Peter & Emily, The Girl From New York

by Thomas Hayes

Chapter Fourteen

  I looked away from Peter. My eyes darted over the grass, my mind trying to catch up with itself.

  “What? What are you talking about?”

  “Your name was Tinker Bell,” Peter said. “You used to live here, with us, in Never Land. You actually lived here sometimes, and sometimes in the village of the Lost Boys, and—”

  “No,” I said. I walked away. I had finally heard too much. Peter had finally gone too far. I could deal with him bringing me here, I could deal with him putting me in danger. I could deal with his crazy stories about pirates. But now? Now he was lying to me. “No.” I waved my arms as I walked. The fairies fluttered off, frightened. “I’m not going to listen to this.”

  “It’s the truth,” Peter said. “I was supposed to…I should have told you earlier.”

  “Stop it,” I said. “Just stop it.” I walked toward the edge of the plateau. I didn’t know where I was going; I just knew I didn’t want to be anywhere near Peter or the others.

  As I walked by Wes, he touched my arm. “Emily, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. That wasn’t how—”

  I held up my hand. I kept walking. I walked into a small grouping of trees and left the others behind.

  “You better go talk to her,” Wes said.

  “No,” Tiger Lily replied. “Leave her be for a moment.”

  Away from the fairy village, away from the others, I reached the plateau’s edge—essentially a cliff. It was quiet there, looking over the ocean. The moonlight shone off the water, and the only sound I could hear was the waves lapping against the shore below me.

  I sat down in the grass. My entire body was shaking. I took a deep breath. Where was I? What was this place? How was any of this possible? It was like Peter’s lies had fully shook me back to reality. What had I done? Were my parents looking for us? Were they worried? Did they know we were gone? How were Tim and I going to get home? How long were we stuck here?

  Why was Peter lying to me? Why were all of them lying to me? It was all so stupid. It was all so…

  I broke down and cried. I sat on the cliff, with my face in my hands. I hadn’t cried like that in a long time, not since my grandmother died. But now, it was all too much. I could handle it before, and it was actually weirdly fun, in a scary kind of way, because I thought I was with people who would protect me. But now, they were lying to me. I realized how much danger I had put Tim and myself in, just by coming here.

  Catching my breath—or at least attempting to—I knew I needed to get it together. The only way Tim and I were going to get home was by me taking control and getting back to the village of the Lost Boys. As much as my head was spinning, I needed to get back to Tim, by myself if I had to, so we could get out of this place.

  Who could help me? Who could help me get back to the Lost Boys? Tell me the way? The fairies. After all, I was the only one they had gathered around. If I went back to their village, and told them I needed help, I bet they would…

  But wait. Why had they only gathered around me? Why had they flew so fast out of their village? They seemed so…happy.

  I heard a noise behind me. Three of the fairies—a blue one, a red one, and a green one—fluttered in place near a couple of trees. They were close enough so I could see their faces. They were watching me, but when they noticed I had seen them, they looked away. The red one flew back toward the fairy village.

  “No, wait,” I said. I remembered how I had batted them away. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t angry at you.”

  The blue fairy flew toward me. The others still kept their distance.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to frighten you. I shouldn’t have done that.”

  The three fairies looked at each other, then flew over to me in a group. When they got closer, I heard the twinkling again. It was quite a pretty sound.

  The green fairy and red fairy landed softly—and nervously—on my right shoulder. The blue fairy flew around and hovered in front of my face. I realized it was the one I had seen up close earlier. Holding out my hand, I offered it as a place for her to land. But when I moved, she flew backwards, and the two on my shoulder jumped, startled.

  “No,” I laughed. “I’m not going to hurt you. I was just a little scared. But I’m not anymore. I was just mad at Peter.”

  The green and red fairies settled on my shoulder again and the blue one flew closer.

  “I know you were just trying to greet me,” I said. “I wasn’t a very grateful guest.”

  The blue fairy chuckled. She shrugged as if to say, “It’s okay.”

  The two fairies on my shoulder whispered to each other. I couldn’t understand them; it almost sounded like musical notes.

  The blue fairy hovered in front of me.

  “Do you know me?” I asked.

  She nodded, smiling.

  “How?” I still didn’t believe Peter’s story, but maybe these fairies could shed some light on the situation.

  The blue fairy rubbed her chin, thinking. Then she reached to her belt, pulling out a small scroll tucked there. She quickly drew on it with a little pencil. When she was done, she showed it to me; she had drawn a circular clock. She pointed at me, then at the clock, waving her arm back and forth in big motions.

  “You knew me a long time ago?” I asked.

  The blue fairy nodded excitedly. The other fairies on my shoulder laughed. This was just too weird.

  “How long ago?” I asked.

  The blue fairy thought, then drew on the scroll again. It took her a moment, and she looked at the paper for a few seconds, making sure it was what she wanted to show me. Then, she turned it toward me.

  It was a pencil drawing of a tiny, blonde-haired fairy with a long ponytail, sitting on the bow of a pirate ship. She wore a sundress with flowers on it.

  She looked just like me.

  I heard another noise, and turned to see Peter emerging from the same trees the fairies had.

  “Were they able to tell you anything?” he asked. “They insisted on coming to see you.”

  I didn’t look at him. “Sit down. Start talking. I can’t promise I’m going to believe you, but start talking.”

  Peter sat. He never looked at me; he simply stared at the dirt and nervously played with a twig in his hands. It took him a long time before he spoke.

  “You used to live here,” he said. “You were a fairy, and you lived on this island with the rest of the fairies. Your name was Tinker Bell. You were their leader, really—everyone knew that Tinker Bell was the bravest and strongest of all the fairies, and the one to go see if you needed anything. All of the fairies looked up to you. Many people in Never Land looked up to you.

  “And you and I…we were best friends. We were best friends for as long as I can remember. From the very first day I came to Never Land, you found me and we became best friends.”

  I looked to Peter, shocked.

  “We were constant companions. Everywhere you went, I went, and everywhere I went, there you were. Everyone knew we were a team. Together—you and I—we fought off Hook so many times, I can’t even count. I can’t even remember how many times you and I saved Never Land.” He chuckled. “I think towards the end, Hook was even more scared of you than he was of me. He knew you were the one not to mess with.”

  I thought back to the train, when I had first encountered Hook. He hadn’t recognized me, so that didn’t make sense. Yet, I kept listening. I didn’t want Peter to stop talking.

  “But then, you had a way of…” Peter thought a moment. “You had a way of getting jealous. Of other people I hung around with. Like girls.”

  I laughed through my nose. This was taking yet another ridiculous turn.

  “I’m not saying you were—well, I guess you were. I don’t know. I had no idea. I was bloody eleven most of the time I knew you. And you were a fairy. But at first, it was Tiger Lily. You tolerated her, but you could get feisty sometimes. Then the real trouble started when Wendy came to Never Land.”

  Wendy. The
girl I was there to supposedly help Peter save. I thought back to Peter’s treehouse. There was definitely a room there for a girl, so I figured this Wendy was a real person, at least.

  “You hated her right from the beginning. Really hated her. I had never seen you like that. When she was living with us in the village of the Lost Boys, you were almost uncontrollable, because you were so angry. Your jealousy got us in a lot of trouble, to be honest.

  “And then, when I left to go live with Wendy in the World of the Grown-Ups, I never told you. I didn’t tell anyone, but I especially didn’t want to tell you. I didn’t want you to find out I was leaving. I know that’s a terrible thing, because we were best friends. It’s an awful thing. The most awful thing I ever did. No one should ever do something like that and not tell their best friend. But I was eleven. I didn’t know any better. And I was awfully afraid of you.”

  “I wish you still were afraid of me,” I said. “Then maybe you wouldn’t have gotten me wrapped up in this mess.”

  Peter laughed. He finally looked at me. “Oh, believe me, I’m still afraid of you. I’m more afraid of you now than ever. You’re my size. You used to slap me around back when we got in arguments when you were a fairy, I don’t even want to know how bad you’d beat me up now.”

  I shook my head. Peter noticed the look on my face.

  “Are you believing anything I’m telling you?”

  “I don’t know. I honestly have no idea. Just when I thought this couldn’t get any more bizarre. And just when I thought you were done telling me crazy stories.”

  “I know, but it’s all true. I don’t know how I can prove it to you. You’re not believing me at all?”

  “Well, I want you to keep talking, if that means anything. Let’s say any of this is real—is that why you brought me here?”

  “Yes. I knew we needed you back here. To face Hook.”

  There was one thing Peter hadn’t explained; the one thing that made the least sense out of any of this.

  “But if this is true, how did I end up living in New York?”

  Peter looked to the dirt again.

  “Well, you know how I left Never Land for a few years? To go live with Wendy and her family?”

  “Yes.”

  “When I came back, no one wanted to talk to me. No one wanted to look at me. Everyone hated me. I had left without telling anyone, and when I came back, I was a teenager. And I had brought other teenagers back with me. I didn’t blame everyone for being mad, but I honestly didn’t think they would be that mad.

  “It took a long time, but eventually the Lost Boys at least let me live with them again. You, though? You refused to ever speak to me. You told anyone that would listen—you had a fairy bring this message to the Lost Boys—that if you ever saw me again, it would be a war. The fairies would go to war with the Lost Boys. You barred me from ever stepping foot on the Island of the Fairies, and as many times as I tried to send you messages or ask you to meet me, you wouldn’t hear it. For years and years, I never saw you, or heard from you. You made it very clear you didn’t want to be friends again, to say the least.”

  A moment passed.

  “Years went on. Eventually, there was almost no contact between the Lost Boys and the fairies. You and the others secluded yourselves from almost everyone, living in Hook’s old ship. It was like because I had betrayed you, you would never trust anyone again, except for other fairies.

  “But, every once in a while, Mike—the leader of the Lost Boys—was allowed to make a trip to the Island of the Fairies to trade for fairy dust, when we needed it. Because you guys needed stuff we had, too. That was the only time any Lost Boy ever saw a fairy. And, on one of those trips, 17 years ago, when Mike went to trade with the fairies, they were in a panic.

  “They let Mike onto the island, and they explained what had happened. A witch had visited them, from another land—the same witch that later gave Hook his powers. This witch went to the island, and asked specifically for you.

  “She told you she could make you human. So that you could finally be the same as me. The same size as me, and human like me. So that we wouldn’t be different anymore. For nothing in return, she said she would grant you that wish, if you wanted it. She told you she knew for years and years that you were…”

  “I was what?”

  “In love with me. And she also knew it could never be, because you were a fairy. But, if you wanted, she said, she could make you human, just like that.” Peter snapped his fingers. “She said she could do it, right there. So maybe you and I could be together.”

  I was in love with him? I opened my mouth to say that was foolish, but then I stopped. Really, why was this any different from anything Peter had told me, and shown me, in Never Land? And the way he was telling his story—he had never paused, or faltered, once. If he was making this up, he was doing a damn good job, that’s for sure.

  “But it was a trick,” Peter said. “If you or the other fairies knew what the witch was capable of, you never would have listened to her. But at the time, nobody knew. The witch hadn’t made herself known yet in Never Land, she hadn’t given Hook his powers. As far as you and the fairies knew, she was telling the truth.

  “So, you said yes. You didn’t even really need to think about it. It was what you always wanted. And, just like that, she made you human. In an instant and a puff of smoke, you were no longer a fairy. But…”

  “What was the trick?”

  “She turned you human. But you were a baby. An infant. No more than 6 months old. And then, with a laugh, the witch left. Took off, and left the fairies with a baby.

  “The fairies went into a panic. Not only did they not know how to take care of a baby, but you were their leader. You were everything to them, you were the one who they looked to for guidance. Now you were gone, with a quick spell, all of a sudden.

  “Mike from the Lost Boys showed up only a couple hours after the witch turned you human. Normally, the fairies would have never let a Lost Boy that far onto their island, but they didn’t know what else to do. They told him what happened, and with no other choice, they told him to go get me.

  “He came back to the village of the Lost Boys, and I went with him to the fairies. They led us through the trees, and into your house. Sure enough, there you were, lying in a little bed of leaves and moss that the fairies had made for you. A six-month-old baby, happy as a clam.

  “I knew it was you. As soon as you smiled at me and Mike, I knew it was you. I knew from your smile. It was the saddest thing I ever saw. My best friend Tink, turned into a baby, who couldn’t talk back to me or laugh with me or go on any more adventures with me. It was the saddest thing I ever saw.”

  Peter stopped talking. I watched him carefully. There were tears in his eyes.

  “So what…” I didn’t know what to say. “What did you do?”

  “I knew right away what I had to do. There was no undoing the spell. Not anytime soon, anyway. No one on Never Land knew any magic. The witch had left. And we couldn’t wait around to see if she would come back or something. You were a little baby; at the moment you were happy, but I knew at least a little about babies. I knew you would need food—food that we didn’t have. You would need a real bed and diapers and someone to take care of you and love you. You needed an adult. You needed a mother.

  “So, I flew with you to the World of the Grown-Ups. I went to America. New York. I’m not sure why. I had too much history with London, I guess. I took you there, and I walked right into the first hospital I found. I told them I had a baby that needed to be adopted. They looked at me like I was crazy, obviously, because a seventeen-year-old kid had just walked in holding this little baby. Before they could ask too many questions, I ran out. I ran out, and flew up onto the rooftops.

  “Later that night, when I was sure not too many people were around, I went back into the hospital. I looked around until I found the nursery, and there you were, with a few other babies. You had new pajamas on, and you were nice and w
arm, in a little crib. You were safe, and there were grown-ups around. So I knew I had done the right thing.”

  I thought it over. I ran through the details in my head. I knew I had been adopted when I was around six months old. I knew the adoption agency had no idea who my parents were. I knew that someone mysterious had dropped me off at the hospital. I knew it had been a minor story in the New York papers and on the Internet at the time, that a mystery baby had been found in New York. I shivered, goosebumps running down my arms. Most of what Peter was saying…most of it lined up with what I knew about my adoption.

  “After only a little while, you got adopted, and it was by a really rich couple who I knew would take care of you. I would have made sure, though. I would have made sure, with everything I had, that whoever adopted you was good people—people who would love you the most. I would have done that for you. I would have done anything for you.”

  A silence. I was having a hard time breathing. Could any of this be true? I hadn’t believed a word of it before, not even when the fairy had made the pencil drawing of me. But now, with what Peter had told me…why couldn’t it be true? I felt light-headed, and my heart was pounding. I knew Never Land was a real place; I had been there long enough to know that. And I knew there were mermaids and a half-mechanical pirate and floating islands. And I knew it was fairly easy to travel to Never Land from New York. What was freaking me out most of all, though, was that I knew there were fairies. I had just seen a few dozen. Heck, I had just talked with one of them.

  Why couldn’t Peter’s story be true? There was a chance—a good chance—that he was telling the truth.

  “I stopped going to New York after that,” Peter said, “because I knew you were being taken care of. And you were, that was the best part. Your mom and dad were the greatest. You had the best life. It had been many years since I went to New York, but then, when Hook returned and started capturing the people of Never Land, I knew I—”

  “Peter!” someone shouted. I spun around. Tiger Lily burst through the forest and onto the cliff. Her eyes were wide.

  “What is it?” Peter asked.

  “He’s done it,” Tiger Lily said. “He’s finally done it. Hook’s attacked the Island of the Lost Boys.”