Moonlight streamed through the open curtains and spilled into the room, penetrating its darkness and washing it with silver. The night had grown warmer in the past couple of hours, and the window was thrown wide open in an attempt to draw any kind of breeze in, but there was none. The scent of the roses from the courtyard below was heavy and sweet, drifting up from the gardens to sit sluggishly in the room.

Emily was sitting on her bed with her pajamas backward, and the cotton was sticking onto her because of the heat. She was wide awake, though this had less to do with the heat and more to do with her anxiety. In just a couple more hours, her grandmother was going to wake her up. The problem wasn’t that she needed more sleep, but that her hair had been magically grown by fairies and she couldn’t cut it off.

You see, fairies aren’t like you would think. Yes, some fairies are cool, but most fairies are evil to the bone. You see, unlike other people, Emily has the ability to see magical creatures. Regular, normal people see beetles for the bad fairies and butterflies for the good fairies. 

For months, the fairies have been bothering Emily to no end. At one point, they had found her secret diary which included her notes about fairies, most of which were mean, so it was no surprise when fairies had her hair grow this long. She looked like Rapunzel, there was no way her grandmother wouldn’t notice. Just last night her hair was only up to her shoulders, now it was dragging along the floor! If her grandmother saw her hair, she would cut it off and then discover that the hair couldn’t be cut off, which would later make her grandmother suspicious. No, she couldn’t go to eat breakfast this morning, NO WAY. 

“I’ll just have to read my diary,” she thought, “Then I’ll be distracted.” So she did and found an interesting piece of information that she hadn’t written:

“Your hair has grown as a punishment for the insults you wrote in this diary, but we can give you a clue as to what you need to cut off your hair. First, you must find something that is sharp, a type of metal that rhymes with peel.” 

This was easy, it was obviously steel. There probably wasn’t another metal that rhymes with peel. But did her grandmother even own a knife? Maybe for cooking, but surely none of them were steel. There might be a steel knife in the kitchens where they served the cafe, but going to the cafe would mean getting out of her room. This was hopeless. 

Under the bed she saw something shiny! She looked and found a steel knife. Emily immediately started chopping off her hair. It was uneven, but she could always fix it later.  She tied it into a ponytail so it wouldn’t seem so uneven. 

She got out of her room and, “Whoosh!” She wasn’t in her room anymore. There were butterflies and fairies and glitter everywhere! Emily was in the realm of fairies.