Forever Neverland Read online

  That place, with its endless beaches, native villages, and thick forests, had reminded her a lot of home.

  But anyway – this world was honestly far from boring.

  Still, it was no use arguing with Peter when he was in one of his moods. And his mood was growing darker by the second.

  “I agree,” Tinkerbell said, her bottom lip turning out in her patented pout. “It’s awful here. Let’s go back.”

  Peter was silent for a long while. And then he sighed again and turned to face her. “I can’t. I keep trying, I swear. I tried again last night. But I’m stuck here.” He shook his head and ran a hand through his shaggy blonde hair. “I can feel that my promise still binds me.”

  “But the Lost Boys are all fine, Pete,” Tink said, shaking her head. “They all have homes now.” Her brow was furrowed and her hands found her hips. “So, why are you still bound by this promise of yours?”

  Peter blinked. And then he shrugged. “To tell the truth, I don’t know, Tink. I don’t know what’s holding me here. I vowed to make certain that Neverland’s children were okay before I went back. And they seem to be okay…” His expression became one of stark frustration. “So, why can’t I leave?” His hand was balled in a fist and in a sudden fit of fury that was very like Peter Pan, he turned and swung his fist toward the window in front of him.

  Luckily for him – and for the window – Tink had grown used to Peter’s temper tantrums, and she easily caught his arm before his hand was able to connect with the glass. She was inhumanly strong, being a pixie. Otherwise, she would not have been able to stop him. He was now nineteen, after all, and no longer as small as he once was. He’d grown quite strong, himself.

  “Calm down. We need to figure this out.” Tinkerbell released his arm and turned to pace across the room. She chewed on her lip. “We just need to think…” She was quiet for a minute and then she stopped in her tracks and looked up. “Are you absolutely sure all of the Lost Boys are okay?”

  Peter nodded. “Loving parents, warm beds, school rooms and healthy food and all that nonsense.” He made a face as if disgusted by the thought. “Yes,” he finished. “They’re all fine. Happy, anyway.”

  Tinkerbell shook her head, her hands on her hips once more. “Then this just makes no sense.” She blew out a sigh and walked over to a purse that was hanging on a hook on the wall. As she pulled the purse off of the hook, the hook gleamed, reflecting some distant light streaming through the window. It gave her pause. She studied it for a moment and shuddered. Then, with a determined set of her jaw, she shook off the strange feeling that had overcome her and looked away.

  Tinkerbell turned back toward Peter and put the purse strap over her shoulder. “This world is a curse. I can’t think anymore without this horrible human caffeine stuff they have,” she huffed. “I’m going to Starbucks,” the fairy said. “Wanna come?”

  Peter rolled his eyes, but he was already moving for his leather jacket, which also hung on a hook on the wall. Tinkerbell had made the jacket for him. Using fairy magic, she made everything they needed to survive in the human world, including the house they currently lived in.

  Peter Pan shrugged on his coat and then followed Tinkerbell out the door. “Tink, why don’t you just magic up some coffee? It’s cold outside.”

  “You never used to mind the cold, Peter,” Tinkerbell said over her shoulder. “Besides, this is more fun.” She skillfully jumped over a fallen log on their private, woodland path and then stepped out of the forest and onto a sidewalk.

  Peter’s gaze narrowed at the back of Tinkerbell’s head. “You just like it when the boys flirt with you.” He followed her onto the sidewalk, leaving their secret path behind.

  “Why Peter,” Tink smiled. “Are you jealous?”

  “I never get jealous,” Peter insisted. “That’s a grownup emotion.”

  At that, Tinkerbell blinked. “You look older, you know.” She took in his broad shoulders and the stubble of hair that shadowed his chin. “You’ve aged in this world.” And that’s an understatement, she thought.

  Peter said nothing, but his green eyes flashed and his glare became a scowl.

  “Maybe you can feel a grownup emotion after all, Pete.” Tinkerbell laughed and it sounded like pixie dust. And then she whirled around and skipped briskly down the street. Peter grudgingly followed.

  Chapter Two

  Wendy had long since managed to dry her tears by the time she’d walked all the way to Michael’s school. It was one of her many jobs, as an older sister, to pick Michael up every afternoon and walk him home.

  Today, despite its horridness and humiliation, was unfortunately no exception. So, Wendy put on her best face for her little brother and smiled when he came running through the front door.

  “Wendy! Did you finish it?”

  Wendy blanched. “Umm. . . “.she stammered. “No, Michael. I didn’t have a chance to write today, after all. My teachers gave me boatloads of homework.”

  Michael’s face fell, but it was obvious that he tried to hide his disappointment. “That’s okay,” he shrugged. “Want some Sour Patch candies?” He held out a clear plastic bag filled with sugarcoated, gummy people.

  Wendy shook her head. “No thanks. They sting my tongue. But I’ll buy you a cocoa if you want.”

  Michael shrugged again. He was still trying to hide his disappointment. “Anything’s better than going home and putting up with Dr. John.”

  At this, Wendy smiled, somewhat bitterly, and hooked her arm in her brother’s. As they began walking away, the school doors opened once more behind them. A hand full of boys filed out into the play yard. “Hey, Darling boy!” one called out.

  Wendy froze, bringing them both to halt.

  “Gotta get big sis to walk you home ‘cuz you’re such a darling little baby!”

  Wendy’s jaw tightened. Slowly, she turned around, letting go of Michael’s arm. Darling is such an unfortunate last name for a boy, she thought to herself. It was fine for her – but for her brothers. . . . Not so much. The only reason John didn’t get teased the way Michael did was because John was in an extra special school for extra smart kids – and because he had grown up big, like his father.

  Michael, on the other hand, was still a rather small child. And utterly unlike any other ten-year-old boy Wendy had ever known. Where most boys that age were filled with a wrestling rage and foul language, Michael was calm and gentle. Inquisitive and quiet. The only thing he ever asked Wendy for was her stories.

  She couldn’t bear that he was the brunt of other boys’ cruelty. “I’m sorry,” she said, softly so that the boys on the other end of the playground would have to be very quiet to hear her. “I’m afraid I didn’t quite catch that. Can you come closer and repeat it?”

  Michael tugged gently on her sleeve, but she ignored him. Her gray eyes held storm clouds and a hurricane was coming.

  The boys fidgeted for a moment, unsure of exactly what to do. Then the one who considered himself to be their leader rolled his shoulders back and strode closer to Wendy and Michael.

  “Your brother is a retard,” he hissed at her, showing incredible and stupid bravery by speaking this way to someone seven years his senior. “Tell your parents to put him in the remedial program before he stupids-up everyone around him.”

  Wendy’s lip twitched and her lovely face became an impassive mask, utterly belying the tempest raging behind her thunder-gray eyes. “But, little boy, if I did that, then the two of you would be together all the time. Is that really what you want?”

  The boy’s features went slack for a moment as he tried to figure out what that meant. And then they twisted with fury, his cheeks turning an embarrassing, bright red. At once, as if no longer able to control his actions, the boy lurched forward, his right arm drawn back in a readied punch.

  To Wendy’s astonishment, just as she had been preparing to pummel the boy with her own fists and teach him a lesson, it was Michael, and not her, who met the foul child in hand-to-hand co
mbat. With a cry of rage, Michael lunged forward, blocked the boy’s punch, and threw one of his own. His knuckles connected solidly with the boy’s jaw and before Wendy really knew what was happening, they were both on the ground, and Michael was sitting on the boy’s waist, hitting him again and again.

  “Don’t you ever touch my sister!” Michael screamed, as his fists rained down on his enemy’s face.

  “Michael, stop!” Wendy hurriedly bent and tried to grab his flailing arms. It was difficult work, as for a ten-year-old, he was quite strong. But, eventually she managed to pull her brother off of the other boy, who was now sobbing and spitting blood.

  As luck, or the absence of luck, would have it, it was at that moment that the school’s front doors once more opened and two teachers came running out onto the playground, several ten-year-old boys following closely behind. The boys were grinning maliciously and it was clear, now, that as soon as the fight had begun, they had gone back inside for help.

  For the second time that afternoon, Wendy’s pirate ship heart sank. For, she knew that the arrival of the teachers could really mean only one thing. Her parents would be notified of this fight. And she highly doubted that Michael, who technically threw the first punch, would be found innocent of guilt.

  Wendy grimaced as the teachers approached – one woman and one man.

  “Well! Miss Darling! Of all the things!” The woman huffed as her companion helped the bleeding boy off of the ground.

  “What is the meaning of this?” the male teacher asked then, his expression grim.

  “I didn’t do anyshing!” the boy wailed, his speech slightly slurred. “He punthed me firsh!” The boy pointed a scraped finger at Michael and glared through his tears.

  “Really!” the female teacher exclaimed again, apparently unable to speak beneath a certain volume. “Is this true, Michael?” She turned a scrutinous eye on Wendy’s brother.

  Michael glared back at the teacher. She blinked. He nodded. Once.

  “Well, we’ll just see what your father has to say about this, Mr. Darling!”

  The male teacher said nothing, but threw an exasperated look at Michael, and then at Wendy, before he helped the boy walk back across the playground to the school doors. The other teacher followed them, walking briskly and with purpose. Wendy watched them go as a numbness climbed up her limbs and into her heart.

  “I’m not sorry.” Michael said softly. Wendy looked down at her little brother. He was rubbing his hands gingerly. She gently took his right hand and peered at it more closely. The knuckles were scraped and reddened. She sighed and looked him in the eyes.

  “I’m not sorry, Wendy,” he repeated.

  Wendy nodded. “Let’s go home.” The two walked the remainder of the way home wrapped in a synchronized silence that was filled to the brim with words left unspoken.

  That night, while Peter Pan slept a fitful sleep, Tinkerbell left their little house in the woods and regained her tiny winged form so that she could fly. The fairy missed flying. In Neverland, she had flown everywhere. It was the way of the pixies. To become human-like was to lose a bit of magic, and so her people never took human form in Neverland. Instead, they remained small and used their wings and their dust.

  But here. . . . Well, in this world, flitting about as a fairy was dangerous. She could get swatted flat like a fly or batted about like a bee. Or worse. She could end up squished on the windshield of a human locomotive.

  She shuddered at the thought.

  Still, Tinkerbell missed the freedom that being a fairy was all about. And so, every once in a while, she turned back into a pixie and soared through the night. She had learned, over the years, to keep a watchful eye out for owls and to stay away from the ground, where cats and other predators would eat her like an insect. She had also learned to stay out of human sight, for a bright, twinkling light streaking through the sky was a very strange thing for them to see. And humans did not treat strange things very well.

  Now, Tink sighed a satisfied sigh and raced beneath branches and over boughs. Eventually, she reached the edge of the small copse of woods that she and Peter lived in, and she chanced a peek out into the adjoining street. There was no one coming. It was late; all of the humans were in their homes, asleep or close to it.

  She smiled and flew out into the street. She hovered for a moment as she decided where to go next and then she made her way down the sidewalks and neighborhood alleys, appearing, for all the world, like a tiny piece of fallen star.

  Tinkerbell flew in this manner for several hours, basking in the cool night air that chilled her smiling face and danced around her wings.

  And then, quite suddenly, she stopped.

  She froze in midair, looking from side-to-side, wondering what had made her so unexpectedly want to pause. Something felt not quite right. It was like a tingle at the back of her tiny neck and the faint hint of music that she couldn’t quite make out.

  Tink turned slowly in place, taking in her surroundings. She was in an alleyway between two tall houses. One house was dark, its windows shuttered, its people asleep.

  But light streamed from the windows of the other.

  On a whim, Tink chanced a closer peek. She flew to the first level and landed daintily on the sill of what appeared to be the largest window. There was a crack in the curtains on the other side. Tink leaned over and peered inside.

  Chapter Three

  The numbness that had crept over Wendy earlier that day had, by now, enveloped her completely. She sat still as a statue on the couch in their family room while her father raged and John paced and Michael stared at the floor. Her mother, too, sat still, but her eyes were on her husband and her expression was a mixture of weary concern and plain old weariness.

  “This has gone too far. It’s gone beyond too far. I am at my wit’s end with you two. It was bad enough before, but now you’re fighting with your classmates? What will you do tomorrow? Skip school? Rob a convenience store?”

  “George!” Wendy’s mother interjected, but George Darling shook his head stubbornly.

  “You know I’m right, Mary. One evil deed always leads to another, does it not?”

  “George, I should hardly call this evil-”

  “Call it what you like, it’s wrong.” Wendy’s father insisted. “Fighting in the school yard is for ruffians who grow up to spend most of their lives in prison. Not for children like you!” George whirled on Michael, who still stared at the floor.

  The room was silent for a moment.

  And then Wendy’s other brother, John, cleared his throat. “If you want my opinion-”

  “We don’t,” Wendy and Michael both replied. They gazed at their brother. John Darling stood stock still where he’d ceased pacing. He was the same height as his tall father and had the same blue eyes and black hair. But where as his father’s expression held more than intelligence, John’s seem to contain only intelligence. Wisdom and experience, it lacked. This made his face somewhat uncomfortable to behold. At least, Wendy and Michael thought so.

  “Michael,” Mary Darling spoke again, her calm voice like a balm on the raw nerves of everyone in the room.

  Michael looked up to meet her gaze. She smiled at him. It was an ever gentle smile, the kind that only mothers can produce. And Mary Darling was a very good mother.

  “Michael, you haven’t told us what happened yet. Would you care to explain your side?”

  Mrs. Darling’s suggestion was so logical and patient that George Darling could only blink in the wake of it. Why hadn’t he allowed his son to explain? That made so much sense, didn’t it? Perhaps he had a good reason for pummeling another boy bloody. . . .

  And that, Mr. Darling reasoned, was why he hadn’t bothered asking for an explanation. There were only so many times you could hit someone before it simply became too much. And Michael had crossed that line today with a hurdle.

  “He tried to hit Wendy.”

  Again, the room was quiet. Only this time, both John and George Darling
stood with their jaws dropped open, their eyes wide as golf balls.

  Mary Darling’s brow furrowed. “What?” she asked, in disbelief.

  “He was teasing and Wendy gave him a taste of his own medicine,” Michael continued, his voice very quiet. “So, he tried to hit her.”

  John stuttered, “S-s-o - you hit him instead?”

  Michael looked up and met his brother’s gaze head-on. “Yes,” he said, simply.

  John blinked, as did Mary and George. The living room lapsed into a stunned silence once more. And then, delicately, Mary Darling cleared her throat. “John,” she began, nodding at her older son. “Wendy,” she continued, nodding at her daughter in turn. “Could you two please give us a moment alone with Michael?”

  Wendy stood slowly and placed a reassuring hand on Michael’s shoulder. He didn’t move and he didn’t look up, but she knew it had comforted him, nonetheless. Then she turned and walked out of the room. John hesitated momentarily and then followed her out. Behind them, Michael and his parents began to converse in hushed tones.

  John closed in behind Wendy, securely shutting the kitchen door behind them. “This is all your fault,” he hissed at her once they were out of ear shot.

  Wendy turned on him, her eyes a steely gray. At first, she said nothing. Then her gaze narrowed and she stood straighter, coming to face him fully. “What, John? Exactly what is my fault?”

  Neither of them noticed the brief flash of a tiny speck of light in the corner of the kitchen window.

  “This mess you’ve gotten Michael into. You’ve turned him into a mindless toy with your foolish stories. You’ve pulled him into your make-believe world so that he can’t face the truth and get over it like I have. Why must you insist on hurting him in this way?” His voice had lowered into an angry hiss.