The Truth About The Tooth Fairy

Last week my little girl - she’s eight - lost a tooth at school. She was all excited about it and showed it to me as soon as she got home. "I spit it out in class," she said, beaming. But what she was really excited about was the tooth fairy, who was going to blow into town that night and put a little extra padding under her pillow. My kids all like the tooth fairy. My son once asked me if I could pull all his teeth out so he could hit the Tooth Fairy Jackpot. He counted his teeth and figured that if he yanked them all out he’d have enough money to buy a Nintendo 64 game.

Anyway, my little girl was pretty excited about the impending visit from the tooth fairy. "I wonder what the rates are this year," she said, and pulled out her little Barbie-pink calculator and punched in some numbers.

I remember the very first time she lost a tooth. I remember it because the tooth fairy forgot to come. Now, just to be up front about it, you should know that there’s no such thing as the tooth fairy. Or if there is, he owes me a bundle because I’ve been covering for him for years. But for the purposes of this story I'm the tooth fairy. And the first time my little girl popped a tooth I forgot to put a handful of change under her pillow. She was pretty disappointed about it the next morning and I felt kind of bad about it, too. But I made a graceful recovery and told her that the tooth fairy, never having visited her before, probably got lost and would come the next night for sure. And he would leave more money, too, I assured her, on account of the mix-up.

Her eyes lit up and, sure enough, the tooth fairy showed up that night and has not missed an appointment ever since. Until one day last week, when he forgot again.

My little girl came downstairs for breakfast with her most recent tooth in her hand. "He forgot to come again," she said, and the disappointment rang clear in her voice like a bell. I decided it was time to tell her all about the tooth fairy. I sat her down and looked her in the eyes. "I’m the tooth fairy," I said, in a very serious voice. "It was me who forgot to take your tooth last night and it was me who didn’t leave any money under your pillow." Her eyes were very wide. "It was me all the time," I said. "All these years it was me who was the tooth fairy." Then I reached in my pocket and pulled out a shiny new loonie and gave it to her.

That night when she came home from school she was really excited. "You should see how many kids at school want to be my friend since I told them that my dad is the tooth fairy," she said.

Later that same night my mom phoned. Both my mom and dad are retired and they are going on a cruise someplace and she was pretty excited about it. This is the same mother that never went anywhere her whole life and now flies all over the world to anyplace that has a casino. I told her about how I was suddenly the most popular dad in school because my little girl's friends all figured I was the tooth fairy. "Well, honey," my mom said, "You didn’t want to stop believing in the tooth fairy, either. You were about eighteen when we told you about it and you were really disappointed." Then she told me how earlier that very day she had lost her teeth, too. They aren't real teeth, but it's still a neat coincidence.

"And I just got them, too," she said. "I get a new set every five years because the insurance company pays for them. So I got them and your father and I went out to celebrate. But my new teeth were hurting like crazy so I took them out in the car on the way home and put them in the glove compartment. I wrapped them in tissue paper and I left them in there overnight. I forgot all about them until this morning when I went to get them. Now - I've known your father for half a century and he’s never cleaned out the glove compartment in the car. So guess what he did this morning?"

"Cleaned out the glove compartment?"

"Can you believe it? We’re going on a cruise in four days and I don’t have any teeth. The insurance company won’t pay for another set for five more years. And even if they did, where would I get a set in four days?"

"Maybe you could get a used set somewhere," I said. "Or else you could look at a couple of those estate sales they advertise in the paper and maybe get a set that isn't - um - needed anymore." I tried to sound helpful.

After I hung up the phone I thought about teeth for a while and decided that it doesn’t matter how old you are. On some level we all need a tooth fairy.