"There are fairies at the bottom of our garden"
At the bottom of our garden, over a low fence, there is a small wood. Long ago it was part of an immense Royal Forest, home, so it was said, to wolves, bears, deer, squirrels, wild boar and many other forest denizens.
At the end of the nineteenth century the "Developers" moved in. In the following decades the forest was torn down to be replaced with suburban housing. Now there only remains our little wood, known locally as "Elfin Wood."
In Spring the wood is carpeted with bluebells that the children gather to take home triumphant as gifts for mother. It was on a beautiful Spring day that I made my pilgrimage to the bottom of our garden, to the summerhouse to be precise.
Perhaps that does not sound much of a pilgrimage, but I had not visited it for seven months.
It was seven months since my husband, Greg, had died. He had built the summerhouse with his own hands, and in his stubbornness, with the last of his strength. I had harboured a dread of seeing the place since he died, fearing the memories it would evoke.
On the morning of my pilgrimage, I had said to my son, Ivor, as he set out for work, "I shall go to the summerhouse today."
He knew of my fears, so he smiled and said, "Perhaps something wonderful will happen for you there, and a new life after."
With those enigmatic words, he kissed me goodbye and left.
I waited until after lunch to go to the summerhouse. It was a gloriously warm day and I decided to dress as I often did on summer days, and in a manner that used to tease Greg.
It was a garment resembling a sarong that I had designed and of which I had made several versions over the years. It was intended to be revealing of breasts with which I am amply endowed, and sitting in the right position, showed the tops of my thighs and, if I chose, my vagina.
Greg had loved to see me in this garment, and when he arrived home from work on the days I wore it, he often could not wait, but would take me as I sat on the kitchen table. I would part my legs, place my feet up on top of the table so my genitals were exposed to him, and he could enter me standing in front of me.
As our son Ivor began to grow up we had to be careful about this place and method of coupling. He almost caught us a couple of times, and there had to be a hasty and frustrating separations, followed by improbable explanations.
Given my dread of going to the summerhouse, it is strange that in my grief and sexual frustration, during the previousd seven months, I would sit on the same kitchen table and masturbate. Again Ivor walked in unexpectedly, and it was another hasty cover up, as Ivor pretended he hadn't noticed.
Making my way to the summerhouse, I stood for several minutes looking at it, remembering the love that Greg had put into its making. Then, gathering up my courage, I entered.
Given I thought no one had been near the place for months, I was surprised that it was dust and dead leaf free. I thought Ivor must have been keeping it swept and dusted.
There was a low wooden couch, the last thing Greg had made, that was strewn with cushions. I sat on it recalling how Greg and I had planned to come here to make love – plans that were never fulfilled.
As the memories flowed through me, my eyes lit upon a small book lying on a little table beside the couch. Wondering how it got there, I picked it up, and looked at the front cover title. It read, "There Are Fairies at the Bottom of My Garden."
I smiled, remembering those words from my childhood.
"A children's fairy story book", I thought. "How ever did it get here."
I idly opened the book, lying back on the cushions, as did so. The first page was the picture of a young man clad in a tight green garment. He looked beautiful, and seemed to smile at me from the page.
Underneath the picture was the word, "Pertic". "Must be his name," I thought.
I browsed through the pages expecting to find a story, but it consisted only of pictures. There were more young men dressed in the tight green garments, and lovely young girls in diaphanous costumes, through which firm youthful breasts could be seen, and little dark patches of pubic hair were dimly visible.
"Hardly suitable for little children," I thought, and turned back to the first page and studied the picture of Pertic again. I noticed that a large penis was outlined rather in the manner of a male ballet dancer, but, unlike the artificial padding of the ballet dancer, Pertic's projection was clearly the real thing.
I looked at the other pictures of the green clad young men, and they all demonstrated the same powerful sexual organs but each appearing individual in the way they lay or projected against their green tights.
"Lucky fairies," I said softly but aloud, feeling my nipples hardening and my vaginal lubricant beginning to flow.
"Yes, they are, aren't they," said a gentle voice beside me.
I looked up and without surprise saw a tall young man in green standing there.
"Hello, Sally," he said, smiling.
"Who are you," I asked. I was a trifle amazed that I felt no fear at the sudden appearance of a strange young man.
"I am your Elf friend, Sally," he replied. "I've been waiting for you a long time."
"Why have you been waiting for me – how long?"
"I have been waiting for you ever since you started to grieve. I am here to ease your grief."
"But I don't know you."
He gave a merry chuckle. "Yes you do, Sally, you were admiring my picture, especially one particular part of me."
"Pertic?"
"Yes, Pertic, your Elf friend."
He extended his hand to me and said, "Come with me Sally, we have things to see and do."
Without hesitation I took his hand, and he led me outside and we began to walk to the fence that separated our garden from the wood, except now, there was no fence. There was not even a garden, only a meadow abutting the wood.
As I looked with some amazement at the transformation that had taken place since entering the summerhouse, I noticed that the wood, instead of stretching for a few hundred metres in either direction from what had been our garden, it now stretched out of sight.
"What's happened?" I asked, now feeling somewhat shaken at what I was seeing.
Again Pertic laughed. "Nothing has happened, Sally. Everything is as it always has been for thousands of years, the only difference is, you once saw it with human eyes, now you see it with fairy eyes."
"But…but…I'm not a…a fairy," I stuttered.
"Are you not, Sally?" he responded. "Look at your garment."
I glanced down at my sarong, but it was no longer a sarong. I wore the diaphanous garment the fairies wore in the pictures.
"Come a little way with me," said Pertic, "and you will see yourself."
We went into the wood – or forest as it now seemed to be – and after a little came to a clear pool of water.
"Look into the water," said Pertic.
I looked, and the water was like a mirror, only clearer than any mirror I had ever seen before. I saw reflected back myself, yet not myself. I looked younger, the marks of my grieving gone, and a loveliness that I knew did not belong to me.
"Pertic!" I exclaimed, "the water deceives. That is not me."
"Yes it is, Sally," Pertic said, seriously this time. "It is you as you really are. It is you as the husband you have been grieving for saw you. It is you as your son Ivor sees you. Did not one of your famous poets and playwrights say, 'Beauty is in the eye of the beholder'? You are now privileged to see yourself as those who love you, see you. You are seeing not only what is on the outside, but also the depths of your soul.
Taking my hand again, Pertic said, "Come, there are those whom you must meet."
He led me deeper and deeper into the forest, and as we went I began to see other young men in green and girls – fairies – dressed as I had seen them in the little book.
I recalled fairy storybooks from my childhood and the pictures they contained. Lovely though the pictures were at times, most of the fairies and elves looked alike. Now, in reality, I saw they were as individual in appearance as humans, but were all beautiful in their own way.
Many of those we passed greeted Pertic and called out to me, "Welcome, Sally." Some came to me and kissed me on the lips very tenderly.
Finally, we came to an avenue of trees. The surrounding trees seemed to spread their branches to form an aisle.
I looked along the aisle, and saw at the far end two figures seated on seats that seemed at the same time to be flowers and thrones.
