A Fairy Out of Her Tale - Dear Diary - 38. Scene 38

15th January 1995

Dear Fertiliser Diary,

I must hold the record for shortest romance ever. We didn’t even last a day…

Though there is a tiny, tiny, tiny chance that it’s not over. Lydia and I just need to sit together and talk quietly without my intestines overreacting. I don’t even know what happened, it’s not like I ate things I wasn’t supposed to like when they fed me corpses at the hospital.

Bottom line is that I must not have bodily functions in front of Lydia. It’s a dwarf thing. Like how we fairies lose all respect for anyone who steps on the grass or, you know, murders another living being.

And do you know how I found out about that? I haven’t actually spoken to Lydia since that urge to “fertilise the land” (I’m assuming you, being a fairy diary, is well-versed in our euphemisms for defecating. “Defecating” is such an ugly word isn’t it? Never mind the meaning). It was Unn who told me.

Yes, Unn the merperson spoke to me. At least I can say I’m on speaking terms with at least one housemate at a time…

After I saw that Lydia fled my room, I thought of looking for her, but to be honest the stitches were hurting a bit because of all the fertilising I did, so I walked out of my room hoping I wouldn’t have to climb the stairs to Lydia’s. I went to the office instead. Maybe she would be playing a game to wait for me, and she was just bored instead of disgusted.

No such luck.

Kris was the one playing. I shouldn’t be surprised, with his 200+ hours of Fairy Fun Greenhouse, but it’s still disappointing. And it meant I couldn’t play either. His stare pretty much threw me out of the room.

So I walked back, thinking about what else I could do to check on Lydia, when Unn came out of her bedroom in her water tank. I did that thing where I don’t think about what I’m saying until it’s already been said and it makes me look like a horrible person.

‘How can you get in the first floor with that thing? I thought you couldn’t do stairs?’

Unn narrowed her eyes. ‘Good morning to you too. I could hear how much you enjoyed your night yesterday, but thanks for asking about mine. I managed to get some sleep after the loud kissing died out.’

If embarrassment could kill, we would be at my funeral right now. Unn kept staring at me while I opened and closed my mouth and struggled to come up with a proper apology.

‘Sorry,’ I said in the end. Unn raised an eyebrow. I didn’t think I sounded all that convincing either.

‘If you must know, my bedroom has a lift that takes me between floors without having to rely on stairs. Lóránt did ask if I could let you use it to go down to meals, but considering you can’t even remember proper etiquette, I’m sure I made the right call on this one.’

‘I didn’t mean to be rude.’

‘I did.’ She grinned that kind of scary grin that overstretches the lips and shows off all the teeth (merpeople’s pointy teeth make it even scarier). ‘But if feels the same to be at the receiving end of rudeness regardless of the intention, so get out of my way before I run over your toes. I’m not saying my tank can break bones, but I’m implying that’s the likely outcome of 640 litres of water plus the mechanical equipment on top of your fragile fairy bones.’

‘I’m sorry! You’re not even the first person I didn’t mean to offend today!’

‘Oh, really?’ Unn turned her tank to completely face me. ‘Was the other offended person a certain dwarf housemate of ours, by any chance?’

I nodded. She had already made it clear she knew Lydia had been in my room, so what was the point in denying our involvement?

‘What did you do to her? Did you say mountains were nothing but boring dead rock formations? Did you imply she doesn’t know how to dig? Did you call her your Precious Pyrite without knowing it’s a saying that implies she lacks intelligence?’

She said all those things with the kind of bitterness that made me wonder if she had done them at some point in the past. But I managed to not say any of those thoughts out loud.

‘No. I just went to the loo, and when I got out, she wasn’t there anymore.’

‘Ah.’ Unn rolled her eyes. Are all merpeople that expressive with their faces? Is it over-compensating because they don’t have legs? ‘You certainly insulted her. Not that it’s a difficult thing to do.’ Another eye-roll. Was she talking about me or Lydia? ‘Dwarves like to pretend biological necessities don’t exist. It’s a big taboo subject you wouldn’t mention to your grandma, let alone your crush. Apparently when you live in a series of cramped, interlocked tunnels, one fart is enough to poison the whole mountain. So she probably associated your explosive diahrroea with the apocalypse.’

‘How did you know —?’

‘I can hear you kissing, I can hear you pooping. Get used to it.’

What could I say to that? I think I managed a vague “thank you” to her and hurried back to my room before she could act on her threat to pulverise my toes. I’ve been here since, thinking of what to do next.

I just got an idea: I’m going back to the library. Hopefully Kris will be so busy playing that he’ll ignore me while I look for a book on dwarf culture.

If I want to have any chance of making it up for Lydia, I better make sure I won’t screw up again.

Thanks for reading!
So Nessa’s romance ended as suddenly as it started? For real? Why even bother including it in?
Unless it’s not the end. Maybe there is still a future for Nessa and Lydia. And whatever that future holds, it’s probably hiding behind that book Nessa is hoping to find (and away from the toilet).
Here’s some good life advice, folks: when you’re afraid of screwing up, do your own research before you have a chance of screwing up. Nessa learned the hard way so you don’t have to!
 
And this has been your exceptionally early Tuesday update. I'm off to London now for the next two days, which means I got a 5 hours train trip I can use to work on this story (of course, I may end up working on anything  but this story considering my general state of undersleepyness...
 
And don't forget to check out my Patreon on my profile. Because if you don't I'll tell Lydia to never talk to Nessa again!  
See you Friday!