The year was 1726. A boy wandered through the large house that belonged to his rich aunt. His parents had died a couple years before, and for a time, he had lived here happily. But his aunt, as it turned out, didn't much care for children. She hated them, in fact. The boy was only kept around because he was useful. He did everything he was told to do.
Still, at night, as he lay in bed, he looked out his window at the stars and dreamed that he could run away to a place where people weren't so mean to a six year old. He was beginning to wish he'd died with his parents.
This continued for two years, and on his eighth birthday, something happened. It wasn't his fault. His aunt had been in a bad mood and he probably should have known better than to ask, but it was his birthday and he really wanted just a few pencils and some paper to draw on, like all those famous artists he read about. He wanted to be an artist like them.
But his aunt had been angry and the boy was sent to his room until she said he could come out. The day passed slowly and she never came. The boy cried as the sun went down, but he didn't dare try the door. So he huddled on his bed and tried to quiet his sniffles so no one would hear. Tears streamed down his face and he whimpered almost inaudibly. He wished so badly that his parents could come back and take him home. He didn't want to be here.
A shadow passed over his face and he startled, hastily wiping away his tears as he glanced up, expecting to see his aunt standing there, ready to yell at him for crying.
But it was just a boy. He was dirty and he wore strange clothes, but he was smiling.
"Hey there, kid," he said. "What's the matter?"
He talked funny. The boy tried not to laugh at it, which wasn't hard because he was quite embarrassed at being caught crying like a baby. He just stared at the older boy, blinking.
"Say," the boy said, "What's your name? They call me Peter. Peter Pan." He extended a hand, which the boy looked at curiously, then he shook it and squeaked, "They call me Rat..." He'd had a name with his parents. A real name. But he couldn't remember it.
"Rat, huh?" Pan said, making a face. "You don't look like a Rat. Don't you worry. I'll think of a better name for ya. How would you like that?"
The boy nodded, his eyes drying a bit. He sat up a little and asked, "How did you get in here?"
"Why, I flew!" Pan grinned, and just like that, he floated off the ground, making the boy smile for the first time. Pan floated back down and said in a whisper, "I can take you away from here. You don't have to be Rat anymore. You can fly!"
The boy's smile faded and he glanced at the door. "I... My aunt... She'll be angry."
"Let her be angry," Pan said flippantly. "She'll never be able to hurt you again, cross my heart." He went as far as to make to motion across his chest and the boy nodded slowly, then more firmly.
"Well then, take my hand," Pan said, offering it.
That was the start.
The little boy found a new home in Neverland and he earned a new name, Foxy. It was much better than Rat, he thought happily.
There were other boys there too. His best friend became Squirrel, a mute, freckled boy with sandy hair. Together, they ran around in the woods, plotting mischief and playing like little kids do.
Nothing changed for years, not even their age. Pan said they'd be young forever. They never had to grow up.
Foxy spent years and years learning everything he could. Pan even brought him things back from his old home, mostly books. The 1700s went by. Then the 1800s. Foxy grew to be the smartest boy in Neverland, teaching what he knew to the other lost boys. He loved to draw and as time went by, he became quite good. Squirrel liked to watch him silently for hours as he painted the bay, as he drew Mermaid Lagoon.
But Neverland became a prison more than a place of freedom. Foxy watched as more and more lost boys came to live here in the paradise that Pan had created. He was restless and he kept asking Pan about his old home until the older boy looked at him with a small smile. "Would you like to go back now, Foxy?"
He hadn't thought he could. But hearing so, he grinned and nodded vigorously. He could start new, grow up and be the best artist in the world. He could find a pretty girl and have children of his own one day.
Pan, as promised, took him back.
The world had changed so much. Foxy couldn't help but be overwhelmed by it all. Wandering the streets of a big city called New York, he carefully picked his way through crowds of people wearing strange clothes. They looked at him oddly and he found himself, looking down to avoid their gazes. He felt small and vulnerable, but he walked on.
He was on the street for three days before James found him. James was a policeman, Foxy learned, and he seemed very nice. He asked where the boy's parents were and Foxy told him they were dead. They had died a long time ago.
James then asked him if he had any other family and Foxy shook his head. They were all long dead too.
James looked at him with concern and he promptly led Foxy to his car. James said he was going to find him a place to live.
Foxy thought maybe he meant he knew someone who would look after him, but it ended up that James took him home and Foxy met Maria.
In no time at all, they became his new parents and they even gave him a brand new name. Neal.
Neal was ten when everything changed.
His father was no longer there, and his mother made them move away with James' partner, Ellen. Together, they went away and didn't speak of James again.
Maria became distant and Neal learned not to bother her. Instead, he turned to Ellen, who raised him like she had been his mother all along.
She took care of him for eight years.
Neal had wanted to be a cop, just like his dad. They told him he'd died a hero, so he intended to follow in his footsteps. On his eighteenth birthday, however, all of that changed.
Ellen told him the truth, that his father might have killed someone and that he wasn't dead. He was on the run. Neal didn't listen to the rest. With tears in his eyes, he fled and he didn't look back.
All those years on his own in Neverland had taught him how to look after himself and now that he was familiar with this world, it was easy to get everything he needed.
He never went back home, becoming a ghost. He tricked and conned, the rush of living on the edge becoming too addicting to leave behind.
He was no longer Neal Bennett, though. He didn't want anything to do with his father anymore. He was Neal Caffrey. His mother's last name was comforting, in a way. He wondered if she even missed him.
Everything after that, well, it slowly got better. He made a friend in Mozzie and soon after, he met Kate.
Mozzie was a good friend. They got along famously, but all through it, Neal kept thinking that they had known each other.
A year went by before he figured it out.
Squirrel.
His old friend from Neverland had left soon after he did and he'd grown up in Detroit. He'd started talking not long after an orphanage for boys had taken him in, and had been looking for Foxy ever since.
Now that they'd found each other, they slipped easily back into their mischevious ways and with Kate, they were nearly unstoppable. Everything was as it was supposed to be.
At least until another Peter came along.
This Peter was no Pan. He was a serious grown up, practically nothing child-like about him. Neal took an immediate interest and so began the chase.
Neal stayed just out of reach, laughing, while Peter Burke chased him, trying not to laugh as well. It was a grand game of cat and mouse, in which it was difficult to tell who was who.
But then Neal let his guard down. When it came to Kate, that happened a lot, so it should have been no surprise that Peter was there to catch him.
It had been a good game, but now it had ended and Neal let it go. He knew when the chase was over.
And yet now here he was, at Peter's side. They worked together, no longer chasing each other, but chasing others. It was a new game, one that Neal found he enjoyed. Especially since he got to legally do the things he was good at.
They worked together flawlessly and Neal used everything he'd learned in his long, long life to help.
As he followed Peter up go his office, the agent called him a name. It was a specific name, one that almost made Neal laugh out loud.
"Peter Pan."
No, he thought, but close.
I'm a lost boy.