The Fairy Godmother’s Last Spell

She never thought a woman could break her heart…

It started off playful, little gifts of love presented in cards, letters, and candy. Before the light of a new day, Fairy Godmother Honore fell madly in love with the forest’s most popular warrior. She fixated on her smile, her voice, her laugh, and her words. She imagined the two of them coursing through the Land of Timeless Hope, hand-in-hand.
Camille…

Honore said her name and the flutters in her heart stirred without fail. Camille… the world stopped. Camille… everything that was meaningful faded into the background, was put on hold or canceled. Fairy Godmother Honore had found love. She found a reason to retire and give up casting spells that created a life of happiness for others. It was time to shine a light on her own. It was time for stepping into the center and being the focus. It was time for a welcomed peace.

But, her fantasy was one-sided. The hope of embracing love at the reins never matured for Honore. Camille was a bolt of lightning, busy luring hearts but never falling for them. She was a madwoman, casting spells of her own. With eyes of thunder, a head full of fiery hair, lips that summoned the seas, and a body brickhoused to perfection, Camille used what she had to engage others in indescribable ways. She was her counterpart’s downfall.

Unbeknownst to her, Camille’s ways were invisible until Honore wanted to reveal her feelings to The Warrior. She wanted to tell her of the love that danced around in her heart for months. She built up the courage, gathered every ounce of pride, and swatted away every question the village threw at her.

“But, she’s a woman. Why, Honore?”

“Are you THAT desperate?”

“Can your heart not find its true love in a man?”

Fairy Godmother Honore ignored their cries. Love was bigger. It catapulted her into a confident realm.

On a day when the sun sat highest in the sky, Honore wrote a love letter to Camille. She attached an old poem written in her honor and placed them both in a handmade basket where she added fresh fruits, a box of chocolate, and granola. Honore waved her wand over the basket, said the crafted love spell, and sent it on its way.

It arrived at Camille’s doorstep just before a break in the clouds. A knock cracked violently across the door. Camille was sitting at the kitchen table, eating breakfast when the knock shook her. “A visitor? At this hour?” She went to her door, pulled it open, and stared at the open forest with no one around. Her eyes shifted downward and there it was, Fairy Godmother Honore’s gift of love. Camille scooped up the basket and hurried inside. She tore into the contents and grabbed the letter.

As she read it, a boiling pit formed in her stomach. Her body ached. A headache tapped at her temples and caused her to blink quickly. She read the last words of the love poem wrapped in the letter. “If you will be so willing to let my love, love you, it would be an Honore.”

No signature. No other hint of the sender. But, Camille knew who her pursuer was… “an Honore.” She scribbled a few words onto the back of the letter. It was a declination of declinations. “You are a Fairy Godmother. Love… Love deserves more than spells or chants or being twisted into something it is not. I am not a project, Honore. I won’t be willed, least of all, by you.”

She summoned her errand boy and had him swiftly take the basket back to the Fairy Godmother. Honore met the boy just as soon as his hand began to tap the hardwood door. He stood there, eager to finish his task. Honore snatched the basket, gave the boy a shilling, and sent him on his way. In the silence of her home, she dug into the basket and pulled everything sent off back out.

The letter…It laid there, crumpled and out of place. She read the letter… But, what now?
Honore turned it over to read Camille’s words. A fitful sting struck her heart and dollops of tears poured from her eyes. “I am not a project, Honore. I won’t be willed, least of all, by you.” Fairy Godmother Honore sat with those words for hours. She washed her hair with them. She cried with them. She lolled throughout the house with them.

But what about the gifts, the cards, the hints? Everything that Camille had gifted her, was it all a dream? And then it hit her.

Honore had been lured by Camille specifically for this reason–to learn that there are no spells for true love. Two hearts must meet, be in sync, and work together as one.

She never thought a woman could break her heart.
But, she needed it.