Disclaimer: I own nothing. At all. Nothing. Not even the pebbles on the ground these people walk on. Not mine. Nope.
Wow. Y'all gave me very inspiring reviews. Read The Playwright, people, I dare ye. ; )
When James crept back into the house, it was already nearly two in the morning. He was suddenly glad the boys didn't have school the next morning; he wouldn't be able to get himself up in time to help get them ready. He was very convinced that he would get a pretty good amount of sleep, due to the fact that he was worn out from listening and talking. Listening to Mr. Wonka, and talking to Mr. Wonka.
Wonka was, indeed, an interesting man, as James learned. His father didn't really give him much respect as a child; he had a feeling, he told James, that it was because he missed his mother, who had died when Willy was only four.
He had also talked about his life as a chocolatier, going from hopes and dreams to a little shop on the corner to an enormous factory. He talked about Charlie, the little boy who'd won the entire factory and was Wonka's best friend.
When he asked James to talk, the other man was slightly startled. He'd been watching Wonka speak with intense interest, and when he stopped, James nearly urged him to continue. But apparently, it was his turn to have a word.
He talked about his parents and his several brothers; the one who'd died and the fact that his mother never really knew James was there. He recounted writing his first play and meeting Charles Frohman, his producer and good friend. When he approached the topic of the Llewellyn-Davies', he hesitated. The memories of Sylvia were a bit too hurtful to recall, yet he did anyway, pausing mid-sentence only once to regain his ability to speak.
When he did, Wonka had changed the subject and asked about Peter. James told him about Peter Pan, then talked about George, Michael, and Jack. He even talked about Neverland.
"Neverland," Willy had asked, genuinely curious. "What's that?"
"Oh," James murmured, leaning back on the bench they were sitting on in the park, which was shrouded by darkness. "It's a wonderful place, Mr. Wonka. Pirates and mermaids live there. Fairies. It's a place that thrives on wonderful imaginations and pure hearts. I go there every once in a while. You know…for space."
"Can I go there?"
James looked at Wonka's hands, which were resting on his Technicolor cane. He smiled faintly, letting the vapor his breath was creating in the cold night air vaguely obscure his vision. He looked back at Wonka's face. "Do you have a wonderful imagination and a pure heart, Mr. Wonka?"
"I might," he'd replied quietly, glancing at his own hands as well.
"Then I really don't see why not."
"What if I don't have an imagination and a pure heart?"
James leaned forward and said carefully, "I don't think you have anything to worry about there; just by what you've told me, you have a pretty astounding imagination."
"A pure heart?"
James gave a half-grin. "Perhaps someday you'd like to prove that to me, ay?"
Wonka looked at him, not sure what James meant. James, however, chuckled and tapped the brim of Wonka's top hat, standing up and taking Peter's notebook with him back to his house.
The period of time between leaving Wonka and climbing into bed completely flew over James's head. It seemed like one minute he was walking away from Wonka, having been cheered up considerably; the next minute, he was staring up at his ceiling, imagining he was outside laying in the grass, staring up at the stars.
He also imagined he was with Willy Wonka….
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
"I didn't mean to scare you, Charlie."
"There is absolutely no excuse for that, Mr. Wonka. I woke up, and the Oompa-Loompas said you weren't here. You…you had me worried!"
Willy rubbed his temple with his free hand and limped half-heartedly out of the Chocolate Field and towards the Glass Elevator. Charlie was at his heels, sounding a lot like his own mother at this point.
"Don't go out so late at night again, Mr. Wonka. I don't want to wake up to find you've gone missing—"
Willy stopped inside the Glass Elevator, then turned to face Charlie. "I saw Mr. Barrie."
Charlie stopped speaking and sighed through his nose. "How'd it go?"
Willy's features lit up, despite the fact that he was exhausted after falling asleep on the bench in the park. "We talked for a few hours." He looked at the ceiling of the Glass Elevator, motioning for Charlie to join him. When the boy got into the elevator, Willy looked down only to press a button labeled "Balm Room." Once the elevator took off, Willy just gazed at the ceiling again.
The two of them rode the elevator in silence, and Willy stared at the ceiling the entire time. When they got to their destination, Willy lifted his arms in exclamation.
"Ah, here we are!"
The fact that Charlie had never seen this room before startled him; he was sure he'd gotten a good look at every important room in the factory. Of course, there were a few rooms Willy was hiding, but Charlie understood those were secret rooms. He knew that even though Willy trusted him greatly, it would still be some time before he was allowed access to these mysterious rooms.
Even so, this room didn't seem to have a reason to remain a secret, yet Charlie had no prior knowledge of it. It was an interesting room indeed; there were several pale yellow shelves with hundreds of tiny multi-colored tubes sitting on them. Charlie realized after looking around the room for a while that one side of the room started with red colored tubes, then they merged into various shades and hues of orange, then yellow, and so on until there were separate shelves for black, white, and grey. No two tubes were the exact same color.
"This is the Balm Room, Charlie," Willy said cheerfully, walking out of the elevator. "Do you know what all these little tubes are?"
Charlie shook his head, sidestepping an Oompa-Loompa who was carrying a light turquoise tube past him.
Willy stood up onto the rolling stepladder, grabbing a deep red tube from one of the topmost shelves. He examined it for a second, a bright smile on his face, then handed it carefully to Charlie, who frowned.
Charlie examined it, too, and comprehension dawned on him. "Lip Balm," Charlie murmured, looking up at Willy in amazement.
"That's right," the chocolatier said, carefully descending from the ladder and dusting off his overcoat. "Not only is it Lip Balm, but it has different flavors, and not only is it for your lips, but you can put it on foods and candy, too! Imagine, Charlie, a candy seasoning for candy!"
"This one's cherry," Charlie said, reading the label. "What other flavors do you have?"
"Well, there's pumpkin and pumpkin pie," Willy chimed, waving to a few orange-colored tubes. "And there's lemon, banana, and even butter."
Charlie laughed. "Butter?"
"I had to use something for yellow…it could've gotten very ugly." He continued down the army of shelves. "Pecan, peach, pineapple, lime, pea, lettuce…."
"You have nearly every flavor," Charlie murmured, following Willy and gazing at the tubes of Lip Balm in astonishment.
Willy beamed again. "I do. But I need your help, Charlie. I'm not sure if I should add flavors or take some out." He took out a dark green tube and showed it to Charlie. "Broccoli?"
"Get rid of it."
Willy tossed it into a large box in the corner marked "Rejects." He pulled out two others: "How about blue raspberry and blueberry?"
"Sounds good to me."
This continued for a while, yet it stopped when Willy announced they would continue their "shenanigans" the next day.
"I was thinking of making a Barrie flavor," Willy said, breaking the silence that had once again reached the two of them on the elevator trip back to the Chocolate Field.
Charlie did a double-take. "A what?"
"A berry flavor," Willy repeated. "I don't think I have enough Barrie flavors. Which berry do you think I need?"
"Mr. Wonka," Charlie asked, watching outside of the elevator to take a guesstimate at how far away they were currently from the Bucket house. "Are you saying…Barrie, or…berry?"
Willy raised an eyebrow. "There's no difference between the two things you just said, dear boy." He tilted his head. "I said berry."
"As in…berry?"
"Yes."
"But…it sounded like you said Barrie."
"That's exactly what I said."
Charlie closed his eyes and shook his head briefly, then opened them and said, "Berry? As in the fruit? Or Barrie as in Mr. Barrie?"
There was a long silence, and Willy raised both of his eyebrows and flushed a deep pink. His mouth formed a small, surprised 'o' and he stared at Charlie, realizing his fault. "Why, that's just silly, Charlie," he said, grinning nervously. "You can't have a Mr. Barrie-flavored Balm." Yet again he blushed. "It wouldn't be…ethical. It's an…unethical thought, Charlie. Ethicality is…good. That's…unethical, which is…bad. Hurray for ethicality!"
Charlie stared at Willy, slightly amused at the disorder of his mentor, who'd chosen to fall very, very silent the rest of the trip.
Ah, 'tis the ending of a very well-liked chapter by the authoress herself. Ha. I really do like this chapter. I put together the Balm Room very nicely, don't you agree. :P Oh, and...as you all probably found out, I know nothing about J. M. Barrie's brothers. Heh...