“Yes.”
She handed me the paper.
The wish contained eight words:
I wish Dad will always be my fairy.
That was all.
She had not asked to be cured.
She had not asked for more days, fewer needles, or a guarantee no doctor could give.
She wanted the man beneath the costume to remain reachable.
I had spent months becoming harder because hardness felt useful. I spoke to doctors, managed medication, repaired things, handled bills, and refused to cry where Ellie might see.
She feared that if treatment ended—one way or another—the gentle version of me would disappear with the fairy costume.
I lowered myself onto one knee.
“What does always mean?”
“Even when you’re old.”
“Fairies don’t get old.”
“You already are.”
Fair point.
“Even when I don’t wear the wings?”
“You have to wear them sometimes.”
“Define sometimes.”
“Birthdays. Bad hospital days. If I ask.”
“And glitter?”
“Always glitter.”
I looked toward Lena.
She was crying without hiding.
I returned my attention to Ellie.
“Until my last breath.”
She held out her little finger.
I linked mine around it.
The club brothers watched through the glass. None heard the wish, but they saw the promise.
Later, I told them.
Mack removed his sunglasses inside the hospital corridor and wiped both eyes. Rico pretended glitter had entered his. Owen looked toward Ellie’s room and said the only words that mattered.
“Then we help you keep it.”
The third wish belonged to me.
Not because I had granted it.
Because it would never be finished.
Ellie completed that treatment cycle.
Her recovery was slow. Several complications delayed her return home, and the word remission did not enter our conversations for months.
I kept the costume.
The wings hung inside my motorcycle garage beside leather jackets and riding gear. Glitter remained trapped in the seams. The plastic crown cracked along one side after I accidentally sat on it.
Ellie repaired it with silver tape.
On difficult hospital days, she requested the fairy.
Sometimes I wore the entire costume.
Sometimes she accepted only the crown and wand.
The Iron Lantern Riders became involved despite claiming they had dignity to protect. Mack wore green wings during a blood draw. Rico appeared in a pink cape after Ellie caught him saying fairies were not his job.
Children from nearby rooms noticed.