The Baby Isn’t Yours

In that moment, the children’s voices grew even louder, filled with excitement.

-Wow! Can you hear our voices? It’s amazing! Are you a human?-

-We didn’t even reveal ourselves, yet you can see us. You’re definitely not human!-

-Who are you? You’re a newcomer, right? Where did you come from?-

Fairies.

They were indeed fairies.

Occasionally, Simon had mentioned the existence of fairies to Kalia.

Simon, due to his mixed elven blood, claimed he could see them.

However, fairies were not commonly seen outside the Fairy Forest, so Kalia had only encountered them a few times in her life.

Kalia had now met such beings.

Fairies were secretive creatures.

Despite possessing 20% of the world’s land, they rarely let humans enter their territory.

They had established their own empire, hiding their entrance behind mighty enchanted trees and a boundary.

However, some fairies wove their existence into trees, the land, or other natural elements to live in the human world.

The fairies Simon had seen were of this kind.

Kalia felt her breath quiver and answered the children’s questions, her voice slightly trembling.

“No, I’m not. I’m a human. I come from the capital… and this is the first time I’ve seen fairies.”

The children slid down the tree trunk one after another as Kalia spoke, coming closer.

The children perched on branches just above Kalia, their curious eyes locked onto her.

Upon closer inspection, except for the faint light that dispersed like mist from their bodies, these fairy children appeared quite ordinary.

They had rich brown hair, blue eyes resembling the color of trees, and cute freckles on the bridge of their noses.

The three children, despite their differences, bore a striking resemblance to one another, like ginger cookies baked at slightly different temperatures.

The child closest to Kalia, slightly larger than the other two, stared at her intently and then mumbled with a puzzled expression.

-How can a human see us? That’s the most amazing thing…-

The child’s gaze shifted to Kalia’s belly as he spoke, and for a moment, a shimmering look filled the fairy’s eyes.

-Is it because of the child in your belly?-

At the child’s words, Kalia hesitantly placed her hand on her belly.

“Can you… tell that I’m pregnant?”

Upon hearing Kalia’s question, the children exchanged glances and then burst into laughter.

-Yes, we can tell! We can see children!-

-That’s right, sometimes children can see us too!-

-Yes, yes! That’s right!-

“I see. You can see them,” Kalia replied with a slightly trembling voice, her hands cupping her belly.

To see her child, even though she couldn’t, was remarkable. It made her cheeks flush.

One of the children descended from the tree, and the others followed, standing in front of Kalia and tilting their heads.

“What’s wrong?”

Kalia asked, and the children exchanged looks before excitedly speaking.

-You know, this child seems very special.-

-Yes, special. No, extraordinary!-

-That’s right, it’s exceptionally special!-

What does that mean?

At the fairy’s abundance of praise, a subtle but pleasant warm feeling washed over her. Kalia felt a mixture of delight and unease, and she asked:

“What do you mean?”

The children, who had been humble earlier, now shouted with one voice.

-We can see a beautiful light emanating from your belly!-

“…A light?”

Kalia’s voice shook as she inquired. The children were excited as they replied.

-Yes, a very pretty light!-

-We’ve never seen a child with light before!-

-This child will be an exceptionally special being! No doubt about it! Fairies can prophesy!-

Upon hearing those words, Kalia’s heart sank, and she felt a nervous fluttering. It wasn’t a pleasant tremor.

The term ‘exceptionally special being’ was heavy and frightening.

She simply wished for her child to grow up ordinarily. To be content in a self-chosen happiness, without anything exceptional happening…

-Human, why does your face look like that? It’s turned so pale!-

-Human, are you feeling unwell?-

-Shall we give you some fairy water? You’re also a special human, so it’s okay if we share some of our fairy water with you!-

-Oh? Should we do that? Maybe one of the three of us will emerge from this human?-

-Yes, yes! One of us will probably come out!-

“No, no, I’m fine. You don’t need to worry,” Kalia rushed to reassure them.

Fairy water was rumored to be a universal cure-all. Whether it was true or not, she didn’t know, given the proliferation of counterfeit fairy water.

But the reason Kalia hastily declined the offer was that it was made from fairies’ tears.

Regardless of its value, Kalia didn’t want to accept these children’s tears.

-What? Are you really okay, human?-

Upon hearing the children’s words, Kalia’s voice trembled. She kneeled down to be on eye level with them, cupping her hands around one of the children’s cheeks.

She gazed into their eyes and kindly smiled, speaking gently.

“So, please don’t cry for me. There’s no need to force tears from your eyes.”

At Kalia’s words, the child she was holding blushed deeply. She cradled the blushing child’s head gently. The kindness of the little fairies touched her heart.

-I want a hug too!-

-Me too, me too! I want a hug too!-

The two children who had been nearby, watching the scene, jumped into her arms playfully.

Kalia chuckled lightly and hugged the children in her arms, then stood up.

“I have to go now. I’ll come back before I leave tomorrow.”

-Yes! Come back tomorrow for sure!-

-Goodbye, human! Goodbye!-

-See you tomorrow!-

Kalia bid her farewells and left, with the children waving enthusiastically behind her.

She watched the children wave until she reached the hotel’s entrance and entered. 

Watching Kalia walk calmly back, they couldn’t help but guess:

-You know, don’t you think the light isn’t just coming from the belly?-

-Maybe… It’s not the child’s? What if… the light isn’t just from that human’s belly, but subtly shines around her too?-

-True… the light from the belly is so strong that I didn’t notice, but now there’s a faint glow around the human!-

-Oops, does that mean she might not be human?-

-I don’t know… she said herself that she was human?-

-Or it’s possible that she isn’t aware she’s not human!-

-Ah! For once, you’re clever, right?-

-For once? I’m always clever! Unlike you!-

-What? Ready to fight?-

-Fight? Alright, let’s compete!-

Throughout the night, the children played and ran about in the square, their joyous laughter filling the air.

But just as dawn’s first light began to paint the sky with shades of gray, the children fell asleep.

* * *

However, the next day, Kalia couldn’t find the children.

After getting up early, tidying her room and having breakfast, she went to the square again for a stroll before departure, but the children were nowhere to be seen.

“Kids? Hey, I’m here.”

Kalia called out to the children in a soft voice, but there was no response.

A light breeze brushed past her cheeks. The breeze made the leaves rustle and whisper, as if the trees were gently conveying a message to her.

‘Perhaps… are they asleep?’

Kalia, shaking her head, looked up at the sky. The enormous tree, bathed in the morning sunlight, scattered light through its leaves.

She made a canopy with her hand to shield her eyes from the sun, looking at the dappled leaves. With a sense of longing, Kalia circled around the Amaradina tree.

After walking halfway around it, she noticed something sparkling underfoot.

“What’s this?”

It was a tiny crystal vial, hardly larger than her fingertip. She picked it up, and even though there was no wind, the leaves on the tree rustled busily.

‘Could this tree have its own consciousness?’

She asked aloud, almost playfully, as she knew the tree could not understand her.

“Did someone drop this? It might not be right to pick it up so casually.”

The leaves on the tree began to rustle vigorously, as if in vehement disagreement with her words.

Shh… Shh… Shh… Shh…

“…So… Did they leave this here?”

Kalia asked again.

Funnily enough, the leaves that had been rustling so violently calmed in an instant.

The branches swayed gently, very gracefully, as if to agree in response to her words.

Shh-shaaa-

For a moment, she seemed to hear the tree’s voice.

Shh, that’s right.

The rustling sounded something like this.

When she saw the leaves quiver as if dancing in the air, even the most tactless could understand that this was what the children had left.

Laughing at the tree’s ‘words’ and how it had reacted as if it were a creature with an ego, she reached out to pat the trunk once.

The rough, and hard texture beneath her hand didn’t feel bad.

‘Now that I think about, is this a fairy tree?’

Even though the children said it was OK and were so determined to give Kalia the fairy water, Kalia was still a little hesitant.

If they were in front of her right now, she’d thank them immediately but… She felt sorry to take it just like this.

However, it was almost time for her to get going.

She couldn’t delay any longer. Kalia looked up at the tree, and then looked around.

It was only the middle of the morning, just past 10 o’clock.

Some stores were busy preparing to open but the plaza was still pretty idle. Everybody that was there were busy going about their day and it seemed as if no one was watching her. 

Even if there really were, it’d probably just one or two.

After all, to them, a day like this was just like any other and would be easily forgotten; whoever is actually watching probably wasn’t paying much attention. Besides, they would long forget this memory of theirs in a day’s time.

“I’m in a hurry to pack and leave so I don’t have much on hand to give. This is, uh, a cookie I bought this morning,” she mumbled.

After kissing the trunk as a thank-you kiss, she placed the cookie under the tree, “When the kids wake up, tell them I’m grateful. I’ll make sure to drop by again on my way back. Alright?”

She didn’t know if the tree understood or if it was just her imagination but the leaves seemed to shake gracefully after hearing her words.

Shhh-shh-shhhhh!

The sound was quite vague and careless.

At any rate, Kalia gently stroked the tree trunk as if she were proud of it.

Though she may be mistaken, she swore she felt a faint tremor run through the great trunk.

‘Must… must be my imagination, right?’