Disclaimer: Not mine!
A.N.: Sorry it took so long to update, and sorry if this is a bit weird, it was written all in one go, from 10 o'clock in the evening to 1 o'clock in the morning.
III
Her Diary
III
Margaret led the two teenagers into what could have been a basement. It was, indeed, underground, but looked more like a pantry then a basement. On the wall was a large painting of a young woman sitting down, and young man standing behind her with his hand on her shoulder, a small boy standing by the man's side and an even smaller girl sitting on the woman's knee. Alix had seen enough newspaper clippings to know who they were. So had Peter.
"Wendy." He whispered.
"Yes, my grandfather insisted on having it painted after my mother was born, and Nana Wendy left it to her in her Will, and she left it to me." Margaret explained, "Mother hated it."
"It's not very good." Peter agreed, "You can't see any of Wendy's…goodness. She looks empty."
"Why is it down here?" Alix asked, "I mean, it's very well painted, why isn't it in the entrance hall?"
"Because it's a secret." Margaret grinned, and reached pulled at the picture frame. Alix gasped, sure it was going to drop off the wall, but instead it swung open, revealing a safe, "I keep everything to do with my family, especially my grandmother, in this safe. My home was robbed a few years ago, and I didn't feel it was safe there."
She pulled out a battered old book, and handed it to Peter, who took it lovingly in his hands. He stroked the cover for a moment, before looking up at Margaret.
"You said she sealed it with Pixie Dust?"
"My mother and I tried to open it for years, but we never could." The old woman told him, "We tried everything short of ripping it open. You can try but I don't know if-"
She stopped, because as Peter ran his finger over the golden lock, the book had sprung open.
"Oh." She whispered.
"As if Wendy could ever keep anything locked away from Peter." Alix grinned, and Margaret could not help but smile back.
"No, I suppose she couldn't." She agreed.
III
"So, are you going to leave tonight?" Alix asked. They were standing outside her house, Peter clutching the diary tightly.
"After I've read the diary, yes." He nodded.
"Then I suppose this is goodbye." She laughed at that, "God that sounds cheesy."
"Well, all girls are cheesy." He told her, and she hit him lightly on the arm.
"Shut up." She grinned, "It was…really great meeting you. Not many people get to say they hung out with Peter Pan and Tinkerbell."
"Um…Alix." He looked away, as though embarrassed, "Thank you, for everything. I'd never have found any of this if it wasn't for you."
"It was nothing Peter." She hesitated for a second before hugging him, "Come visit me next time you're in London, no matter how old I am."
"I will." He promised, and started his walk home.
Alix watched him walk for a moment before heading back into her house. She greeted her parents briefly and hurried up to her room. Closing the door behind her, she stumbled towards her bed, finally allowing herself to cry.
"Damn it Peter." She whispered, "Why couldn't you have asked me to fly away with you?"
But she knew the answer, and it only made her cry harder.
III
Dear Diary,
Charles has asked me to marry him. Mother and Father approve, so I suppose I should be happy. He is a charming young man, and I enjoy his company a lot. And I think he likes my stories. And he doesn't seem to mind that I have other male friends. What would I do if I could not talk to James Barrie?
I was so pleased when James got his book published. True, it is not exactly as I told it, but it is supposed to be a children's book, and the true story may be a little too grown up for them. And, of course, he had to make the story his own is some way.
I wish the ending really had been true, with me going off to visit Peter once a year. It wouldn't be perfect, but it would be so much better then never seeing him again.
Oh I miss Peter so. I don't think I could love anyone as I loved him. No, not even Charles, although I am fond of him.
I miss Peter.
I miss Peter.
I miss Peter.
Dear Diary,
Mother is ecstatic. She says that it was the most beautiful wedding she had ever seen. I suppose it was nice.
But I so hoped that he would turn up, to claim me as his own. I knew he would not though.
Dear Diary,
I am pregnant. Mother is, of course, delighted. She hopes it will be a girl. So do I. I mean, I love little Charlie, but he is far more his father's child then mine. If it is a girl, I shall call her Jane, like in the book.
Dear Diary,
Jane said her first word today. It was Peter! I am so happy! Charles was not very pleased, and Charlie just laughed, but it warms my heart to hear Peter's name upon a child's lips. Just as it should be.
Dear Diary,
A war has broken out. I was terrified that Charles would have to go away, but his leg injury means that he's unfit. He was so angry when that car hit him; he said that it ruined his life. I think now he's sees that it actually saved his life.
Charlie will no longer listen to my stories about Peter. He says they are infantile. Jane still listens to them religiously, she loves them. She has taken to insisting that the window of the nursery is kept open. She says that Peter will come for her, like he did in the book.
If he does not, she will be wither heartbroken, or will cease to believe that he exists, like Charlie. If he does…I should be happy for her if he does come. But I know that I will be jealous. Jane will be the little girl who flies in the sky with the boy I love.
Yes, even though I should be over him, I still love him, with the same innocent love of childhood. My love for Charles is the love of an adult, and it can never compare. Charles knows that, and that is why he hates my stories.
I can hear him, building a bomb shelter in the cellar.
Dear Diary,
Today the war had ended! Charlie and Jane were playing out in the road with all the other children, dancing and celebrating. For the first time on over a year Charles smiled at me, and kissed my hand as he used to when we were young. For a moment I saw the young charming man I married, instead of the crippled bitter man he has become.
Jane has an admirer. Edward Masters, the son of one of Charles' friends, has taken to following her around. She is embarrassed of course, but I think it is sweet. He is a blond boy, with light blue eyes. If she is anything like her mother, he is just the sort of boy she will fall for.
Dear Diary,
Edward has asked for Jane's hand in marriage. Charles and I agree that it is acceptable. Jane is overjoyed. I hope that she has chosen a better companion than I did.
Charles and I rarely talk anymore. He spends all day in his study, being miserable over his leg, which seems to get worse everyday. He now cannot walk without his walking stick. I feel that he is chained to the ground, and that he is chaining me down with him.
How I wish I could fly, like I did in my youth.
Dear Diary,
Jane has had her child. It is a beautiful little girl. She has named her Margaret. Somehow I had hoped that Jane had got over the childhood stories of Peter Pan, but she has not. When Jane placed the baby in her crib she whispered to her "I hope that he visits you, like he never visited me." How can I explain to Jane that he did not abandon her, but me?
Charlie, it seems, is as lost to me as his father. He told me today that I am a bad wife for not supporting Charles more. I explained to him that his father is a stubborn ass who wallows in self pity.
When I told Peter that there was so much more, I did not mean this. I did not mean a miserable husband, an arrogant son and a disillusioned daughter. Margaret seems to be the last bit of happiness I have. When I look into her sweet face, I feel the stirring of childhood once again. But other than that, I have nothing of the young Wendy inside me.
Dear Diary,
We are at war again, and Charlie has gone off to fight. I begged him not to, but Charles gave some speech about 'a man's duty' and told Charlie that he was proud of him. I almost killed him. He's sent our son off to die in some foreign country, alone.
I can feel the last bit of my childhood dying. With Charlie off at war, Jane raising her daughter with her husband, and Charles making me as miserable as possible every chance he gets, I am withering away.
I have decided that I must do something. I am going to put together every scrap of childhood that I can summon into a box, and seal it, just in case Peter ever does come back for me. Then he can have that box, which will contain the Wendy he loved. For god knows I am not her.
Margaret is the only one I live for. My husband and children are all bitter in one way or another, Charles over his leg, Charlie over something, possibly my lack of affection for him as a child, and Jane over Peter never coming for her. But Margaret is perfect, and I will make sure that she will never be bitter.
Perhaps she will be the one who will give the box containing my childhood to Peter.
III
Peter did not even stop to pick up the diary when he knocked it over in his rush to get to the phone.
III
"Ok, ok, explain again." Alix urged him. Peter had phoned her up a few minutes before and had hurriedly explained something to her, but she had no idea what.
"She put her childhood somewhere!" he shouted down the phone, "In a box! It's all there, her childhood, waiting for me! I have to find it, that's what will fix me!"
"Peter, go and get the diary, she might have written where she put it in her diary." Alix ordered, and she heard him scrambling around down the line.
"Ok, one minute." He said, and she heard the rustling of paper, "Ok, she doesn't mention the box for a while, and then…Oh no."
"What, what is it?" Alix asked.
"This is after her house got blown up. She says she's worried because she hid the box in the house, and now she thinks it's been destroyed." Peter explained, "She says she wanted to grab it when they were hiding, but didn't want Charles to see… Where would they have been hiding?"
"In a bomb shelter, probably." Alix told him, "But I'm pretty sure there isn't a bomb shelter in our house."
"But there was!" Peter exclaimed, "Look, listen to this, 'I can hear him, building a bomb shelter in the cellar.' It's in your cellar!"
"Peter, it won't still be there." Alix pointed out.
"Yes it will, it will!" he shouted down the phone so loudly that she had to move the receiver away from her ear, "Go look for it now, I'm coming right over."
He slammed the phone down, and Alix was left with a silent phone line.
"Damn it!" She muttered, "As if it'll still be there!"
But she still made her way down to her bottom floor, and stood outside the cellar door.
"Dad!" She called out nervously, "My light bulbs gone! I'm gonna go get a new one from the cellar, ok?"
"Alright." Her dad called out from the living room, "But be careful on the stairs."
Alix's cellar wasn't a very bad one, not really. It was small and dusty, true, but brightly lit, and filled with interesting things accumulated over the years. She made her way down the stairs, which were more like a ladder really, and picked her way past the old wheel chair and table that took up most the room.
"Where the hell do I start?" She muttered, and picked up a box at random and moved it out of the way.
Half an hour later she was still sifting through the mess.
"Ok, ok, be methodical. If I wanted to hide something, I'd hide it in a place where it would be safe, and not easily seen. Maybe in the walls?" She began to inspect all the walls for loose bricks, but they were all reassuringly sturdy. It occurred to her to look for loose floor boards, but then she reminded herself that the floor was made from solid concrete.
"Alix!" her dad called down, "Are you still looking for light bulbs?"
"Um…yeah…and look, there they are!" She called up, diving for the box of light bulbs on the table. Just as her hand closed around the box she felt herself loose balance, and grabbed wildly for something to keep her balance. She clutched the back of a chair, but that only resulted in bringing the chair down with her, and it banged against the floor with a hollow thud.
"Are you alright?" her father called out, surprised at the noise.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine!" She assured him, "I'm…wait?"
The chair had landed with a hollow thud…on solid concrete?
She picked up the chair and moved it away; running her hands over the area it had landed on. It was slightly bouncy, like warped wood. She looked over at the nearest wall, and saw that the floor seemed to fall short of the brick. Prizing her fingers into the small space, she began to pull back what seemed to be a sort of thick grey plastic, which looked identical to the concrete floor. And below it, just as she had thought, was warped wood. Again, she prized her fingers into a small space, this one the space between the floorboards, and lifted the wood.
The box was untouched by dust, the plastic having kept all of it out. Alix reached in and grabbed it, before letting the wood fall back into place. She replaced the plastic covering, and started to make her way back up the stairs before remembering the light bulbs. She passed her father as she closed the cellar door.
"You're covered in dust." He noted.
"I'll shower later." She promised, and rushed up the stairs. She ran into her bedroom, and yelped in surprise when she found it occupied.
"Peter!" She exclaimed, her hand at her chest, "Give me a bloody heart attack, why don't you!"
"Sorry." He grinned, then looked at her hand, "Is that it?"
"I think so." She replied, passing him the box, "Peter…please don't get your hopes up about this."
He didn't reply as his fingers ran over the small box. It was plain, just a simply carving for a pattern in the lid. There was no lock, and it put up no resistance as Peter lifted the lid. Alix inhaled sharply, and then…nothing.
"What's inside?" She asked.
"Things." He whispered, "Just…things."
He showed her. There was a folded up piece of paper, an acorn, some dried flowers, a very ornate necklace, a dagger, a lock of hair and some dust.
"What are they?" Alix said nervously.
"Those are Neverland flowers." Peter pointed, "That's the dagger Nibs gave her to defend herself, that's a lock of her hair, that's one of the jewels we stole from the pirates, that's Pixie Dust, and that's my kiss."
"And the paper?"
"I don't know." He shrugged.
"Don't you want to see?" Alix asked.
"You look." Peter told her, and she nodded, and took the paper.
"It's a poem." She said after a moment, "A love poem…about you."
"Oh." There was a long silence, and then; "I thought it would really be her."
"I know you did." Alix said sadly.
Tinkerbell, who rarely made any noise these days, tugged affectionately at Peter's hair.
"I suppose you're going to go back to Neverland now." Alix murmured.
"No." Peter shook his head, "I can't go back, it won't have me back, I'm still broke."
"But what about Tinkerbell?" Alix asked, aghast.
"What about her?" He asked, bemused.
"Don't tell me she's supposed to look like that!" Alix exclaimed, pointing at the fairy, "Peter, can't you see? She's dying! She's not supposed to be here, it's killing her. If you don't go back, she's going to die!"
"I suppose she's loosing her glow a bit…" He admitted, looking at Tinkerbell properly for what seemed like the first time ever.
"A bit? Peter, I've only seen her over these last few weeks and I can see how much she's loosing her glow. You cannot be that blind."
"Tink…?" He asked, uncertain. The little fairy tried to look brave, but her glow was diminishing, and her face was shrunken and unhealthy.
"Go Peter, go, now. Neverland is your home, your soul; it will let you back if you need it to." Alix assured him. Peter walked towards her open window and stood by it for a minute. Then he turned to look at her, and his light blue eyes were alive.
"You're right, it will." He agreed, "Alix…come with me."
III
She couldn't. Her family, her education, her friends, her life.
Peter Pan, the boy of fairytales, stood in front of her.
She'd be throwing it all away, all of it.
Tinkerbell, a real live fairy, stood on his shoulder.
Everything she'd ever worked so hard for…
Neverland waited…
She couldn't.
But how could she not?
III
She smiled, and his face lit up.
"Just think happy thoughts." He whispered as Tinkerbell whizzed around her head, sprinkling Pixie Dust.
I'm going to fly away with Peter Pan.
Her feet lifted off the ground, and laughter bubbled out of her. She watched him zoom out of her window, and was about to follow him when she saw the open box sitting on her bed. She reached back and grabbed it, and then…
She stepped out of the window…
…and into eternity.
III
A.N.: Not finished, not finished at all! There is more to come, when Wendy and Peter get reunited!
Thanks to:
Prieto: Not too long now! And Peter could never be happy with Alix.
YokoYuyGal: I understand, lusting after Peter Pan so much, yet loving Wendy too. And thank you!
Tidus' girl Candy: Don't worry kiddo, Happy ending just around the corner.
Kittybro: Well, here's an update.
Cherry2hil: Thank You Muchly!
Zeldy: Well, Alix might have a bit of a crush on him, but she knows that he'll never be hers.
Miki123: Sorry I'm so slow updating!
Zorrina: Well, now you know!
Mike: Yay, I love your reviews, so encouraging! Sorry I take so long to update, I'm lazy.
SilveryStars: I'm not sure if I got Peter right this chapter, it was a bit rushed.
Kasmira36: Nope, no time machine, although you might start to work it out now.
Horsefly: I used to love Quantum Leap! But I have an idea of how to resolve this.
Leli1013: The fun ness of suspense
Girl with the Evil Computer: It was actually your post that inspired me to write another chapter. So here it is!