The Tooth Fairy Game

Luca lost his first tooth! There is nothing that can drag you out of thinking the world is going to hell in a hand basket like a six year old showing you a tiny, off white little tusk and telling you the tale.

"I thought I threw up some pretzel with no goopy part so I decided to just eat it but when I bit into the pretzel it was hard. It was my tooth!"

And then we began the game. Luca knows there is no Tooth Fairy. We know he knows there is no Tooth Fairy. But if you want to receive, you have to believe. And when Luca wants to convince us he believes in something to get money, he adopts a little baby voice.

“Can I wite a wedder to da Toof Fairy to see if she’ll wet me haf my toof?”

I swallowed a tiny bit of irritation and said of course. Luca also suggested that since this was his first lost tooth, he should get $10. Before I could stop myself, I loudly informed everyone that we got twenty five cents for teeth when I was a kid. My old man dadness hung in the air like humidity.

Eli laid it on thick, telling Luca that he had to go to bed early so the tooth fairy wouldn’t pass our house by. He then theatrically winked at me to let me know that he knew I knew he knew and Luca knew.

We sent Luca to take a bath and then went about the process of trying to find paper money in 2016. Miraculously, I found a crumpled $10 bill in my backpack. Luca called from the other room, “Did you say you had five dollars or ten dollars?”

The next morning, I was taking a shower and Luca burst in. He held a tiny little white piece of paper that was folded into tiny little envelope. Inside was a $10 bill and a little note written in tiny letters that looked a lot like my handwriting.

“What does it say, da-da?” Luca said in his little baby voice.

Dear Luca,

Magic is real.

Love,

The Tooth Fairy