran to the backyard and laid on the green grass, staring at the sky above and imagining the tooth fairyland amongst the clouds.

Oona was the leader of the tooth fairyland. She was a whopping 1073 years old and was entering old age with several ailments. She was losing her sight day by day and found it difficult to keep track of all the wonderful children losing their teeth. It had been a long couple of years for Oona. With the steady increase in population over the last few decades, she had been growing increasingly tired and was barely able to keep up with the rapid pace of tooth loss amongst children worldwide.

“Another kid lost his tooth! If this pace keeps up I will keel over and die from exhaustion” screamed Oona.

She opened her little black book, which contained the records of every child, the number of teeth they lost, and their reward. Samuel was a brand-new addition to her magical little black notebook. Oona had not slept for three days because of the backlog from the number of kids losing their teeth each hour. She painstakingly flipped to the section on Canadian kids and transcribed the entry of Samuel Boots. She marked the time for Samuel’s money to appear under his pillow at 3 am. A safe time to assume most children of that age would be asleep no matter how hard they tried to stay awake for the magic. Oona was on the brink of passing out from exhaustion when she accidentally imputed 20,000 dollars in the money column of her magical little black notebook, flopped over her desk, and entered a deep slumber.

Samuel was fast asleep in his single bed, with the moon shining through his window: casting a shadow on his small innocent face. He had tried in vain to stay awake past his 8:30 pm bedtime but fell asleep shortly after being tucked in by his brother.

As the clock struck 3 am, Oona and Samuel were both fast asleep in their respective worlds as the 20,000 dollars was delivered by a groggy tooth fairy delivery girl named Ophelia. Ophelia was not the brightest fairy in tooth fairyland and had a fragile constitution. Her energy levels were often compared to that of a sloth, and for a good reason. She could barely read and would get extremely tired after four to five deliveries. When Samuel's delivery rolled around, she was so exhausted that she did not realize how much money she was delivering to a child of seven years of age.

As the sun rose, Samuel groggily opened his eyes and stretched his arms wide above his head. The clock read 6 am as Samuel poked his tongue through the hole that once held a tooth. He rapidly looked under his pillow to find four fat wads of hundred-dollar bills.

“Oh my God! I knew the tooth fairy existed! Why didn’t anyone tell me you get this much money. I don’t think this is normal. Oh my God” Said, Samuel.

Samuel fumbled as he grabbed the wad of cash and slammed it eagerly on his desk. He grabbed a pen and paper and got to counting.

“This adds up to 20,000 dollars, that’s a lot of money. I could buy all the candy in the world!” whispered Samuel in excitement.

At the other end of the door, Jackson heard the commotion and barged into the room to find out what was going on.

“Get out of my room you butt-face” yelled Samuel as he covered the money with the books that lay on top of his desk.

“So, I guess the tooth fairy didn’t come you little booger, told you to tell mom and dad you lost your tooth so could’ve gotten two bucks at least” mumbled Jackson as he trotted away.

Samuel quickly slammed the door shut and stared at the money awestruck.

“I can buy so much candy, I love candy, mom never lets me get candy because she says it will rot my teeth” mumbled Samuel in excitement.

“If I buy as much candy as I can and rot all my teeth I can get even more money” whispered Samuel to himself.

“Mom and dad are always complaining about money, saying that we can’t do this or get that because we don’t have money” sighed Samuel.

“Now I can do whatever I want!” squealed Samuel.

He grabbed a wad of 100-dollar bills, shoving them in his pocket, and immediately ran to the candy store across the street.

The store bell rang as he bolted to grab empty candy bags and began filling them. After stuffing ten bags to the brim with candy, Samuel scrambled to the counter: throwing 500 dollars on the table. He then ran out of the store with all the candy a kid could dream of having.

He sneaked back into his room without a hitch since his parents had left him in the care of his brother.

After two hours of pigging out on a dangerous amount of candy, Samuel felt sickly and threw up all over his bedroom rug. Jackson barged in, lifted his brother to the bathroom, and helped him wash up.

“What the hell happened” yelled Jackson.

Samuel wiped his mouth and proceeded to spill his guts about what had happened.

Jackson pondered for a minute and said “We need to give the money to Mom and Dad.”

“What! No way it’s my money!” pouted Samuel.

“Listen Mom and Dad need this money. They’re worried because they don’t think they can afford to send us to University. Your plan to rot all your teeth for more money is completely insane, you do realize that right?”

“You said I was crazy for believing in the tooth fairy and you were wrong. You think you know everything but you don’t!” yelled Samuel.

“Ok, how about you keep the money but don’t blow it all on candy. Think of better things you can do with it” Said Jackson.

“I’m surprised you’re not taking the money and running away” Said Samuel.

“Not going to lie I’m considering it” Sighed Jackson.

“What is University? Is it like school?” asked Samuel in a small voice.

“Ya Sams it's like School but harder, I want to go so bad but… anyways”

“Here take it,” said Samuel as he shoved the cash towards his older brother.

“Why would you give me this I’m always so mean to you” Said Jacks.

“Because you were nice to me and you need it more than I do” Said, Samuel.

Jackson, lost for words gave his younger brother a big hug. A rare bonding moment manifested from a tooth fairy mishap.

“WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO ALL THE MONEY” yelled Oona, who had awoken from her sixteen-hour sleep-induced coma.

Oona furiously marched over to Ophelia and slammed her hands on the table made of children's teeth.

“Why do I have 20,000 $ dollars MISSING!” screeched Oona.

“I … I …I don’t know” stuttered Ophelia with tears welling up in her eyes.

Oona marched off, brimming with rage as she flipped through her magical little black notebook. She landed on Samuels name and stared horror-struck at the atrocious blunder she had committed.