Forever Neverland

by Susan Adrian

  —

  Some of the food for the Feast is invisible.

  No one else mentions this, or even seems to think it’s strange. There are platters of fruit—mangoes, which I won’t even touch because they’re slimy, and pineapple, oranges, and bananas. There’s a big platter of fish that the mermaids contributed, roasted over the fire, and a plate of bite-size honey cakes the pixies brought. Clover asks Shoe why the mermaids would eat fish, when they’re “part fish,” but Shoe explains that they’re not fish at all. They’re a separate species.

  I knew that already. They’re Nereids. Clover should have asked me.

  There’s a bowl of boiled eggs, tiny eggs with shells that are slightly blue or slightly brown.

  Everything is served on hollowed-out slabs of wood. The jugs of juice are made out of hardened mud or clay, except for one glass one, filled with a pink liquid.

  Then there are three platters, mixed in with the others, that are just empty.

  We line up, smaller wood slabs in our hands, to take some food, and I stop at the first empty one.

  “Make sure to try the beast!” Jumper says. She pretends to take some with her hands, like she’s doing improvisation. We do that at the Autism Center sometimes. They say it helps to visualize things before you see them for real.

  I frown and look at Clover behind me. She shrugs. “There’s invisible food in the book, too,” she whispers. “Just pretend.”

  I don’t want to. It seems wrong, silly. But I reach out and act like I’m picking some meat up with my hand. A drumstick, maybe. I like drumsticks, as long as they don’t have any sauce on them. The weird thing is, it almost feels like I do have something in my hand. Clover pretends to take some too.

  I take a real banana, and an orange, and skip the fish. It smells fishy. I take honey cakes. I stop at the next empty platter.

  “What’s that?” I ask George.

  George looks surprised. “You don’t see it? That’s your favorite meal. I have enchiladas. I remember those from when I was small. Shoe has hoppers. No one knows what Peter has, but he always gobbles it up.”

  I stare at the plate. It’s different for everyone? How could that be? How would that work? Magic, I guess. Or just imagination, if there isn’t really anything there.

  What would I have if I could have anything? That’s easy. Grilled cheese.

  I pretend to take a grilled cheese sandwich, and I almost smell the cheese, the buttery bread. This one is the kind of cheese I like, plain American. My mouth waters.

  “It’s your favorite meal,” I tell Clover. “Favorite ever.”

  She scrunches her face, scratching at her bumpy arm. “I can’t even think of what I want. Anything?”

  “Favorite ever,” I say.

  “Pasta carbonara,” she says. “Like Mom makes. With peas.” She reaches out and scoops with her hand, but then her face changes. She drops the invisible pasta onto her plate and wipes her hand on her jeans.

  “I felt it,” she whispers. “For a second it was there.”

  “It’s magic,” I say. “Because we’re in a story.”

  “The sweets plate is last,” George says. “That’s even better.”

  “Do you think they have chocolate chip cookies on the sweets plate?” I ask Clover.

  She shrugs, her face tight. “I bet they do.”

  I forgot: she can’t have any.

  I pretend to pick up a chocolate chip cookie and then go sit on the sand by Friendly and Shoe. We’re way high up on the beach, and the mermaids are far out by the rock, with food spread out on it. I think Peter took it to them.

  I can hear them splashing out there. I feel the pull tugging at my chest a little bit. I watch the waves instead. In and out, in and out. I think the ocean is the best place ever.

  The pixies are here too, all of them buzzing around in their own area a little ways off. I wonder if they’re still mad at Clover. She doesn’t look at them.

  The sun starts to drop, pink spreading across the sky like Apollo is dragging it behind his cart. I nod to Apollo and eat. The honey cakes are delicious, and the banana and orange are sweet and just the right amount of ripe. I wish I could eat the invisible grilled cheese, but I can’t remember where it was on the plate, so I can’t find it again. I pretend to eat the beast meat, even though I don’t know what kind of beast it’s supposed to be. I think I taste it a little. Like chicken.

  The cookie I completely taste, warm with the chocolate perfectly melty.

  I like eating here. At home there’s a lot of pressure about eating—you have to do it at a certain time, the same time as everyone else, whether you’re hungry or not. You’re supposed to eat the same food everyone else is eating, even if you don’t like it. It doesn’t make sense. I don’t like most of the foods other people like. Here nobody seems to worry about it.

  “Finish your fruit,” Clover says, and I grind my teeth. She seems to worry about it. But no one else.

  When we’re done eating, Friendly and Jumper start a bonfire with some sticks and logs from a pile under the trees. I make my hands fly, and hop on the sand. Mom and Clover and I have been to beach bonfires a couple times, and I like them. The smoke smells like summer, and the crackling is soothing. It doesn’t have a pattern, but it has a rhythm. You can see it in the flames, too: a dance. I squat down by it, dig my toes in the sand, and watch the orange flame catch, spreading from wood to wood.

  “Clover, will you sing?” Peter asks. “The song you sang to Fergus when I listened at the window.”

  Everyone goes quiet. I glance at Clover. She has her scared look, but then she swallows, and nods. I clap my hands. I always like to listen to Clover sing.

  Singing. I can do that, even if I can’t adventure properly. I know how to sing. I take a sip of water, then a deep breath.

  “Alouette, gentille alouette.”

  The quiet in the circle gets deep. Even the mermaids stop splashing to listen.

  “Alouette, je te plumerai. Alouette, gentille alouette. Alouette, je te plumerai.”

  I sing and sing, my eyes closed. It feels like my voice is the only sound other than the waves and the fire. It’s almost the feeling I had with my happy thought. With everyone listening to me, I feel strong, powerful. Peaceful.

  When I finish, there’s a long pause before anyone moves again.

  “That was amazing!” Shoe says softly. “You should sing something else.” The others murmur agreement, and George even claps.

  I feel like maybe I could fly right now even without pixie dust.

  Before I can reply, one of the mermaids starts singing, out on the flat rock. The one with the twisted hair. Her voice is soprano, eerie and beautiful.

  “She’s competing with you,” Shoe says, laughing. “Jasmina is a little competitive about singing.”

  I almost recognize the song. Not the words—it’s a language I’ve never heard—but the melody is familiar. We all sit perfectly still, listening, like we’re in a trance.

  Suddenly I hear something else, faint, messing with the perfection of the song. What is that?

  Jasmina keeps singing, sitting up high on the rock. She lifts her chin, her twisted hair flowing perfectly behind her. With the sunset behind her she looks like a painting, or an illustration in the Peter Pan book. The other sound gets louder. What is it?

  Oh. It’s dogs barking.

  I sit up to say something, do something, but it’s too late.

  There’s a rush and a roar. The water near the rock swirls in a circle, strong, like there’s a tornado under the water. Jasmina’s voice cracks as something breaks through the surface.

  I scream so hard it feels like I’m tearing my throat.

  There’s a monster. Right in front of us.

  The top is a woman, with a beautiful, mermaid-like face, though her long h
air writhes strangely. It looks like it’s made of eels, constantly slithering around her head. Her bottom half is tentacles like an octopus’s, coiling under her, pushing her up through the water. She’s massive, ten or eleven feet high, blocking the sun.

  But what makes me scream most is her middle. Around her waist, coming right out of her skin all the way around, is a pack of barking, braying dogs. The front halves of dogs, five or six of them. They’re frantic and wild, their mouths snapping in the air, their paws wheeling. The monster lunges for the mermaid and in one movement grabs her, throws her over one shoulder, and dives back below the waves.

  The barking lasts for a few seconds; then everything is quiet and still. The water is smooth again.

  I press my hand over my mouth, hard. I don’t think we’re going to win this adventure. If that’s our foe, it’s nothing we’re going to be able to fight.

  “What was that?” Shoe asks, her voice a squeak.

  “You don’t know?” I whisper, like if I’m too loud the monster will come back. “She hasn’t been here before?”

  Shoe shakes her head.

  “That’s way worse than the dragon,” Rella says. Tears shine in her eyes. “It’s terrible.”

  All the mermaids cluster in a tight huddle in the middle of the lagoon. It looks like they’ve never seen this creature before either. The Lost Boys just stand there in shock—even Peter. We have to do something, right? But what can we do?

  Peter runs down to talk to the mermaids. The rest of the Lost Boys gather in groups, whispering to each other. I can see them miming the eels, the dogs. I shudder.

  Fergus’s fingers are tapping, and he’s breathing fast. I’m not sure he’s verbal right now—when he’s really upset or overwhelmed, sometimes he loses his speech.

  But he slides his backpack off, unzips it, and pulls out one of his mythology books. He bends over it, studying the index, then thumbs to a page and hands the book to me.

  It’s the story of Scylla and Charybdis. I don’t remember him telling me about this one before, but it’s from The Odyssey, so I’m sure he knows it pretty well. I read. Scylla is a monster in Greek mythology who killed six of the men on Odysseus’s ship, snatching them right off the ship and eating them. Odysseus couldn’t defeat her. Later Hercules killed her…but her father, a god, brought her back to life. It doesn’t say what happened after that. She’s half woman, half octopus…with barking dogs around her middle.

  “Oh no,” I whisper. I look at Fergus. “This is who that was? Did we bring her somehow?”

  Fergus nods solemnly.

  “But she’s a myth!” Myths are supposed to be pretend. They’re scary, but they’re still just stories.

  That was real. There wasn’t any pretend to that monster. I keep forgetting we’re in a story. But this isn’t the fun Neverland adventure I was expecting.

  Fergus sits down next to me, locking his arms tight around his knees.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  He doesn’t answer. I want to help him calm down, like I usually do. But all the things I would normally say—don’t worry, we can fix this, I can take care of it—none of them fit. We should worry. And if that’s a myth, he knows more about this than I do, than any of us do.

  I look at Peter, standing with his ankles in the water. We’re going to have to tell him about Scylla.

  I can’t talk. It’s like my brain overloaded looking at the monster, and it burned out the part where I can get words from my head to my mouth. But I know who that is.

  I know who that is.

  That has to be Scylla, here in the flesh. From my books. I know the story well.

  Scylla was a nymph, the daughter of Phorcys and Hecate. She was young and beautiful, and Glaucus, a sea god, fell in love with her.

  That’s never good.

  She refused Glaucus—I think because he had a tail—and ran away. But Glaucus wouldn’t take no for an answer. He went to Circe, the famous witch, and asked for a love potion so Scylla would fall in love with him back. But Circe fell in love with Glaucus—so instead of a love potion, she secretly gave him a poison, and told him to pour it into the pool where Scylla bathed. He did, and it turned Scylla into a monster. Then Glaucus ran away from her.

  Scylla was left alone, a terrible monster, and she didn’t even do anything wrong. Glaucus seeing her, and being interested in her, ruined her whole life. In some of the books she has seven heads, or a snake tail, or three rows of teeth. But here she looks like some of the other drawings I’ve seen, with the tentacles and the human top…and always, always, there are the dogs, alive, coming right out of her skin.

  She’s here. Somehow I brought a monster to Neverland just by knowing about it.

  I need to be alone for a while, to think things through. I wave at Clover to stay where she is and then go up the path a little, behind a bush with big, flat leaves. It’s out of sight of everyone. I sit on the ground, pull my knees up, shut my eyes, and rock.

  It’s calm, quiet. I can hear the ocean murmuring against the shore, see the stars getting bright overhead. We’ve only been here for one day, I realize. All that happened in one day.

  I rock back and forth, using the same rhythm as the waves in the ocean. It’s soothing, and I can control it, which helps. I breathe, slow and deep. Suddenly I feel warmth in front of me, by my chest.

  I open my eyes. One of the pixies is there, snuggled as close as she can be without quite touching. The light is brilliant. Warmth pulses from her, matching my rhythm, my heartbeat. She’s helping. It reminds me of a cat purring, snuggled up in your lap. It’s the same feeling.

  I fumble my voice recorder out of my pocket, go back to track fourteen, and press Play. Mom’s voice comes out, talking about breakfast. I recorded her the day before we left. “Would you like strawberries today, Fergus?” she asks, and my eyes fill up. I rewind and play it again. “Would you like strawberries today, Fergus?”

  There’s someone else here too now, a more solid presence. I know without looking that it’s Clover. She sits there for a while, silent, and that helps too. After I repeat Mom a few more times, I hit Stop.

  “We can go back, if you want,” she whispers.

  The pixie flies straight up and away. I clutch my chest, missing where it was. But I think my mouth might work now. “Back?” I ask.

  Clover brushes her hair off her face. “To London. We can make them take us back.”

  I hadn’t even considered that. I think about it. It’s scary being here, if we have to face a real monster. Scylla is a serious monster. But we knew there would be adventure coming in. There’s always adventure in Neverland. And I think of running up the trail, laughing, splashing the others, singing the marching song. Dancing on top of the mountain. Sitting by the fire with everyone.

  I don’t have to worry all the time here about whether I’m bothering people. No one stares, or looks at me funny. Ever.

  I’m not ready to give that up. And if Scylla is here because I’m here…

  “We need to stay,” I say firmly. “Help.”

  Clover scrunches up her face like she does when she’s thinking, but then she nods. “I showed Peter the part in the book about Scylla, but he and the Lost Boys are waiting for you. They want you to tell them more about her. Are you okay to do that?”

  I close my eyes, to gather myself. “More time.”

  We sit for a while longer. I listen to the ocean, and think about Mom making breakfast, about the rhythm of the waves. My brain starts to come back together, untangling.

  I think I’m ready to go now.

  We go back to the group—sitting together on the beach, silent—and I tell them everything I know about Scylla. I read them passages from my books. They listen, still quiet, and then Peter goes to tell the mermaids.

  He comes back frowning, which looks wrong on his face. “We know wh
o she is, thanks to Fergus. But why is she stealing the mermaids?”

  “Maybe they made her jealous,” Friendly adds. “Because she used to be like them.”

  There’s silence for a while. That’s a good idea. Then Clover clears her throat. “The song?” Clover asks softly. “Maybe it was bothering her? Or called her?”

  Peter’s face lights up. “The song. Or the songs. You sang first, Clover, and your song called me, in London. Maybe your song called this Scylla monster, and then when Jasmina started singing, Scylla took her.”

  Clover frowns hard, the worry lines deep in her forehead. “Wait. My song?” she whispers.

  “I know what to do,” Peter says, triumphant. He jumps to his feet. “Clover, you can go out on the rock—the mermaids can take you out, if you can’t swim—”

  “I can swim,” Clover breaks in. “But—”

  “I will be there too, on the rock with you. You will sing. Then when Scylla comes up, I will slay her. Cut her head off. Easy!” He mimes slicing with a sword. “Then the mermaids can swim down to her lair, wherever that is, and find Jasmina and Allora and rescue them. It will be a great victory. Peter Pan versus the Sea Monster!” He turns to me. “You can put it in a book, and everyone will tell the story.” He rubs his hands together, grinning. “We’ll have to do it tomorrow, when the sun’s up. I will go tell the mermaids.”

  He runs down to the shore again. The Lost Boys start cheering, like we’ve already won.

  But my chest is twisted into knots of anxiety. “Clover?” I whisper. “That isn’t safe.”

  I look up and meet her eyes, and I can name that emotion. She looks terrified.

  I can’t do this.

  I think it over and over. I can’t say it out loud, not even to Fergus.

  We’re on the beach again, the sun just up, waiting for Peter to make the call to go. Fergus is talking to Friendly, discussing strategy, and the others seem more excited than nervous. I sit by myself, panicking.

  How can I stand out on the rock and sing, knowing it might bring that monster right to me? What if Peter can’t kill it, and it really drags me down under the water? I’m not a mermaid. I’ll drown. I’ll die.