A modern fairytale

…And they lived happily ever after.

She closed the book. Right, because fairytales exist. There is a cute boy waiting somewhere for you to let your hair down so he can climb right up and rescue you. She had tried. Oh god had she. She fell a couple of feet short. But if she sat in her room on the ground floor and let her hair out, it nicely sweeps the floor. She had long hair; that’s where the whole obsession started I think. The reading of fairytales. Watching the Disney movies. Collecting the dolls and dreaming. She could sit and dream all day long. But everyone grows up someday right?

Her mother said that.  All.The.Time. It was like a tape that had got jammed in the player. Everyone has to grow up. It’s high time you did too.

She’d heard that so much she wanted to give up. On the fairytales. And the dreaming. And the waiting.

But why should she. Once in a while, you would think that maybe… your parents are right. Thankfully that time hasn’t arrived yet.

Her mother was not right. The man she was waiting for, the happiness and the life. It would all come. And very soon. She was only 15. She could wait.

                                                               *

As she tidied up the kitchen, she heard her little girls swooning in front of the tv. They were so cute when they didn’t fight all the time and drive her crazy. It was only then she remembered that she loved them.

“ohmygodmummyflynnissoawesome!”

“you have to enunciate your words rhea. I’m not a mind reader.”

“Flynn mom!”

Her blank expression must have given her away because her daughter continued with an exasperated sigh.

“Flynn rider mum! From Tangled. The movie.  The one that is based on Rapunzel, mum!”

Her daughters continued to stand there and argue over who would marry Flynn. She tuned them out as she remembered 15 years ago.

Her love for Rapunzel and prince charming hadn’t faded. So, he was called Flynn now? Odd name. And what was this about a smolder? Prince charming only had to show those pearly whites and all would fall at his feet. She remembered she did. Oddly enough, that misplaced teenage love still didn’t embarrass her. Fairytales were an essential part of her growing up; it’s what made her, her.

And somehow she felt sorry for her daughters. They would never know the true fairytales. The racing of your heart; the costumes, the speech, the style. These modernized versions would never cut it.

And yet, wasn’t the feeling the same? Weren’t her girls seeing their Prince charming in Flynn?

As she smiled to herself, she thought; some things will never change.

As the doorbell rang, her smile just got wider. After all, sometimes you get your fairytale. She did. Her husband was what one would call a tool who analyzed the stock markets. But he was a closet romantic who whispered stories to her as she fell asleep. And who fell in love with her for her hair first.