I crossed my arms over my chest and glared at everyone that wished me happy birthday.

If anyone hadn’t added a ‘fairy bait’ to the end of their greeting, then I would have been much nicer, but not a single person we passed did. It was all Lawrence, the Fairy Bait, or just plain Fairy Bait.

And the thing was, they weren’t even crazy like Mama and my sisters, but they went along with it, and I think that was just as bad.

When we got home, my sisters and an aunt met us at the gate and took the groceries from us before my Dad came over and helped me down from the horse, then helping my mom down with a spin and a ‘My conquering hero!’.

I watched them with a look that I hope showed exactly how unamused I was as they kissed and nuzzled and Dad talked about what a wonderful hunter my mom was, and when they looked at me that both cooed and said how happy they were that their first born miracle was following family tradition. I slapped away my Dad’s hand that tried to pat my cheek and my Mama took that same hand mid slap and dragged me up the path where everyone was gathered with sticks and big grins.

I screwed my eyes shut to avoid getting oiled petals in my eyes, my sisters, aunts, cousins, and any other relative that believes in the crazy throwing them at me from all directions as I came to stand on our porch with Mama. One got in my mouth and I spat it out, my attempts to scrap the petals off my face interrupted by my mother, who took both my hands from behind and forced me to hold still and endure.

“Protect the child!” Someone laughed, one of my little cousins – one from my Dad’s side of the family that didn’t understand that today was about making a freaking victim out of me rather then to celebrate me- came up and trying to stand with me before my Dad rushed over and got her, caring her off to where his own mother was near by.

I stood there in front of Mama, getting coating in gross smell petals for what I was sure was at least ten minutes, maybe longer.

When I felt Mama step away from me, I felt like five solid pounds of soaked petals dumped over me and I yelped, cursing when Mama came up behind me to hold onto my wrists so I didn’t push the clumps of oily petals of my head.

I screwed my eyes shut to keep from getting oil in my eyes as I was hit with full flowers.

I felt someone clean the back of my closed eyelids with a warm cloth and after I had my cheeks slapped at once, I opened my eyes to see my Dad with a big, stupid grin. I shook my head at him with a scowl as he laughed a little.

“Open up!” He said, and I clamped my lips as tight as I could, leaning back against my Mama as she laughed and pushed her fingers through my oily, petal tangled hair. “You keep resisting and it’s just going to last longer, Lawrence!” Dad laughed.

Which was true, I guess.

I rolled my eyes and opened my mouth, staring at the sky as my Dad lifted Mimi so she could spray the gross anti-fairy mist into my mouth. I choked on it, gagging but closing my mouth, since spitting it out meant I’d have to not only get it again, but drink it instead of getting just a spritz. My mom held onto my wrists and clapped my hands together, cheering with the rest of them as I briefly choked.

“And now, he is beaten!” Mama’s Mom called.

“I’m hungry.” I complained, but all I got in return was ‘You would have eaten dessert for breakfast if you didn’t run’ from an aunt before she whacked me right in the stomach with her branch. I jolted and scowled and let Mama march me around the house to walk between the long row of the dozens of family member lined up to smack me with branches, each tied with ribbons that were dipped in perfumes and whatever other crap was part of the ceremony.

Spices, maybe.

I don’t know.

Everyone was singing and laughing as I was hit, my mom reaching around me to pry my hands away from my face so her mother could lightly smack me right on my face, a ribbon going into my mouth and my tongue getting covered in the gross tasting perfumes. I coughed and gagged, swallowing my spit before mom let me cover my face again, her arms holding onto my shoulders as I was hit everywhere else above the waist and below the knees with the branches. I could tell when my aunts hit me because they were the only ones with good enough aim to hit my thighs without getting me in the groin, which meant I was likely nearing the end.

I got one final hard swat from what felt like a flower crown to the back of my head from who I was sure was Mama before I was turned around and I straightened, dropping my hands from my face to scowl and glare at the ceiling while everyone came toward where we were in the kitchen. Everywhere I had been hit was stung and burned, which I could handle, but the feeling of being covered in oil and tasting like someone threw up in my mouth was almost to much.

My mouth filled with saliva and my stomach turned as I slowly looked to the tall glass of dark green liquid I was going to be made to drink that Mama’s grandma was making up for me.

When my cousin Nell turned twelve and Mama was making the drink for her, Mama let me have a taste and I got preview of the horror that I was going to be forced to digest. It had stuck with me all these years now that that it was time…

This was so stupid.

Mama brought me over to the island counter in our kitchen and I gagged a little as I smelt the mixture.

“Today begins the most crucial, dangerous part of Lawrence’s life, my sweet firstborn entering his fairy years where he must undergo a terrible trial that will decide the rest of his life -” She reached down and picked up the glass, holding it up. Most everyone closed their eyes like they were praying, a few – all of which were married into the family rather than being blood – watching with amusement.

I know some of them had bet on whether on not I’d go through with it.

They bet on a lot of the things I was supposed to do.

My Dad slid through the crowd with a smirk of his own, coming over to stand next to my mom. I glared at him before I looked up to see my mom had her eyes closed.

“Please, heavenly father, bless my son so that his eyes will be open, his heart will be turned to steel, and his mind sharp for the trials that are ahead of him!” she said loudly, the rest of the family mumbling along with her. I sighed in annoyance, Mama sharply kicking my leg to shut me up. “He has now become visible to the Woodland Fairy, and they will seek him out to steal him away from us – please let him have the strength to recognize the signs of these dark creatures coming for him, and the ability to return to us by any means necessary so we might continue to be blessed with him in our lives!”

There was a chorus of amen and I swallowed thickly, sighing quietly as Mama lowered the glass, looking to me then before she handed it to me.

“Drink it all as quickly as you can, don’t breath through your nose.” She said lowly, gently placing a hand on the back of my head.

I made a face and rolled my eyes, but did as I was told tilting it back to hurriedly drink it down. It was awful – there was for sure some sort of vinegar in there and a whole like of nasty herbs, all struggling to come back up as soon as they went down. It was acidic, and oily, and chunky, all it of disgustingly warm. I frantically swallowed around it, coughing a little before my Mama told me to keep going.

Once it was all down I coughed, gagging, and showed her the glass with teary eyes from resisting the urge to vomit. She looked into it before she beamed and nodded, the rest of the family breaking into cheers and applause. I scowled, sticking my tongue out in disgust before Mama kissed the top of my head, laughing a little as she wiped the oil off her lips she got for her effort.

There was a lot of commotion, music being turned on in another room, chattering as both my grandmas went to get out fruit and food to start handing off to others to bring into the dinning room, I was sure. Mama dragged me over to the sink before she was handed another glass by my aunt in passing, Mama making me take it.

“This is much sweeter, it’ll help get rid of the taste,” She said as she wrapped her arms around me to rest her cheek on the top of my head. I started to drink it and surely enough it was sweet, also tasting like vegetables, probably carrots or something. I drank about half before she took it from me, finishing the glass herself and setting it into the sink. “Let’s let that settle in your stomach, and then we’ll get you something better to eat in a little while – presents!” she said suddenly with a big smile, taking my shoulders to start directing me through the crowd and into the living room where there was indeed a stack of presents.

I was made to sit on the couch, a towel under me to protect it from the oil on me. A few of my cousins came over to sit with me as Mama called out to the person who’s gift I was opening in case they wanted to come over and see, which most did. I waited until she gave me a nod before I started opening the paper packages and slowly went through the pile of gifts. A couple practical gifts like books with useful knowledge geared toward young adults like basic cook books or animal husbandry books, a couple different knives. My Dad’s mom got me a really cool slingshot, the card coming with it talking about David and Goliath.

After presents, I went and played Pull Down outside with my cousins.

Pull Down was one of those games that had been around forever, but it was supposed to be played in the snow. Everyone would be divided into two groups, and the way you played was you had to get every member of the other team on the ground at the same time – they could be sitting or laying, but they had to all have their butts on the ground for a victory to be declared. There were a lot of ways you could do that, but if you broke whatever rule was established before the game started – like no slamming if there was less than six inches of snow on the ground, or no pushing – then you were out.

The game was pretty fun, but because it could get really rough, we usually played it in two rounds. The first round was when everyone played, even the really little ones. Nobody really counted that round since the main objective there was to make sure the kids had fun being chased around and they were exhausted enough to sit out the next round, and even the really little guys could play (and usually would).

After that, the main game was played and two teams would go at it to get the other on the floor.

Once you were on the floor, you had to hold two fists above your head and count out a Mississippi on each finger (or just count to ten if you were under five and struggled with the long river’s name) before you could get back up.

In our family, we usually did modified rules where the little kids were allowed to be medics and come over and ‘heal’ the fallen member, and once they ran up and tapped their shoulder, the down member could get back up. If you hit a medic, even on accident, you were automatically out, so you had to watch where you were going because they’d run out of no where to heal someone.

Today there were a lot of little kids around, so we just kept them in the game throughout and weren’t rough at all.