Minds Like Fae by avadel / IntoTheShadowTrees 

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The raindrops ooze from the clouds and slither down my hair, my face, my back, drenching me with the cold realization that I am nothing but one more plaything for him to impress.

"Peter!" I yell through the trees. "Peter!"

No doubt he's been distracted again by the mermaids at the cove, whose attention never fails, or by the princess he rescued from Hook's trap. Now even the self-sufficient tribal people at the north end of the island must find themselves indebted to him.

"The dashing, the daring!" I call bitterly. "The hero." The wind changes direction, carrying the distant sound of revelry with it, and I walk toward the noise. It's strange to walk after learning to fly, and I swallow the knot in my throat. I can't help but wonder if he even noticed me tumble out of the sky and into the trees when the rain washed the pixie dust away.

The twigs and the leaves scratch at my skin and tug on my clothes, but I push past them. Peter may rule this island, but I refuse to be helpless without him. Eventually, the trees and darkness cut away into the tribe's encampment, the roaring fire at its center turning the rain to steam. Around it, tribe men and Peter's lost boys all cavort, howling and singing. Their voices are full of raw freedom, of wanting and finding, of lacking and never knowing it.

As the rain continues to trail down my face, my heart aches.

And in the midst of them, soaking in the adoration, dances and sings Peter. He would stand out even if he wasn't trying to. The firelight paints him in bright, soft hues, like the victor in some grand-sized oil painting, standing triumphant and beautiful over all his spoils. Before I met him, I never wanted to touch a paintbrush. If I had him to sit for me, though, I would learn to be a master artist.

"Wendy!" he exclaims, grinning. He lifts off the ground, flying past the fire to land in front of me. "There you are." The warm callouses of his fingers slip around my hand, and he tugs me toward the fire. "Come dance!"

My fingers slip from his grip, and he faces me again, surprise filling those bright, otherly eyes. "I can't, Peter."

Baffled, he stops. "Are you hurt?"

My head shakes.

"Is... Did you forget how?" He brightens, reaching for my hand again. "I'll show you!"

My arms wrap around myself, and my voice is barely audible over the hubbub. "It's not that."

His head cocks, and I wish for the thousandth time that I understood what he was thinking like I understand my brothers. I search the faces of the parading revelers but can't pick them out from among the group, and my heart clenches again.

"Peter..." I look down. "Peter, it's time for us to go home."

His face falls, and he steps closer again. "No," he murmurs. "No, you've hardly been here any time at all."

"We've been here nearly a week." My arm sweeps toward the fire. "And apparently that's long enough to turn even the most sophisticated London teenager into one of the lost boys."

He frowns. "There's nothing wrong with my boys."

"Can't you see it, Peter?" I lean forward. "Can't you see anything?"

He steps forward, arm slipping around my waist before I can dodge, and leaps into the air.

"What are you doing?" He glides through the air, the rain ricocheting off our bodies. "Go back!"

He swoops in toward the peak of the mount, alighting in the top branches of the tree that alone stands on it. My feet touch down on the slippery bough, and I cling to Peter. He leans out, one hand nonchalantly wrapped around the arm-thin trunk. Breaths hard, I stare out over the island.

The trees whisper down the rocky hillsides like mischievous children at playtime. So far below, the fire dances as a candleflame surrounded by ants. The shore sparkles as the receding tide tickles its sands. And in the endless waves, the stars and moon ride the shimmering water to the edge of the world.

Peter's voice whispers like a distant night-bird. "Can't I see it, Wendy? I see all of it."

"But..."

"I see the rocks shift and reshape in the cove. I see the birds roost and hatch and fly and wither away. And I see boys and girls come and come and come, enchanted by the island, enchanted by me, and constantly—in every but the rarest incidences—I see them leave." He lifts me again, swinging around to the other side of the tree, and involuntarily, I yell.

He regards me. "You think I might drop you."

"I—" I look up at him, at the rain sliding down his russet hair, plastered to his sun-darkened skin. His deep green gaze arrests me, beautiful and unknowable. "I know you didn't see me fall earlier." He frowns, but I pull back, building pace. "I know you left me on a precarious ledge before that so you could show me how much cleverer you are than Hook. I know that because of that, you forgot about the princess you were supposed to be saving and almost left her to drown." I pull in a breath. "And I know that you brought me here to be mother to your lost boys, to teach them and care for them, but you haven't the faintest intention to care for me."

"Of course I care about you! What about when I protected you from the mermaids?"

"But you didn't protect me, Peter! They were jealous and tried to drown me, and you thought they were playing with me! The only reason they stopped was because they thought they had humiliated me enough for them to reclaim your attention."

He laughs. "They wouldn't really hurt you."

My chest constricts, as if the rain grew icy claws to clench around me and squeeze. As the water runs down our faces and fills the space between, the distance feels more and more. "No," I whisper. "You'll never see."

Slowly, he stills, laughter washing away from his face with the rain. "Wendy..." I watch him as some kind of distant sadness creeps into his eyes—or rises toward the surface. "Please don't leave me too."

The icy claws dig in, and a fracture splits my heart. I bury my face in his chest, and his arms wrap around me. I know he won't fall from the tree though he's not holding on. He might leap off or dance or sing his song of foolish freedom, but he won't fall. Peter Pan never does, not even when, perhaps, he should.

"Why is it called Neverland, Peter?"

His arms and chest tense with surprise, but he answers easily. "So long as you're here, you'll never grow up. You never must face the troubles you came from, and you never have to be anything you don't want to."

My head lifts, our faces only centimeters apart. "And you never learn."

His face draws, a thundercloud of confusion and sorrow, and salt begins to mingle with the water trailing down my cheeks.

My hand reaches up to brush his soaked hair away from his forehead.

"Don't leave me here alone, Wendy."

On its way back down, my hand pauses, fingertips resting lightly on his cheek. "My brothers have already been here too long."

His hand envelops mine, holding it to his cheek. "Then I'll send them home."

"My family needs me, Peter." My words are a whisper over the rain.

"Please." His grip tightens. "I've never wanted so badly for someone not to leave. Everyone leaves. They always leave."

Tears catch in my throat. "I don't want to leave you." My head softly shakes. "But I can't stay here." My gaze locks with his desperate one, and inwardly, I beg for him to understand, hope that he'll finally see what this place has done, shiver and collapse as I watch in his gaze that he doesn't.

Despairing, anguished that he'll make this goodbye, my toes push up, and my lips meet his. The rain pours around us, slipping from his face to mine, and for one bright-burning moment, I want this to be forever. Eternity, like the waves, this island ours to rule together, two humans with minds like fae because we never age, never face trouble, and never learn.

Gently, he pulls away, arm still wrapped around my waist. "That was goodbye, wasn't it?"

Heart spinning but head mournfully steady, I lean back. "It was... it's time to go."

He turns away, and the moonlight catches on the water dripping down his profile. Then he sweeps me off the branch, and we're gliding through the night again, the rainstorm slowly fading away. At the encampment, the party has died down, and voice steadier than feels right, I convince my brothers to come with me. Peter sprinkles the pixie-dust onto them again.

And we're off, flying toward the second star on the left. The boys whoop and dive as we go, but Peter keeps his arm around me, flying straight and true.

On the other side of starlight, we slip through the London night, sliding through my bedroom window. The boys pause at the door and glance back at Peter, perched on my windowsill. I lean against the trim.

"Goodnight, Peter," the younger of the two offer.

"Yes, goodnight, and thank you," the other says.

Peter only inclines his head, and they go. I turn toward him, eyes on the sill. His fingers brush my chin, lifting my face. For a long moment, he simply looks at me, the stars shining dully behind him, my dress dripping faintly on the wood floor. Then he leans forward, and his lips brush my forehead.

He pulls back, releasing me, voice like a bird's feathers. "Goodnight, Wendy." He turns, leaping away from the window like a man afraid to look back. He doesn't wind around the buildings or perform tricks in the sky. He just flies, flies straight toward the second star to the right of the moon. And then he's gone.

I watch out the window at the uncaring sky, and the fractures in my heart creep and expand. He's gone. Everything that has happened the past week comes to nothing. What was the sense in weathering a rainstorm that refused to wash what existed into something new? What is the point in a kiss that means goodbye?

As the stars slowly fade, I lean on my sill and cry for what could have been.

The moon begins to disappear in the hazy sky, and the tears flow faster. I know that when morning truly comes, I'll dry my dress and face and press on into the world. But for now I ache because when the second-star fades, this will truly be the end.

Against the quickly lightening sky, a dot appears in the distance. I sit up, heart lurching, wondering if it's him—hoping and dreading that it might be. As the figure draws closer, it becomes undeniable, and my knuckles whiten as they cling to the rough grain of the windowsill.

It doesn't have to be the end. This is my chance. Perhaps I was wrong and Neverland can be a place to grow. Pain grips my chest so hard, I lean into the window again. There isn't a choice where something important won't be sacrificed.

He glides to a stop, hovering outside the window. Some sort of frenzy claims his eyes, and I look down, unable to meet them. "Wendy."

I back away from the window, head shaking. "Peter, I can't."

He pulls up short from where he was stepping onto the sill, sorrow flooding his face. "What?"

"Please." My nails dig into my palms. "Don't ask. I can't say yes, and you know it."

Slowly, he steps down into my room, foot splashing softly in the puddle my dress left on the floor.

"Peter," I plead as he steps closer.

"You could say yes. If you wanted. If you believed that there is something to be made of us—something to be salvaged from me."

Startled, I meet his intense green gaze. "From you?"

He strides forward, taking my shoulders and kissing me like this could be the end of the world. This time, though, he's steady, like a tree who won't be moved in the storm, who says, If the world ends, so be it.

Then he's pulling back, desperately searching my face, and all I can do is stare and hope and fear and dream.

"Oh, Wendy," he says. "Won't you teach me to be human again?"