Thank you so much for your reviews. I must say, I like writing the boys, because it's a challenge to make them all interesting and different given how little Barrie said about them. I've spent a good deal of time scouring through my copy of Peter and Wendy, making sure I've got facts straight.
Matter of fact, I had finished this one earlier today, but I realized that it hadn't mentioned white rats at all. In the book, Nibs has a bit of an obsession with white rats, so I went back and re-wrote it, white rats included. The book that Nibs got his name from was, of course, written by Charles Dickens.
The Taming of the Six: Nibs
I'm not Nibs anymore. I never liked being Nibs. Now my name is Nicholas. I picked the name out myself from a book on the shelf in the nursery, while I was waiting for my turn in the bath. The book was called Nicholas Nickelby, and it was written by a man with a funny name. I was rather proud of myself for having a name picked out from a book.
"And what's your name?" asked Wendy's mother (or Mrs. Darling, as Slightly says we're to call her).
"Nicholas," I said proudly. Or as proudly as one can be when he's sitting in a bathtub for the first time, and isn't completely sure what's going on.
"That's strange," she said, pouring some water over my head to wash the soap out. "Slightly said that Peter gave you all names because you couldn't remember your own, and thus far all the names have been odd ones."
I wiped some water out of my eyes, frowning. "Well, I used to be called Nibs, because when I was smaller I ate slowly, and Peter joked that I nibbled. But now I eat faster, and I never liked the name Nibs anyway."
"Then your name will be Nicholas from now on," she said.
Encouraged by my success in one area, I decided to bring up another subject that had always been on my mind.
"Can I have a white rat?" I asked. "I used to want a cheque-book, for my real mother, but I doubt that I'll ever find her. I'd really like a rat though, to keep as a pet."
"Whatever would you want a pet rat for?" Mrs. Darling asked.
"I like rats. They're quite smart. I used to watch them sometimes, but then the pirates came with a cat, and the cat killed them all." I grinned. "I killed the cat, though. I made the skin into a hat, but The Twins were very small then and one of them peed in it by accident. So I punched him."
Mrs. Darling looked uncomfortable. I bit my lip, realizing that it probably wasn't a good idea to talk about killing and punching and peeing in hats to a lady, especially when the lady was going to be my new mother.
"I'm sorry if I'm upsetting you," I said. I tried to stand up and bow, like I'd seen Peter do, but I lost my balance and slipped. Mrs. Darling caught me just before I hit my head on the side of the tub.
"It's all right," she said. "Just be careful."
"Can I have a white rat if I'm careful?"
She laughed. "I'll have to talk to George, but I don't see any reason why not," she said.
"Who's George?"
"My husband."
"Oh, you mean Not A Cypher."
"Not A Cypher?"
"Yes, because he said he didn't want to be treated as a cypher in his own house, so I said that we should all call him 'Not A Cypher' so we wouldn't forget. What's a cypher?"
"A cypher is a person or thing that doesn't mean anything," she said, laughing again.
"I suppose Peter is a cypher now," I said solemnly. "I know he said that he'd come visit, but he always forgets. Once he forgot Tootles, and made him sleep outside for nearly a week. We all thought that he'd be killed by something for sure, but we didn't dare let him in because of Peter."
"Poor Tootles," she said, quite sincerely.
"He's the most unfortunate of us," I explained. "He never has any adventures, and he's always having accidents. We really shouldn't have worried when Peter forgot him. He's so unlucky that nothing happened to him at all, except that he was bruised from tripping over things." I hoped she wouldn't ask me any more. I was sick of talking about Tootles. He's annoying. To make sure she wouldn't ask any more about Tootles, I changed the subject.
"So, do you think we'll do well in school?" I asked.