After Neverland

The woman looked out the window, scanning the skies eagerly for her daughter's return. The house was lonely without little Jane running around the house, playing pirates. But Wendy knew that Jane was having fun where she was.

A little bright dot appeared in the sky. Wendy gasped as it got bigger and bigger. She quickly ran around to clean up the bedroom, so it was ready for when they arrived.

"Oh dear," Wendy murmured to herself. "I must make myself presentable." She flew around the room, brushing her hair, making sure she didn't look a total mess. Wendy glanced at the window to see a boy leading a little girl by hand. Wendy's heart hurt a bit, when she realized there was not a little fairy leading them both.

"Mum!" the little girl shouted, as they neared. Wendy pretended to look surprised and walked towards the window.

"Oh Jane have you come back from Neverland so soon? I do hope you helped Peter finish all his spring cleaning." Wendy said, lifting Jane up from the skies and setting her down on the nursery floor. The little boy hung back at the windowsill, watching them almost jealously. Wendy felt a rush of affection for him.

"Hullo Peter." Wendy said kindly, approaching the boy. "I hope you got all your spring cleaning done."

Peter brightened up. "We would've but the pirates came along and tried to burn down my hut!" he said excitedly. "But I stopped them all with my bare hands!" he added, puffing out his chest proudly.

Wendy and Jane exchanged a look. "That's not how it happened." Jane said, shaking her head. "There weren't any pirates!"

Peter frowned. "Who said anything about pirates?" he asked. "There weren't any pirates – there were bears though." He added. Wendy rolled her eyes in amusement; classic Peter, exaggerating and changing all his stories to make them more exciting – and make him seem more heroic.

"How is Tinkerbell?" Wendy asked. Peter stared at her.

"What's a Tinkerbell?" Peter asked her. Wendy remembered that Peter didn't remember Tinkerbell. Wendy wondered what had happened to the fiery little fairy.

"Oh don't you remember? She was your friend – it was her dust that helped me, John and Michael fly." Wendy prompted him.

"What's a John and Michael?"

Wendy sighed. From the corner of her eye, she noticed Jane yawn. Wendy smiled.

"Bed time." She said to Jane, who nodded and walked over to her bed and climbed in. She turned to Peter, who was floating in the air, doing summersaults in an attempt to show off. "Shouldn't you be going back to Neverland now? It's almost your bedtime." Wendy said to him, feeling like the little girl she once was, telling the Lost Boys and Peter to go to bed instead of pretending to fight off pirates.

Peter shook his head. "We don't have a bedtime in Neverland now that our mother is gone." Peter said.

"Where is your mother?"

"She left a long time ago." Wendy felt a small pang in her heart; she knew that Peter was talking about her without realizing it. "You say that we don't have a bedtime. Does that mean you have more Lost Boys?" Wendy asked. Peter nodded vigorously.

"And Lost Girls too!" Peter added. Wendy remembered a time when Peter whispered to her how children got lost when they rolled out of their prams as babies. He had told her that girls were too smart to ever fall out of their cribs.

"I guess that means girls aren't as smart as they once were." She murmured to herself in amusement.

Peter stopped in his air-summersaults to stare at Wendy. "Will you be our mother?" Peter asked. Wendy felt her heart tug. That had been what Peter had said the night they first met, and the reason why Wendy went to Neverland.

"You can come live with us and the Lost Kids! It's really fun in Neverland – you don't have to go to school or anything. You play and fight and hunt all day. You'll have to be careful of the pirates though – they're pretty bad. And there are the Indians – but don't worry, I'm friends with their Queen, Tiger Lily. [Here Wendy blinked; when she was there, Tiger Lily had only been a little princess] And there're mermaids and giant animals and a crocodile that likes eating people!" Peter said enthusiastically.

Wendy could see it all in her mind's eye. Flying from the sky into Neverland (only to be shot to the ground by the Lost Boys under Tink's command), the adventures they had, the people they met. And the pirates! Captain Hook and Mr. Smee and the crocodile that ate Hook's hand and then followed him around, waiting for the day it could eat the rest of Hook. Wendy felt like she was a child again.

"So will you?" Peter interrupted impatiently, hovering upside-down, waiting for an answer. Wendy sighed, glancing at Jane.

"I can't dear, I'm an adult now. Adults aren't welcome in Neverland." She reminded. Peter nodded seriously.

"But I can make you a child again!" he said suddenly, eyes bright. "All we need is fairy dust and poof! You're a kid!"

Wendy smiled slightly. "But I'm a mother now, I have to think about Jane – and my husband." She informed him. Peter floated to the ground, right-side up.

"So you won't come with me to be our mother?" he asked her sadly. She shook her head, her heart squeezing at the sight of Peter's forlorn face.

"But every spring you can come and take Jane to do your spring cleaning." She reminded. "Given you don't forget."

"Forget?! Peter Pan never forgets!" Peter exclaimed, puffing out his chest again proudly. He glanced at Jane, who was fast asleep in her bed. Wendy saw him do this.

"Maybe you can come live with us." Wendy suggested. "I could be your mother and Jane could be your sister."

Peter considered the idea. "Would you send me to school?" he asked. Wendy remembered him asking her own mother, Mary Darling, the exact same thing.

"Yes, I'm afraid I would have to; it's the law." Wendy said.

"And then to an office?"

"Only if that was what job you'd want to do."

"And soon I would be a man?"

Wendy paused before answering; it was all too much like what Peter had asked her mother. Peter waited for her response. Wendy sighed.

"Yes Peter, you would be very soon."

"I don't want to go to school, and then an office and be a man!" He said to Wendy, just as passionately as he had said it to her mother. "Nobody is going to make me a man! I shall be back for Jane when the spring comes so she can help us clean and be our mother." And with that Peter jumped onto the windowsill and with a small salute to Wendy, flew off into the sky. Wendy watched as he turned into a little white dot in the sky, and then nothing. Wendy made a movement to close the window, stopped, and kept them open. Never would she leave them closed – just in case Peter ever changed his mind.

The End.