Faerly Tall and Pregnant

Like my last story, this one firmly fits into multiple categories. I'm posting it into NonHuman, but it is also a Fantasy story, as it takes place in an alternate world where magic and magical creatures exist in modern times.

The seed for this story was a simple one: a fairy with a human fetish. It's been done plenty of times, sure, but I wasn't focused on coming up with something totally new. Rather, I wanted to take my own spin on the idea, which you'll discover as you read.

I also kept my favorite writing style, which is third person that shifts back and forth between the main characters. Read on and enjoy!

********

Present Day

Deena

My name is Deena Wetleaves. If you're laughing right now, you're probably a human or a dwarf. Instead, if you just nodded at my name, I'm guessing you're an elf, or a fairy, like I am. Wetleaves is a normal family name in the village where I was born. I was only teased about it after my father and I moved to a human city five years ago.

I am currently in a hospital surrounded by human doctors that don't know what to do for me. I have baffled every specialist they have contacted, saying my pregnancy is "impossible." Clearly, it isn't impossible, I really am pregnant with a half-human child, and it is most likely going to kill me very soon.

Currently, I'm in one of the hospital's delivery rooms in the maternity ward, and I've been laying in a clear plastic bassinet that was taken from one of the mother and baby rooms, since keeping me in a full human bed was just impractical. It isn't keeping me comfortable, though. Nothing short of divine intervention could do that. I'm constantly sore, often bordering on agony, and only the love-filled attention from Stephen is keeping me sane.

Yes, before you ask, I still love him dearly. I love him more than life itself. I will hold on as long as I can -- not for me, but to protect my unborn baby and to save Stephen and my father the tremendous heartache that my passing would cause.

Oh... my father. That's a sore point. He blames Stephen for everything and refuses to be in the same room with him, so he flew off in anger. I think he's still somewhere in the hospital, probably in the waiting room with Stephen's parents, though he hasn't come to check on me since yesterday.

I wish he would come back to the room to talk with me. I need to explain everything to him, assure him that I'm the one to blame, not Stephen. If I can't get him to talk to me face to face, I'm going to try to leave him a letter, at least.

Stephen

Sitting here watching my poor little Deena in constant suffering is tearing my heart out. That's good, because I want to feel the pain. I can't take her pain away from her, no matter how much I want to, so I need to share it in any way that I can.

She blames herself. She's always had a fascination with humans, and latched on to me tenaciously after our first "encounter" back in high school. Her father, Zoad, blames himself for her disposition because he's always had a fascination for human technology and part of that passed on to her. That's why they were exiled from their village, in fact.

He also blames me for her condition, and I deserve that.

Maybe we're all to blame. And maybe we should stop pointing fingers and just work on getting her through this.

Trying to keep her comfortable is the best I can do. I keep reaching over to stroke her enormous belly with the backs of my fingers. It's about the size of my fist now, and she's still in the first trimester. If that doesn't seem like much, keep in mind that she's only 111/4" tall. She's the tallest fairy I've ever heard of besides her father, who has about a half an inch on her.

She has to lay on her side just to be able to breathe and I'm doing everything I can to keep her focused on other things. I brought her writing supplies from her college bag and her little pad of paper. For now she's content to stay focused on writing. It makes a good distraction, which is all we can do. No doctor wants to risk human medications on a fairy, especially a pregnant one.

I don't know what she's working on, her handwriting is too small for me to read unless I get really close. I think it's a letter to Zoad. She'll share it with me if she wants me to read it.

The First Encounter - Seven Months Ago

Deena

This was a bad idea. The storm wasn't supposed to hit for a few more hours!

I had planned to come talk with Stephen and wish him a happy birthday. I'd taken up my usual spot, sitting on his windowsill to watch him. I just needed to gather a little more courage.

I'd checked the weather forecast before I left home and downplayed the storm in my mind. The cold air that arrived didn't concern me, but I really couldn't handle the strong wind... or the freezing rain it carried.

At first, I planned to wait for the wind to die down and then fly to the front door. I pictured myself ringing the doorbell and saying hello, but after the rain started, I had to fold my wings into my coat. Then a thin sheet of ice had quickly formed on the siding of the house and the window was starting to fog up. I'd accepted that I wasn't going to fly down from here, and climbing down the icy siding was certainly out of the question. I was trapped, and started to pound on the window.

I wasn't sure how long I was hitting the window. It didn't seem to be working, and he wasn't moving! I had no other option, though, so I burrowed my face into my coat and kept it up as long as I could.

Eventually, I heard a loud crack and the window frame lifted. I fell forward, but I was caught in a pair of warm hands.

Stephen

Today was another lousy day, probably the worst so far this year. I had to admit that, overall, things were better now than they were in my freshman year. But that wasn't enough to stop me from hating school and I was literally counting down the days until graduation. As I plopped down on the edge of my bed, I reached over and crossed off another day on my calendar using the marker that hung there. Seventy-five down, one hundred and five left to go.

I sighed, loudly.

As if to agree with me, I heard the wind outside suddenly turn into a downpour of icy rain. There was supposed to be a winter storm later tonight, but it sounded like it was here now.

I looked at the big red "X" I had just made and I knew the real reason why this day felt so awful. It was January 14th and my eighteenth birthday, though I hadn't noted it on my calendar.

Of course, my family didn't forget. My mom and little sister were off doing something together tonight, and my dad was working nights this week and volunteering for any overtime he could get so he probably wouldn't be home until early in the morning. However, mom had planned ahead and we'd all agreed to celebrate my birthday tomorrow evening.

The part that bothered me was that nobody at school seemed to have any idea. It was partly my fault for not reminding anyone, but I also felt like I shouldn't have to. I have friends that I've hung out with for years!

I had to stop dwelling on this, I was just getting more depressed. I recalled one of the coping strategies my therapist and I had discussed: think of something positive, then expand off from it.

The cold wind picked up again, slapping cold rain against the window and I could hear a branch knocking against the glass. I ignored it, not wanting the weather to darken my mood even further.

It was Friday, which was always a plus. And, for some unknown reason, only one of my teachers had given out homework. All I had to do was watch the news on TV or read a newspaper and do a summary of a news story. We had the Sunday paper delivered, so I'd do it then.

So, no responsibilities for now. I glanced over at my desk and thought about waking up my computer. Last summer I had gained some internet friends through chatting. They didn't know me personally, and vice versa, which was great. I enjoyed the socialization without all the baggage that came from the ridicule and humiliation from my first year of high school.

Right now, though, I found that even the little socializing I did with my small group of virtual friends was unappealing. I had no desire for more.

I sighed and flopped back, staring at the ceiling. I had nothing I wanted to do, and nobody to do it with.

It was Friday night and the sun was going down soon. I tried to think of what my classmates were doing. Many were probably out on a date. The single ones like me were playing video games or watching porn. Neither appealed to me right now, and I wasn't tired enough to sleep. The sound of the rain and the branch tapping on the window were pretty soothing, but I was too wide awake.

Ugh! Damn it, I needed to start over. Think of something positive, then expand off from it.

Deena. Deena had been the silver lining in the storm cloud of my life. She certainly brightened everyone else's lives too.

She's always been a bit of a living paradox -- a concentrated, energetic ball of irony. Everyone said she was big for a fairy, though I had to take their word for it since the only ones I had ever seen were on television, and you can't trust a camera to keep things in perspective. She was an outcast from her own people for reasons nobody knew, and yet she fit in with every group of students she came in contact with.

It was truly a wonder to see her in action. I would walk down the hall one day and see her sitting on the shoulder of one of the cheerleaders in a group, giggling and talking about shopping. Later in the day, she could be found in the science lab where the chess club convened once a week after school. I'd heard she was a fantastic player, too.

We'd met over the summer, right after she'd moved into the area. It was my second year working at the greenhouse, and she'd come right in and worked by my side like she'd been there her whole life. We would chat about anything and everything while working in a perfect team.

We'd bonded, in much the same way she was able to mesh with anyone, but it held more meaning to me. I felt like she was a true friend, and wasn't just trying to make me happy to get what she wanted from me.

She preferred calling me by my nickname, Trip, which I'd been given after the disaster in my first week of high school. She'd asked me why people called me that, when my name was Stephen, and guessed that maybe I was clumsy in the past. I was so relieved to talk to someone that didn't know, and that she'd inadvertently helped me come up with a benign explanation for the name. With the memory of walking through the greenhouse together, laughing and talking while we tended the flowers, I was able to ignore the sneers of the jerks at school and reinforce the idea that I just used to be clumsy. That's all. Not derogatory in any way!

Thank you, Deena!

I smiled, aware that my thoughts were staying positive. I'd just needed the right focus to expand from.

I don't know how long I'd laid there, looking for patterns in the bumps on my ceiling, when the tapping sound at the window suddenly sounded wrong. It was too... irregular. The wind had died down but the tapping sounded more urgent, somehow.

I glanced toward my window and I bolted upright, wide-eyed. I could see a tiny blueish fist, pounding on the foggy, frosted glass, and the vague shape of the top of a fairy's head.

In seconds, I was yanking at the handle of the window, realized it was locked, then flipped the lock and slammed it open. Deena tumbled forward into my hands. A thin sheet of ice had formed on her boots, so I had to pry a little to break them free from the windowsill, and then she was in my arms.

While closing the window, I clutched her to my chest. She was far too cold, but at least she was still shivering.

What was she doing here?

Deena

The warmth was heavenly. My hands were clutching some fabric much warmer than I was. I was too struggling to raise my head and see, and I instinctively clung to the heat.

I began to shiver harder, but it felt good.

I heard a thunk as the window was closed, and then I was moving, being carried.

I heard footsteps, then a light switch. I gasped as I was pulled away from the warmth and fell back onto something soft.

I opened my eyes to see Stephen's concerned face. He was wrapping me in a warm towel. It was nice, but my place on his chest had been warmer.

He picked up the towel with me folded inside and held it to his chest again, and I started to cry in relief.

I closed my eyes to work on slowing my shivering. Stephen was talking to me, trying to calm me, but I couldn't focus on his words at first.

"...your boots are covered with ice, Deena, I have to get them off..."

I was laying down, now, still wrapped in the towel, and he had uncovered my legs.

"Help me sit up, Trip," I croaked.

He was right, both of my boots had a chunk of ice on the toe. With a little effort, I was able to shove my fingers down into the back and push them off, along with my wet socks. After another small struggle, I pulled off my coat and dropped it beside me.

With relief, I collapsed backward again, with my wings folded tight to my back. I closed my eyes and moaned as he raised my legs with his warm hands to look at my feet.

"We need to get you dry and warm." He was pressing against the soles of my feet with his thumbs. They felt hot in comparison to my frigid feet and the contact hurt in the best possible way. "I think you're out of danger now, though."

I nodded once. I was exhausted from shivering, and finally starting to feel normal again, so I let myself fall into a deep sleep.

I awoke at least twice. Each time I was being transferred to a fresh, warm, dry towel. My clothes were noticeably drier each time. What he was doing was working. I was asleep again in seconds after being covered back up.

Some time later, I popped awake as I was exposed again. I was now comfortably warm, and the air in the room hitting my skin felt chilly, but tolerable.

"Wha...?"

"Hey, you're awake. How do you feel?"

"Uh." I sat up on my elbows and looked around. I was on a bed. Stephen's bed. Now laying on a partially folded light blue towel. He was sitting in his wheeled desk chair next to the bed, leaning over me with his eyes filled with concern.

I didn't like that he was so worried about me. I never wanted to worry him.

"Much better, thanks."

I felt my legs and wiggled my toes. In retrospect, these clothes weren't much help in a winter storm. I should have bundled up better. Or maybe I should have just had the courage to call him before I came over, and avoided this whole mess.

"Are your wings okay? They didn't freeze or get wet, did they?" he asked with concern.

I realized he was worried because I'd kept them folded tight to my back and he knew I didn't do that normally. He'd been very curious watching me fly around while we worked at the greenhouse, asking whether they could feel pain, whether I could fly in the rain, whether fairy flight was purely physical like bees and dragonflies, or whether fairy magic was a necessary component.

His curiosity overshot my own understanding. It turned out I didn't really know how my own wings worked. My skills with fairy magic were limited to interactions with plants, but I had to admit that magic was involved with flight, since every fairy I'd ever met could hover in place while holding their wings still. Flight like that wasn't possible for non-magical creatures.

I could tell by the way they felt that my wings were undamaged, and I remembered the way he'd gently moved me around while drying me off so that he'd avoided touching them. Wanting to reassure him, I spread my wings as wide as I could, then straight back away from my body, then one at a time, I brought each forewing and hindwing forward so I could look them over by sight.

Smiling, I told him, "No cracks or tears, I think they're perfect, thank you!"

"Okay, Deena, can you please tell me what you were doing out there?" He was pointing at his window. The worry in his face was replaced with confusion and curiosity.

Trying to stall for time, I quickly ran my fingers through my hair to attempt to untangle the mess. "Well... I actually came to wish you a happy birthday..." I mumbled.

He sat back, looking skeptical, but grinning. "Well... thank you! You're the only one of my friends that remembered! That doesn't really explain why you were outside my bedroom window, though. You didn't think to come to the front door?"

"Um..." I looked down, blushing. "I wanted to surprise you." Not the real answer to the question, but not a lie, either.

"Mission accomplished, then." I could hear the smile in his words. "I am indeed surprised. But still, this seems like a strange way of doing it." There was still suspicion in his voice. He clearly knew there was more to tell.

He looked over at his window. "How did you know this was my bedroom window, anyway? I didn't think you knew where I lived."

I stopped trying to fix my hair and covered my face with my hands. I knew I had to tell him. I wasn't going to hide the truth from him.

Peeking out through my fingers, I confessed. "I followed you home once. I've, um... I've come to visit a couple times, but never had the courage to knock. I always look for a couple minutes, then get too shy and leave."

His eyebrows lowered with suspicion. "You... look at me? You sit outside my window for a couple minutes?"

Blushing, I nodded.

"But... why?"

I was wringing my hands together. I just couldn't stay still, my own embarrassment filling me with nervous energy. I had to tell him the truth. I just couldn't guess how he'd react. I took a deep breath.

"I wanted to see it."

"See what?" he asked with a puzzled expression.

"You know..." I cleared my throat. I couldn't bring myself to say it, not directly, so I figured I could explain from the beginning. "When school started, on that first day, I waved at you and said, 'Hi Trip!' and a couple guys started laughing. Later on, I asked them why it was funny. I wanted to hear about when you tripped. But they told me a very different story than you did. Tony Pirozzi saw you in the gym shower and said it was like a triple A battery..." I looked up to gauge his reaction. Stephen's face was like a thundercloud -- filled with hurt and rage. I wanted to soften the blow and reassure him of my friendship, but I was too slow.

"What the fuck, Deena!?" Tears were starting to roll down his cheeks. "Do you think I am some freak for you to laugh at? A sideshow? I thought you were different. You were my friend. You've been sneaking around, looking through my bedroom window for months, trying to catch me naked so you can giggle and tell all your friends that you saw..."

I had to stop this. I jumped up and screamed, "No! Stephen!"

I never called him that, and it clearly shocked him. He clamped his mouth shut, but his face was red and wet with tears -- so filled with pain that I felt my heart pang in sympathy. I hopped from his bed onto his knee with a flutter and stabbed my hand forward, pointing at his face. He flinched back like I'd hit him.

"You listen to me. I am your friend, okay? I'm probably the only person in this school that knows what you're going through. You think you're a freak show? Just look at me!" I threw my arms up.

"What are you talking about?" he asked, sullenly.

"Do you have any idea how much of a freak I am!? I could buy fairy clothes: there are stores all over the place that sell them, but none of them fit! I'm too big, by half, for even the biggest thing on the shelf! Too small for goblin clothes, too big for things supposedly designed for me! I have a nickname, too, you know! They call me 'Barbie' and snicker behind my back, because I usually have to wear doll clothes!"