Story: The magical ointment

(Ointment: Pixabay)

There was a nurse named Mary. She was thirty-nine years old and lived by herself in a small town house. She wasn’t married because she loved her job more than anything and always put it before anyone. There was a time when she was dating a guy but she never had time for him. She worked at a nearby hospital so she was always working and if she weren’t working she would be on call.

One day she was walking home from work and noticed a man running from door to door. He was knocking but it was late at night so people were sleeping. He was yelling, “Can someone help! My wife is pregnant and I think she is having the baby now!”

Mary finally got closer to him and heard what he was saying. She immediately ran to him and said, “I can help. I’m a nurse. Where is she?”

“Follow me this way. We just live down the street,” he replied.

They both ran quickly to the house. The house was small and nearly hidden behind a huge willow tree. When they got inside, they found the wife locked in the bathroom. “Honey, open the door. I found help and she’s a nurse,” he said to his wife.

She wasn’t responding, so they both knocked the door down. They found the wife lying next to the bathtub with the baby in her arms. It was a little boy. Mary quickly asked if she was okay. “Why didn't you go to the hospital?”

“We can’t go to the hospital,” the wife replied.

Mary was confused but she didn’t bother to ask why because she didn’t want them to feel uncomfortable. The wife handed Mary the baby and asked if she could take the ointment on the table and rub it on the baby’s eyelid. “Sure!” Mary replied. As she rubbed it on the baby’s eyelid, she noticed the baby opening his eyes. Since she was a nurse, she knew much about medicine but she had never seen this type of ointment before.

Mary’s curiosity led her to apply the ointment on to one of her eyelids. As she looked up, she noticed how things changed. The house did not seem small anymore. The furniture in the house was finer and the wife had on a dress made of silk. It was like she was in a totally different house. As she handed the baby back to the mother she did not say word.

The husband thanked Mary and explained that this was their first child so he did not know what to do and was scared. “I’m glad I can help!” replied Mary.

Mary finally went home. She didn’t think much about the ointment because as she went home everything looked the same again.

The very next day she went to the market. As she was browsing around, she noticed a man in disguise. He had a hood on and was slipping the vegetables into the big bag he was carrying. He looked very familiar and Mary finally realized that it was the man the day before that she had helped.

“Hi there, how’s the baby and mother doing?” Mary asked him.

He gave her a confused look and replied, “They’re doing just fine. Wait, you can see me? How?”

Mary laughed to herself as she was wondering why he would ask that. Soon enough she thought to herself, “the ointment.”

“When I was applying the ointment to the baby’s eyelid, I was curious and applied it to one of my eyelids,” Mary explained.

The ointment was some magical ointment that gave them the power to see things. To see things they weren’t supposed to see, but most importantly, to see people they weren’t supposed to see. It was like a totally different world.

The man was afraid that she would go and tell people about the things she had seen, so he wanted to make her blind. But she was the one who had helped him when he needed help, so he could not do this evil thing.

“We must undo this. Come back with me to my house,” the man said.

They both went back to his house and he made an herb remedy for her. “When this is cool, rinse your eye with it three times and this should undo what it has done.”

Mary listened to him and when she got home she did just what he said. She didn’t know if it had worked or not and had several questions to ask so she went back to the house. As she walked down the street, she could not find the house. She saw the big willow tree but there was no house behind it. Mary was so confused and it finally hit her that the remedy worked. The herbal remedy reversed what the ointment had done. Now she is not able to see the little family that she had helped because they are from a different world than her. It is probably for the best!

Being a nurse, Mary was exposed to many different types of people but this time it was totally different. It is something she will never forget and this is why she loves her job.

(Willow tree:Pixabay)

Author’s note: After reading the story, “Fairy Ointment,” I was inspired to write this one. I really liked the story and the events that took place so I kept my story similar to it. I liked how the main character was a nurse. I think it fits very well with the story because I feel like nurses encounter so many different types of people on a daily basis. One thing I did change was the ending. In the story, after applying the ointment to her eyelid, the nurse was able to see the man when she was not supposed to. He then struck her in the eye and made her blind in that eye forever. In my story, he made an herbal remedy for her to undo what the ointment had done. He would have made her blind if she was just a random person but since she had helped him he couldn’t do such an evil thing. I also added the big willow tree and the house in the story. After the nurse used the herbal remedy, she wasn’t able to see the house behind the willow tree anymore. In this part, I want the readers to come up with their own thoughts about who the little family was. Some people may say they are spirits or ghosts.  

My overall goal was to show the different things nurses see and the different people they help. 

Bibliography: English Fairy Tales by Joseph Jacobs. Web source