"Well maybe before I steal anyone I will tell them that I won't hurt them."

"I guess that might push it back down below zombies."

"Fairies are supposed to be a little bit scary. They're supposed to make you go, wait, I have heard about fairies, what were the rules, I know there were rules... but I wouldn't expect anyone to look back on their adventure in fairy and be sad about it. That's not the idea."

"I'm pretty sure some people in stories are sad about their journeys into fairy. I mean, I don't know whether any of the stories have anything to do with actual fairies, but I know there was a thing about people thinking that tuberculosis was caused by fairies kidnapping people every night and forcing them to dance until they wasted away for lack of proper rest, and if you run into a human you've got to figure that that might be one of the only stories they remember about fairies, and they might be terrified of dying and not being able to do anything about it.

"And - I guess there are things that can be a little bit scary and not be terrifying or horrible. Roller coasters. White water rafting. Putting on plays. But I feel like if there's another person involved, and you think the person might mean you harm, and is probably laughing to themselves at all the stupid things you're doing even if they don't, and you can't get away from them, that just sounds - horrible."

"I think most peoples' lives are horrible. And having - a little window out of it - that's important."

"I guess maybe after it'd happened they'd probably be glad that it happened. But while it was happening it sounds like it'd be - I'd probably be too upset and scared to actually enjoy any of the stuff about getting to see birds or bugs up close, or whatever, while I was doing it? But I don't really know what that works out to."

"Well, I'll practice being - not scary. Knowing humans will probably help."

"I guess."

"Are you scared of me?"

"...I dunno? Kind of? I'm scared of lots of people, though, I dunno if that even means anything."

"I can't hurt you. Like, really can't, I would get very sick if I tried."

"I am not mostly scared of people hurting me. I mean, I guess sometimes. But not - mostly. I guess. Maybe depending on what you mean by hurting."

"Then what?"

"Like - 

"I'm scared that if my parents find out my sister's dead, then they'll make me come home, and they'll give away my niece for adoption because she's obviously something really weird and creepy that they didn't sign up for, and I'll never get to see her again, ever, and I'll just live in their house for two more years feeling like I'm a failure for that, and being told through subtle implicature all the time that they think I'm in danger of becoming a failure for totally different reasons.

"I'm scared that if I take eight hundred thousand dollars from your dad it'll - get inside me, somehow, that nothing I actually have is mine, and it's actually all his, and it could all get snatched away at any moment, and of course I'll know it's irrational and that people don't actually come to repossess enormous gifts like that, the thing they do is come by in five years and remind you that you wouldn't be where you are today if not for their support, and of course you should really do thus-and-such with your career because haven't they done enough for you that you should respect their opinion, and even if that never ever happened I would always know that nothing about my life reflected on me, it just had to do with, like, getting ridiculously lucky when I was sixteen in a way that didn't really reflect on me at all, and even if nothing bad ever happened because of it I would never be able to know that it wasn't going to happen tomorrow.

"And yesterday I asked your brother some stuff about fairies and started by asking how I was gonna pay him back, and he said it was traditional to pay fairies back with kisses, and that sounded like basically the worst thing ever, and I was so scared for a second that the first question about payment had already stuck me that I went ahead and agreed to do his Spanish homework for him even though I'm not even in Spanish, and even after I'd stayed up all night doing it, and even before I knew about the fairy circle, it kind of still seemed like an OK deal, because whatever else he wanted could've been a lot worse, even if nobody would've said that I'd gotten hurt at all during it.

"And I'm scared that I messed up at some point, or maybe I didn't even mess up, I just got really unlucky, having to save you from a zombie, and because there wasn't a second zombie for you to save me from we're just stuck like this, which is really upsetting, because before any of this happened you were one of the only people who, like, I know we didn't talk a lot, but I didn't literally count how many words I'd said to you each day, which made you a solid fifty percent of my non-family in-person social interaction, and - I'm really scared that I messed it up, and am going to keep messing it up, and you're not going to like me anymore, and we're not going to get to be friends ever, because there's this thing here that I don't understand and that makes me annoying and affects all of your considerations in ways that I can't really see or predict, and maybe it'll be fine, but maybe it won't, and a few months from now you'll just hate me, and it'll be my fault but I won't actually know how it's my fault.

"So. Stuff like that. I guess. But obviously with fairies you find in a circle it's way worse, because I don't think my parents or your father or your brother or you actually want me to be miserable, and there's no way to know how mean the random fairy is."

...hug?

Yeah, okay. Hug.

That sounds like a lot of problems but maybe the hug will buy him some time to think about them.

She just sort of goes around living her life with a bunch of inaudible screaming in the background, yeah.

Hugs are okay. Like, he is not really an ideal person to get hugs from, given everything, but she hasn't had any since her sister died, and they're probably net good on the whole.

"I'm sorry he scared you by mentioning kisses. I'm sure he'd have been just as happy about some other class, I don't think he was trying to - make it something you'd find difficult -"

"Nah, it's not his fault. I kinda panicked."

Hug. 

"Well I'm glad you have somebody. Even if in the short term you are panicking about that too."

"I guess.

"Sorry for being a mess."

She said it was bad when he had low standards so he shouldn't point out how much worse it could be. She was worried that he'd - 

- this is all too hard.

"I'm glad it was you."

"As opposed to anyone else who could've saved you from zombies?"

"Yeah."