I’ve been floating in the lagoon for countless minutes, maybe hours, with Peter Pan watching me like a guard on the shore.
As soon as I was on my feet after Smee left, he took my hand, dragged me from the house, through the forest and to the lagoon.
“Get in,” he had ordered.
“I’m fine,” I protested to which he said, “Get in the goddamn water Darling before I toss you in.”
With a huff, I peeled off my clothes and waded in and though I don’t like to admit when Peter Pan is right, as soon as the water was lapping around my shoulders, I felt infinitely better.
Now I’m on my back floating and even though I’ve been in the water forever, my fingers aren’t even pruned.
“Why don’t you come in?” I call to Pan.
“The lagoon and I have an understanding,” he answers.
I roll over and tread water so I can look at him on the shore. He’s got his back propped against a large rock that sits on the edge of the woods. One of his legs is stretched out in front of him, the other bent at the knee, his arm draped over it.
His feet are bare.
There is nothing quite so intimate as the bare feet of a myth.
“What sort of understanding?”
“The one where I don’t get in.”
More secrets between him and the island. I know his first memories are of the lagoon and that he believes it’s the lagoon that birthed him.
I know he’s afraid of losing his shadow again and that probably he thinks it’s the lagoon that gave it to him in the first place.
Peter Pan is ancient but even he is afraid of something, but how odd that he’s afraid of a lagoon and an island laying down judgement.
Because even if he won’t admit it, somehow I know that to be true.
I think Peter Pan might be unconsciously worried that while he reclaimed his shadow, he no longer deserves it.
My stomach growls again and I’m reminded we never had our pancake breakfast.
“Are you hungry, Darling?” Pan asks.
“I could eat,” I say.
“Come out.” He stands up and grabs my dress from the sand and gives it a shake.
“But the water is so nice,” I complain.
“Darling.” He tilts his head in a way that promises punishment. “Don’t make me repeat myself.”
I know there’s nothing he can do, considering he refuses to get in and I like playing games with him. I think secretly he likes playing games too so long as he wins. But I’m ravenous in a way that I’ve never been before, even when I was starving back at home, so I don’t think I could play very long.
“Fine,” I say and sink my feet into the cool sandy bottom of the lagoon and make my way to the shore.
When I walk out, water runs down my arms, down my torso and follows the V of my thighs. My hair is heavy and wet and sticks to my breasts.
Peter Pan’s eyes are drinking me in.
“We could linger for a while,” I suggest. “I’m hungry for something else, too.”
“You are always hungry for cock, Darling. But you will never be able to keep up with me if you don’t feed yourself something other than dessert.”
“When you say ‘dessert’, are you referring to Lost Boy cum or pancakes?”
He snorts and holds up my dress. He has it bunched in his hands so all I have to do is thread my arms in as he pushes it over my head.
I wiggle my hips so the thin cotton will sink over my hips. Pan lets out an appreciative growl.
“There will be plenty of time to fill you up with Lost Boy cum, Darling. But right now, you need meat and potatoes. Something to stick to your bones. Come.”
“I’m trying.” I give him a devilish grin.
“Is that the game we’re playing then?”
I don’t know what’s gotten into me. I am 100% a sex-positive kind of girl. I like sex and I don’t try to hide that. But I’m not usually so damn needy for it.
Or maybe it’s Peter Pan I’m needy for.
Pan scoops me up and tosses me over his shoulder.
“Hey!”
The wolf barrels out of the woods and yips at Pan.
“I warned her,” Pan tells the wolf. “She will obey me and so will you.”
The wolf yips.
I’m not sure what that means but Pan seems satisfied with the response.
He starts away from the lagoon.
But he doesn’t go toward the treehouse. Instead he goes toward town.
“I thought we were getting food?”
“We are,” he says. “It’s about time I show my face in Darlington Port. Remind them all who rules this land.”
It isn’t until I hear the distant hum of a small city that Pan puts me down. I straighten out my dress and realize I’m bare foot. But so is Pan. I guess there’s something wild about us both.
The dirt path from the woods connects to a road that goes north and south. But across it is a cobblestone road that spills downhill into a town.
Darlington Port, I guess. I can hear the rattle of wagon wheels over the stones. People shouting and laughing. The toll of a distant bell. The clashing of metal on metal and the smell of burning iron.
It wasn’t that long ago that I lived a normal life in a normal town in the normal world.
But however long I’ve been on Neverland and at the treehouse, it’s somehow wiped away what was normal and replaced it with something new.
Because being here in Darlington, I feel like a tourist in a novelty shop. Like I want to oohh and ahhh around every corner.
I suppose it doesn’t hurt that Darlington Port is very much like a 19th century Dutch Colonial town with white stucco buildings with exposed timber beams and crooked little stoops with colorful awnings and goods displayed in shop windows.
“You’ve been keeping this from me this entire time?! This is wonderful!” I say up to Pan and he smiles down at me.
“I suppose it does have it’s charm.”
We pass a bakery and a man out front is sweeping the stone stoop, the sign in his front window reading CLOSED in big red letters.
When he sees Pan, he stops sweeping, bows his head and keeps his eyes on the stone. “Never King,” he mumbles.
Pan ignores him.
Across the street is a book shop and a stationary next to it and a shoe shop next to that. Only the latter is open.
“Do you have money?” I ask Pan. “I could use shoes.” I wiggle my toes on the cold cobblestone.
“Of course.”
Something sweet bites at the air and on the tip of my tongue and a second later, Pan holds out his hand to reveal a pile of gold coins.
“Holy shit. How did you…where…”
I would have noticed if he was carrying a pile of heavy coins in his pants. Trust me. I notice everything that goes on in his pants.
“A perk of the shadow,” he admits. “I can make anything appear.”
I gaze up at him. I sense there are practically stars in my eyes. “You are amazing.”
He breathes out through his nose and the corner of his mouth lifts. “Go on. Take a few and buy yourself some shoes, Darling.”
He doesn’t have to tell me twice. I pluck a few coins out, having no idea what the worth is or the cost of shoes, and then push through the heavy wooden door on the shoe shop. A bell dings above us and the salesman calls out a hello before he spots Peter Pan and the wolf beside us.
“Good god.” The man sinks to one knee. “I had no idea you were… Apologies, Never King. What an honor to have you in my shop.”
“My…” Pan looks over at me and a wrinkle appears between his brows. “Darling needs a new pair of shoes. Could you assist her?”
“Of course.” The man stands upright. He eyes the wolf, opens his mouth like he means to protest the big hairy beast and then thinks better of it. “What will the lady desire?”
“Something simple will do.” I look around the shop. It’s small and cozy, but there are displays everywhere on the shelves that line the walls and on the little square tables that dot the room.
I make my way to the shelf on my left and the floor creaks loudly beneath me and then the wolf’s claws click and scrap as he follows.
“What do you think?” I ask him as I pluck a ballet flat from the shelf and hold it out.
The wolf says, No good for running.
I peer down at him. “Who says I need to run?”
You should always be prepared to run.
“I agree with him,” Pan says behind me.
“Fine.” I return the flat to the shelf and then pick up a brown leather boot with laces. “This then?”
“Better,” Pan and the wolf say at once.
“Do you have this in a seven?” I ask and the salesman nods and hurries to the back.
“Why are you both worried about me running?” I ask.
Pan is leaning against one of the floor-to-ceiling shelves on the other side of the shop, his arms crossed over his chest. He’s unmoving, but there is still an aura about him that he could break bones quickly, with barely any effort.
If Peter Pan was intimidating before, now with his shadow, he’s…he’s…
It’s impossible to find the right words to describe how it feels to be near him now.
Like trying to describe the way a hurricane feels two days before it reaches land. The air is different and you can feel the impending destruction maybe in your belly, maybe in your soul. But you can’t touch it with your hands and so it doesn’t feel real until the carnage is lying around your feet.
Peter Pan is like that. Like a hurricane.
The wolf comes around a display to look up at me and he snaps me out of my reverie.
Need shoes to run, he tells me.
The salesman comes barreling through a swinging door, a black box in hand. “Here we go!” He sets the box down and pulls over a chair and gestures for me to sit in it.
“Do you have socks?” I ask.
He yanks a pair off a rack, tears off the tag and hands them to me. They’re made of soft creamy cotton with a little bit of a slouch to them.
With the socks on, I slip on the boots and then tighten up the laces and take a test walk across the store.
“Holy shit. These are amazing.”
The salesman beams. “I only craft the best. I was an apprentice of The Shoemaker.”
“The shoemaker?” I ask.
“Renowned Shoemaker in the Seven Isles,” Pan answers. “Taught by the elves.”
“Right. The elves. Of course.” I will never get used to the absurdity of this place. And I suspect I’ve only just scratched the surface.
I lift up my foot to inspect the boots. “Well The Shoemaker and the elves clearly know how to do what they do. I’m glad he passed on that knowledge to you too,” I tell the salesman.
He nods and clasps his hands together. “I’m so glad you like them.”
“How much do we owe you?” Pan asks.
“Oh no. No.” The salesman shakes his head. “I couldn’t take money from the Never King.”
“You can and you will. How much?”
“I really mustn’t—”
I go over to the older man, grab his hand. The second our skin touches, his expression goes blank and his eyes wide. “Our thanks,” I tell him and drop several coins into his open palm.
He nods numbly and then immediately sinks to his knees.
“Thank you. Thank you to you both. What a blessing tonight has been.”
Peter Pan pushes away from the shelf and frowns down at the man. “Why are you bowing to her?”
I laugh and push Pan toward the door. “Let the man do what he wants, Never King.”
Still he scowls. “Only I will be on my knees for you.” He takes my hand in his and yanks me outside into the warm darkness, the wolf following behind.
“Not just you,” I remind him.
He sighs. “Yes, fine. Vane, the twins, and myself. Better?”
I frown. “I’m not sure. Why don’t you show me what you mean?”
There is a deep rumble in his chest. “Darling, I will not—”
My stomach makes another loud complaint, cutting Pan off. He lets our argument drop and pulls me up the next street, then turns us down a wider thoroughfare where more nightlife abounds.
There is energy here. I’ve never been to New Orleans or Bourbon Street, but I imagine this is what it must feel like surrounded by buildings that feel old while the people and their music fill up the cracks and crevices with laughter and revelry.
Pan nods at a tavern halfway down the street. A sign hangs from the roof ledge that reads OX & MEAD in old English lettering.
Is that the name of the tavern or the food they offer?
I’m not eating ox. I was hoping for a burger and fries.
I need to eat too, the wolf says beside us and then takes off at a sprint.
When Pan and I enter the tavern, we’re greeted by a din of conversation and the quiet song of a lute. Circular tables are spread over the room with a bar on the right and booths that line the back. Giant arched windows let in the warm light of the lampposts outside.
It takes the tavern a few seconds to notice who is standing just inside the door.
And then the entire place goes quiet and all eyes are on us.
