“She’s not dead.” He rose and quickly turned to Tinkerbell, who was so stricken that she had gone from her normal pinkish color to a nearly translucent white. “Tink, she needs your dust.”
Tink nodded and immediately left the room in a shower of shimmering glitter.
“Where is she going?” John asked. He had Wendy’s hand in his own and was squeezing tight.
“To get something to drink.”
Tinkerbell returned in virtually no time, carrying an un-opened bottle of soda by its lid. Peter quickly took it from her and popped off the cap. Tinkerbell hovered over the rim of the bottle, throwing fists full of pixie dust into the liquid.
The soda began to glow, at first slightly, and then as brightly as a torch.
“That’s good.” Peter took the soda bottle and leaned over Wendy. “Prop her up, John. Help me get this down her throat.”
John moved beside him, holding Wendy up under the arms as Peter placed one hand behind her head, tilting it back. Her lips parted and Peter placed the soda bottle to her mouth, tilting it slightly.
At first, nothing happened and Michael and John wondered, silently, whether Peter was getting any of the magic potion into her mouth. But then Wendy’s eyelids fluttered and she coughed.
Michael rushed forward as Peter gently withdrew the bottle.
“Wendy, sis, Wendy!” He pushed past Peter, for the moment, not thinking of nor caring for anything but his sister.
There are many different degrees of fear. There is the general anxiety one experiences before, say, an exam or a visit to the dentist. Then, next on the ladder of fear is the uneasiness one feels before a storm or when a friend is late arriving for a date or doesn’t call on time. And then there is the fear that Michael was suffering, the third, the last and the greatest degree of fear one can ever know.
It is the fear that you will never again look into the eyes of someone you love and see them looking back at you.
Michael was overtaken with that fear right now as he shoved his way in between the two boys and looked into his sister’s gray eyes. “Wendy?” he questioned softly.
She blinked and sat up a little straighter of her own volition.
“Michael?” she replied.
He smiled at her and stole her hand away from John. “You’re okay,” he said, his voice filled with relief.
“Well. . . yes,” she said slowly. “Why wouldn’t I be?” Her gaze traveled from him to her brother John. “John, what are you doing here? What’s-”
She looked to Peter then, and fell silent.
During the quiet that followed, what Wendy’s brothers assumed was Wendy very slowly coming to recognize the boy who was Peter Pan, was actually Wendy recognizing Peter right away and trying, with all her might, not to leap up off of the bed and kill him on the spot.
Her gaze narrowed, the gray in her eyes turning stormy.
It was Peter’s turn to blink now.
“You,” Wendy hissed. It sounded like nothing so much as an accusation – which is what it was.
Peter backed up, his green eyes wide.
“W-Wendy?” he asked, looking more uncertain than John or Michael or even Tinkerbell had ever seen him look.
“You,” Wendy repeated, as she slowly righted herself and then swung her legs over the edge of the bed. “Of all the people – of all the times. . . . ” Her tone was a menacing indictment, her gray eyes fairly shooting sparks at the young man.
Wendy stood and John and Michael, being the brothers that they were and, hence, knowing their sister all too well, backed up instinctively, giving her plenty of room.
“Uh, Wendy, you okay?” Peter asked as he, too, backed up.
Wendy advanced on him. “Five years, Peter Pan. Five years go by and you’re nowhere to be found. No one would believe us, did you know that?” She took another step forward and he mirrored her movement with another step back. “No one, Peter. Not even our mother. And you wouldn’t come when we called. So, why would they believe us?” Wendy threw up her arms as if to motion to the world around them.
Peter held up his hands placatingly, his eyes wide, as he backed up another step. “Take it easy, Wendy. We don’t have time for this right now.”
Wendy stopped. “Why are you here? Why now? After all we’ve been through!” Wendy spun, picked up the pillow from the bed, and threw it at him. He dodged it artfully.
“I hate you, Peter Pan!” Wendy yelled at him. “Have you any idea what I’ve been through?” She cast around, peering at the room through storm-filled eyes. Her gaze landed on her youngest brother. “What Michael has been through?”
“Wendy, I’m so sorry!” Peter’s expression was desperate. “I didn’t come because I - I didn’t know you needed me! I promise, I didn’t know!” He peered at her beseechingly. For some reason, it was imperative to him that Wendy believe him. “I wasn’t in Neverland, I swear it! I’ve been stuck here, just like you – ”