Summary: The fate of the Darling women proves inescapable, even to those who do not have daughters. Three orphans of the Neverland Orphanage are swept away by Peter Pan, despite a Darling's best efforts to prevent just that. This story means to tell of the three orphans' adventures in the Neverland, and the adventures of those who preceded them. This story is based on the book by JM Barrie, not any of the movies. The rating has been cranked up because later chapters will be dealing with violence & other non-K things.

Disclaimer: While the characters of the Neverland Orphanage are of my own creation, Peter, Smee, Wendy, John, Michael, Wendy's daughter & Wendy's granddaughter are all belonging to JM Barrie. Michael & John's descendants are of my own imagination, too.


Chapter Four: Gossip & Stories

Allison left the Neverland Orphanage just before breakfast. The teens watched from their dormitory window as she pulled up the collar of her coat against the autumn wind and climbed into the front seat of a long van parked in front of the building. They gaped at the sight of Allison in clothes they had never seen. They were accustomed to her in the aproned dress she wore everyday; like their own uniforms, the dress was standard-issue blue with "Neverland Orphanage" embroidered on the breast. The traveling dress she wore now had a hemline above the knee and was a serious, sophisticated brown, a far cry from standard-issue blue.

The van was new to them, as well. They stared hard at the tinted windows, imagining they saw the solid shapes of people moving inside until Holly called them away from the window. They started dreamily at her voice, staring back at Holly in the doorway like they did not recognize her. Allison had always called them down for breakfast. In their confusion, they did not notice Holly's cheerful smile twitch and almost, for the briefest moment, falter. She fixed it quickly and stepped into the room, laughing with carefully applied merriment at the bewildered teens huddled at the window.

"You'll miss breakfast if Miss Anne has anything to say about it," Holly sang out, shaking her head playfully at them. The scene was rather pathetic, the girls crowded together like a single knot of confusion, eyeing Holly warily. But they liked Holly: she was younger than Allison, considerably younger than Anne, and indulged the teens' desire for the trendy and fashionable. She had shown them, by their special request and with Allison's special permission, how to sew their own bell-bottom slacks from standard-issue blue fabric (though Allison was not as lenient when it came to the much admired platforms Holly donned on her off-days), and always brought them gifts from her weekends off. One week she had brought bolts of fabric from a store that had readily donated the scraps for the "poor dears," and she often returned with sweets and magazines. And there was the legendary Sunday when she had led to the fourth floor a helpful street boy lugging an outdated but fully functional record player and a cardboard box full of records. A lucky find at a garage sale, Holly boasted. The teens argued over which was the real lucky find: the record player or the slightly dirty yet still pleasant to look at boy. Ever since that day, the teens had put extra effort into their grooming and primping on Sundays, and they always wore the clothes they had made from the donated fabric, lounging in careful, pretty poses around the dormitory.

The teens were fond of crowding into Holly's quarters as she prepared for a weekend off, watching with envious, adoring eyes as she brushed out her long hair. It was kept tightly bound and up during the week, but Holly always let it down for the weekend, unlike Anne and her eternal iron-grey bun. Holly's hair was golden and thick and fell past her waist, and as the teens watched Holly easing the comb through it, they imagined her like Rapunzel standing at her tower window, for even though they were certainly Too Old for such fancies, Holly's hair was undoubtedly the stuff of stories.

And so, even though they were troubled by Miss Allison's strange, swift departure and the sight of her legs in stockings emerging from below the hem of a dress they had never seen, they trusted Holly and allowed her to guide them cheerfully downstairs.


The teens were subdued and obedient for the rest of the day, shuffling soberly from lessons to recess to meals, where they ate without even a low hum of chatter: even the silverware seemed to be whispering. After Holly had wrestled and soothed the three-and-unders, none of whom were particularly feeling Allison's absence, into bed, she climbed slowly the stairs to the fifth floor. It was too early to send the teens to bed, so Holly thought she might remove the most pinching of the pins that held her hair up – the teens would not mind if she came to them with a few loose strands, she knew.

Languorous as her pace already was, Holly felt her feet turn to lead as she dragged herself onto the third-floor landing. The closed door of the four-to-twelves' dormitory seemed to stare down at her, daring her to turn the knob and see if the girls had come back, if they had really gone at all. Holly shuffled closer to the door; it loomed over her as if it were solid, impenetrable stone rather than the same old creaking wood that comprised the rest of the building. Bowing her head toward the flaking surface of the door, Holly listened closely for some noise from the room beyond. The absolute silence was eerie, as the four-to-twelves were hardly known for their quietude.

Where were they? The question came unbidden, as did the tears that were suddenly stinging her eyes and burning at the back of her nose. Holly squeezed her eyes shut and stepped resolutely away from the door. They will be back, she told herself. She opened her eyes, the wetness smashed onto her lashes, and stared hard at the door in front of her. "They will be back," she hissed at the door. It loomed unchanged before her, but Holly found herself able to turn away and climb the stairs without looking back doubtfully. "They'll be back," she murmured to herself as she came to the fourth-floor landing.

It was only eight o' clock; the teens still had an hour until their official curfew, and this was commonly their noisiest hour. Holly was accustomed to the comfortable chatter of the girls reading to one another from the well-worn magazines over the music from the record player. Their pleasant noise should have pressed against the door, squeezed through the cracks, trickled into the hallway so that Holly could pass through it like a warm patch of sunlight on her way upstairs. Instead, she stood on the edge of a silence as complete as that on the third-floor.

Fighting against the panic rising in her throat, Holly could not help the chills that shivered down her back as she strained her ears for some sound from the teens. She forced herself to walk to the door, this one looming even more ominous than the one below. Her hand shook, and she grasped the door handle tightly, trying to steady herself. Carefully, she eased the door open, though she was anxious to wrench it from the hinges. There was a rustling noise as all of the teens turned their heads to the doorway, squinting as the light from the hallway spilled across their faces.

The room was dark. Every girl was in bed, though it was clear from their faces that no one had been sleeping. Holly blinked at them in disbelief. "It's eight o' clock," she said.

"We're very tired," Janet, the eldest, replied. The other girls nodded and rolled onto their backs, staring wordlessly at the ceiling. Holly stared at them, her eyes darting from one girl to the next. "Goodnight, Miss Holly," Janet said. Holly managed to whisper a good night before shutting the door on the silent girls. She stood in the hallway, shivering, waiting for some sound. But none came.

Instructing herself not to linger, she continued the interrupted climb to her quarters, picking up speed as she neared her room. She couldn't help the relieved sigh that came at the sight of a door that seemed welcoming rather than threatening. Ducking swiftly inside the room, she closed the door and leaned against the familiar surface gratefully. She sighed again, the tension beginning to ease out of her shoulders as she removed the hairpins biting at her scalp and drank in the sight of her room. Everything was in its proper place; everything was just as it should be.

And then: a knock.

Holly froze in the process of extricating a particularly stubborn pin and stared at the door with a bemused expression, as if asking it to kindly repeat itself. Except for Allison, no one ever knocked on her door; none of the girls were permitted on the fifth floor (and the only ones who would have broken that rule were currently missing in action), and Anne was hardly what one could consider a sociable co-worker. Outside of mealtimes and staff meetings, Holly had never exchanged more than polite greetings with Anne.

Holly's heart gave a sudden leap and she gasped, almost squealed. Perhaps it was Allison! Yes, it must be Allison, back already to tell her that everything was fine and she had found the girls and could she please tell the teens to turn their music down as it was nearly curfew. Holly skipped eagerly to the door, the fingers of one hand still gripping tightly the stubborn hairpin. She swung the door open wide, already smiling triumphantly.

"Good evening. May – may I come in?"

Holly felt the smile slide off of her face as her jaw dropped and she stared at Anne, who was standing in the hallway and looking positively nervous.

It was the fidgety, dodgy-eyed nervousness that really caught Holly off-guard. Anne was a great bulk of a woman, tall and broad and instantly intimidating. Everything about her seemed solid and severe: the rigidness of her posture seemed an amalgamation of finishing school and boot camp, and the heavy, wet-weather shoes she wore at all times gave her steps a heavy, final sound. One did not question the woman responsible for those steps. And there was the self-assured, stomping woman, her posture crumbled as she hunched almost timidly in Holly's doorway, her huge, calloused hands worrying each other, her stone-grey eyes darting anxiously to Holly and away again. If Holly hadn't been so shocked, she would have laughed.

"This is a bad time," Anne sighed. "I'm sorry to –"

"No, no!" Holly forced out, stepping aside to allow Anne room to enter. "Please, come in."

Anne ducked her head and rushed into the room, the only noise being the rustle of her skirts. Her loud shoes, Holly saw, had been replaced by a pair of yellow house slippers that matched the dressing gown she wore. The standard-issue blue uniform had been enough to make formidable Anne look almost silly, but the pastel dressing gown was absurd. Holly was still too surprised to laugh.

"I've just got to get these pins out of my hair," Holly explained, gesturing with her free hand for Anne to sit on the bed while she resumed her place at her dresser. She tried not to watch Anne's reflection in the mirror and kept talking, mostly to keep the awkwardness in the air from settling. "They pinch something awful. If you'd like some tea, you can fill up that pot and turn on the hot plate. There's bags and mugs on the shelf up there." She directed Anne by gesturing with her elbows, as both arms were raised and both hands busied with digging out the many hairpins. Anne jumped up eagerly and scampered about the room, filling the pot from the bathroom she and Holly shared. Once she had set it on the hot plate, there was nothing to do but wait for the water to boil. She resumed her seat on the bed while Holly dropped a handful of pins on the dresser. Anne watched in silence as she periodically dropped more pins Each time she removed one hand to put down the pins, a piece of her thick hair fell down. Most of these fell across her face, allowing her to watch Anne's reflection in the mirror without being noticed. Anne watched Holly take down her hair, Holly watched Anne watching her in the mirror, and they remained in silence until the water began to hiss in the pot.

Anne broke the ice, shifting on the bed and coughing a little to clear her throat. Holly shook some of the hair out of her face and half-turned toward Anne, still picking at the pins but listening.

"You're probably wondering why I'm here," Anne said, and laughed nervously.

Holly nodded as best she could, trying not to further entangle any of the hairpins.

Anne coughed again. Her hands were in her lap, fiddling with each other, worrying over the lines in her palms.

"Anne," Holly called gently after a moment. Anne looked up, her eyes wide and a little brighter than usual.

"What's happened to them?"

Holly's eyebrows flew up in surprise. She knew at once who Anne meant by "them," but Allison had given them orders not to discuss the four-to-twelves' disappearance, even with each other. Had she and Anne had a closer relationship, Holly herself might have approached Anne with a similar question. But she had never dreamed that stalwart Anne would dare go against orders. The woman lived for orders. Holly had the distinct impression that if Anne's life were one day suddenly devoid of both the following and giving of orders, she would drop dead on the spot. No wonder she was so nervous.

Holly tried not to smile at Anne, especially because the question was not a happy one. Allison had plainly told them that the four-to-twelves had gone to the Neverland with Peter Pan, and Holly repeated this to Anne.

"But you can't actually believe that!"

"Well," Holly said thoughtfully. "For it not to be true, that would mean one of two things: that Allison is lying, or that Allison is insane. I've never in my experiences with Allison known her to lie, not even to the children, and she struck me as a very truthful person when I first met her, so I'm not inclined to believe her to be a liar. And I've never felt that she was at all mentally unsound, either, though I suppose it's possible that one can't really tell. But I don't think she's crazy, personally. So, if she's not lying and she's not crazy, then it must be true, right?"

Anne blinked.

"Well, you've known her longer than I have. You tell me, Anne: is Allison lying, crazy, or correct?"

She sighed, now, and shifted on the bed. "I don't think she's lying, no, but – don't you think it's possible she has gone crazy?"

"With grief, you mean?"

"Well, yes. You saw how she was that night. I – I've never seen her like that."

Holly felt a twist of pity: Anne was actually frightened. The shining grey eyes looked beseechingly at Holly.

"She was...strange, I'll admit. But she snapped right back to normal, didn't she? Right back to controlled and in charge. She didn't seem to be crazy when she was making all those plans. It was as if she knew just what to do, as if she'd dealt with it all before."

"Oh!" Anne cried out as if she'd been struck. Holly flinched at the sudden outburst, wincing as a hairpin bit down into her scalp.

"What is it?" she asked, annoyed, as she rubbed the sore spot on her scalp with a fingertip.

"She has! She has dealt with it before!"

"What are you talking about?" Holly stared at Anne, who was wide-eyed and looked both excited and shocked. She got up suddenly, to make tea before the water boiled over, and was busy with that for longer than Holly felt she had patience.

"Anne!" she cried, anxiously.

"Yes, yes, coming!"

Anne placed a steaming mug on Holly's dresser and set her own on the side table, settling back onto the bed. She was even more fidgety than before, moving so restlessly that Holly felt herself becoming nervous and quickly found that her fingers had become agitated and firmly embedded several of the remaining hairpins in knots of hair.

"Come here," Anne beckoned at Holly's exasperated sigh. Bemused, Holly shuffled toward Anne, the mug of tea clenched in one hand while the other remained tangled in her hair. She settled herself on the floor in front of Anne with one yellow house slipper on either side of her. Anne's restless fingers worked swiftly and expertly at the tangles and pins and the action seemed to steady her.

"So, what's this about Allison, then?" Holly asked, after a careful sip of the hot tea.

"Yes, yes. You see, I've been here a long time. Longer than you, of course, but I've even been here longer than Allison. Before she came to run the orphanage, it was operated by her aunt, Belinda Sloane. Sloane the Crone, we called her. She was ancient. I was only a girl then, about your age, and Crone was just so old. We could never imagine her as ever being young, or ourselves as ever being that old. Of course, I'm probably the Crone of Neverland now." Anne laughed easily and Holly chuckled tentatively. It was true, and funny, but she didn't want to offend. Anne pressed on, working gently and steadily at a tricky pin in Holly's hair.

"The girls who worked here were always coming and going. They worked until they got married, usually, or until they found a job they wanted more than this one. The pay is hardly fantastic, as you well know. Crone kept the place open on her own funds – independently wealthy. But this is hardly the business one enters for large profits. So girls came and went, but I stayed, and stayed, and stayed, until only Crone and myself remained from the old times. Crone didn't have any children of her own, but she did have a niece, her sister's child, that she favored. Crone named this niece the sole heir of everything she had – the money, all of her property, and Neverland."

"Allison?"

"Right in one. Crone even put up the money for Allison to attend university. She loved that girl something fierce. And one day, while Allison was still in university, she showed up here late one night, banging on the door until I let her in. I thought she was hurt or in trouble, but she wouldn't talk to me; she charged right up to the Crone's quarters and when I came up after her, Crone sent me away. Told me not to disturb them. The girls and I – and the cook, and the maids, everyone – we all waited up in the kitchen for Allison to come back down, and most everyone was asleep by the time she did. The cook and I saw her leave and then the Crone rang for us and asked us to send everyone to bed. She didn't even mention it the next morning, or ever for two whole years. And two years later –"

"Allison came back to take over Neverland."

"That she did. Crone called me in for a private conference when Allison showed up. And she finally told me about that business those years ago. She told me that when Allison was a little girl, she had been spending the night with her favorite cousins and in the morning, they had all vanished. They came back, after a time, just showed up in their nursery with not a scratch on them. All except Allison's best friend, though. She was gone. But then, that night that Allison came to Neverland, she told the Crone that she had seen her best friend. She told the Crone that her best friend had come back and was still a child, like something out of a story. And that same night, she told the Crone that she'd never have children, that she wanted to have the orphanage. So the Crone told me all this, and swore me to secrecy, and asked me to stay here at Neverland for as long as I could stand it. And I plan to stay here until I'm carried out, and I've never told anyone this story except you just now. So there now, there's the last pin and my last word."

Anne dropped a prickly mass of pins into Holly's palm and took a long sip of her steeping tea.

Holly stroked her fingers along her scalp, shaking out her hair thoughtfully.

"Anne!" she cried suddenly, jumping up to her knees and whirling around to face the bed. Her foot struck the mug beside her and tea spilled across the floor, but she paid it no mind as she leaned toward Anne, wide-eyed with excitement. Anne looked alarmed.

"She said her cousin was still a child!"

Anne nodded slowly, hesitantly, and flinched when Holly cried out again.

"Children don't grow up in the Neverland! She's not crazy! She's telling the truth!"

"But it's just a story!"

Holly tutted impatiently. "Forget all that. This is fact! You've agreed that Allison isn't crazy, you only thought she'd gone crazy. But it's too consistent! She knew just what to do when she realized the girls had gone because she'd already gone through it with her cousin. And she didn't want to have any children because she was afraid that they'd go to the Neverland. And her name is Darling! It all makes such sense, don't you see?"

Anne was shaking her head and looking as if she did not see at all. "It's not real, Holly. How can the Neverland be real? Maybe she is crazy! Maybe she's always been crazy!"

"Would the Crone have given the orphanage to Allison if she were crazy?"

Anne frowned thoughtfully.

"This makes sense, Anne. It just takes some effort, but it makes sense."

Anne looked dubious. Holly rose to sit beside her on the bed and nodded encouragingly. "It makes sense."

"We'll have to trust her, I guess."

"And the stories. Children always come back from the Neverland, Anne. They'll be back."


and now a word from our author: i think it's safe to say i've lost my readership, but this is really for myself, anyway. i've got a story in me & i've got to get it out, even if i'm the only one sticking with it. to anyone reading, thank you! i hope it's enjoyable.