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reason for her young daughter’s condition. So, using one of her fluffy fuzzy bunny slippers, Gracie wiped clots of chocolaty upchuck from her lips and chin. Then, with a helpless moan, she pulled herself onto the bed.
    As you are surely aware, our planet is turning on its axis around and around in space. It turns slowly, however, making one complete rotation only every twenty-four hours; and that ’s a good thing—isn’t it?—because if our world turned as fast as Gracie ’s room appeared to be turning, the sun would be either rising or setting every fifteen minutes, astronomers would be as woozy as rodeo clowns, and it ’d be nearly impossible to keep our meatballs from rolling out of our spaghetti.
    Gradually, though, the wallpaper slowed down to regulation Earth speed, and Gracie fell deeply, peacefully asleep. It was a primitive, timeless sleep, free of restless dreams, and she might have slumbered that way for hours had she not been awakened by a gentle but persistent scratching or tapping sensation just below her throat.
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    When she could focus normally, she saw that a small winged creature of some sort was perched on her upper chest. At first, it looked to be a dragonfly, standing on its hind legs, if dragonflies can be said to have hind legs, but it was pacing to and fro and anybody who’s paid attention knows that dragonflies can’t walk. Furthermore, it was tapping steadily, purpose-fully, on Gracie ’s breastbone with a front leg—or something resembling a leg—as if to get her attention. The thing was only slightly taller than a birthday candle, and had translucent wings that shimmered like moonlight on a barrel of rainwater.
    More fascinated than alarmed, Gracie wondered aloud, “What in the world are you?”
    Obviously, she wasn’t expecting an answer. Obviously.
    Imagine her intense amazement, therefore, when in a tiny, tinkly but plainly understandable human voice, the creature spoke. “What do you think I am, a Jehovah’s Witness? Do I look like I might be selling Girl Scout cookies?” Before a startled Gracie could even attempt a response, it went on to say,
    “What I am is the Beer Fairy, for crying out loud.”
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    Tasting the stale barf in her mouth, Gracie was pretty sure she wasn’t dreaming. She rubbed her eyes and stared harder. Sure enough, upon closer inspection, the teeny-weeny creature resembled in almost every detail the fairies whose pictures she ’d seen in books. You’d probably agree. In addition to the silvery wings, she (it was definitely female) had flowing red hair, sparkly oversize eyes, a wise, mysterious smile, and a slender, perfectly formed body draped loosely in a strange billowy material that constantly changed color and glittered like diamond dust. She was barefoot, bedecked with a scalloped crown that noticeably resembled a bottle cap, and carried a black leather wand, apparently the instrument with which she had prodded Gracie awake. Gracie was awed, to say the least.
    “Are you really the Beer Fairy?”
    “Yes, I am.”
    “I’ve never heard of a Beer Fairy.”
    “You have now.”
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    “Hmm. Well, you’re very pretty.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Where did you come from?”
    “Next door.”
    Gracie ’s mouth flew open. “You live at the McCormicks’?!”
    That ’s where her mommy was. More or less.
    The fairy laughed. “Not at your neighbor’s house, silly. I mean the world next door to this one.”
    Gracie nodded. She vaguely understood. “How did you get here?”
    “Why, through the Seam.”
    “The Seam?” Gracie was even more vague about that (just because a person turns six doesn’t mean they have to know everything), but she decided to ignore it. “Are you a kind of angel, then?”
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    “No, no, no. Angels don’t do beer. They’re into the fine wine and cognac, angels are. They tend to be seriously sophisti-cated—and if you want my opinion,