Fabian's Fables

Chapter 10

“Ow, my butt!” Charlie cried out when landed back on his chair inside the bookstore.

“Phew,” Fabian sighed. Then he laughed. “We’re back home!”

“Hey, look.” Charlie pointed at a clock on the wall. “Time hasn’t passed at all since we got sucked into your notebook. We’re picking up where we left off.”

“Great.” Fabian got up and swung his backpack over his shoulder. “Now I have time to go home and get some homework done.”

“HOMEWORK?! After that crazy-hell adventure we just had? I think I rather just go home and crash into my bed for the whole weekend.”

“Well, I’m not stopping you,” Fabian teased. “But what are you going to tell Mrs. Winterson on Monday?”

“I’ll tell her that I got sucked into a writer’s notebook with the writer himself and got to experience his stories first-hand. Only the stories are so vivid and wild that by the time we got out of them I was too exhausted to even think about homework.”

“You think she will believe you?”

“I’ll just tell her that Fabian took me for a wild trip out down trippy lane and left me too exhausted to do any homework. It’s all Fabian’s fault. Yeah, she’ll believe that. Maybe.”

Fabian said nothing. He just grinned.

“Hey, Fabe. I have a question about our adventure.”

“Shoot.”

“How come in your first story the Knobbs couldn’t see us, but in the merfolk and the half-human-half-alien-DNA story the characters know we’re there?”

Fabian exhaled. “Well…… you see, when the Knobbs couldn’t sense our presence, I thought the story was too boring for us. Safe, ‘cause they can’t hurt us, but boring. I mean, what’s the point if you can’t interact with your characters in the story? So in the back of my mind, I kinda wished that the characters in my other two stories would know we’re there, and they did.”

“In the back of your mind? You… you just… THOUGHT of something and it became real?”

“My stories materialise from not just what I put in my notebook, but how I want them to be in my head, too. Not every passing thought or idea I get finds its way into my notebook, y’know.”

“I see.”

“Great. So is that all? Then I’ll see you next week —”

“Wait. One more thing.”

Fabian stopped.

“I just want to say thank you for the adventure. For the experience. Even though we nearly died from being digested by an alien. Haha. I’m glad I could share this with you. And you know what? Your stories may be fantasy-based and not real, but they certainly aren’t fake. They can be real enough if you believe in them hard enough. And I know you do, Fabian. You’re a good writer for that. If anything is real about your writing, your TALENT is. If anyone dares to call you ‘Fakian’ or any bad name again you let me know, and I’ll teach them a thing or two about throwing books at and pushing around my best friend.”

Fabian glowed. If it weren’t his imagination he was sure a trail of water was running down his cheek. “Thanks, Charlie. You’re such a wonderful best friend. You go teach them bullies a lesson, alright. But be careful you don’t turn into a Knobb yourself!”