CHAPTER SIX: A Place Called Never Land
Tinker Bell focused all her attention on those two stars, trying not to look at anything else lest she might get lost. She had a hard time doing it, for elation and a deep sadness elbowed each other for space inside her very little heart. Elation because she was going back home, and deep sadness because she was leaving the boy behind.
And so she flew out of London's cold night, back into that blackness with the distant frozen fairy lights, until the lights once again danced and grew ever brighter and wilder, as if they were live things. As before, they pierced her heart with the sharpest of ecstasies, and that was why it took quite some time for her to notice that something was slowing her down as she flew.
That something, of course, was the dark something that held on to her as she was leaving the boy. As the fairy flew through the dizzying dancing colors, she felt a tug on her foot, and when she looked behind, she saw that dark something. At first, it was a wispy slip of a thing, but when the shards of light pierced that something dark, it took shape. Slowly, oh so very slowly, as she watched with her eyes wide and her mouth open, the fluttery thing transformed itself into… a hand.
The littlest finger was curled around her ankle, and in her panic, Tinker Bell shook her leg, and the finger lost its grip. Slowly, oh so slowly, the hand grew, until it became an arm. And then a shoulder attached itself to that arm. And then a torso. And then the other hand and two legs. And then the neck. And then…
She was looking at the head of the boy.
She blinked at him in her surprise, and then the boy blinked back at her.
"Who are you?" The boy asked, his voice curious but not alarmed.
Tinker Bell did not understand how this magic came to happen, but she was grateful, and so very happy.
"I am Tinker Bell, and I am your fairy."
"And who am I?" The voice inquired further.
And so Tinker Bell told him that he was her Boy. By this time they had arrived above the jungles of Tinker Bell's home. The boy looked beneath them as they hovered, taking in all the magnificent sights, and was pleased.
"Ah, the Never Land." He did not know how he knew, and neither did the fairy. But once That Wonderful Place heard the name, it claimed it for its own, so ever after it introduced itself as Never Land to all who came.
Tinker Bell led him down, and seeing that he had no clothes on, she flew about the forest plucking the prettiest leaves she saw, and with the help of some vines attached them to the boy's body in order to give him a semblance of modesty. Of course she was embarrassed, but her pink glow was not noticed by the boy who was busy looking everywhere around him, but even if he did, he would not have understood what had caused them. For he was, as anyone would know, the epitome of the innocence of children.
And so the boy remained Tinker Bell's, and Tinker Bell remained the boy's fairy, and for a very, very long time they flew about the Never Land and were happy.