As they stood around the bed of James Barrie, they still wondered how they came to be there and what the physical resemblance between the old man and Peter might mean; their whispered voices (they didn't dare raise their voices for fear that it could attract somebody's attention; the issue of explaining who they were and how they had come to be there would be too complicated) resounded in the sterile whiteness of the room. The story of the man who had spent almost his whole life sleeping, oblivious to everything, made a huge impression on them. The Lost Boys and their friends racked their brains over the mystery of the hospital room (Wendy and John had previously explained to them the concept of hospitals) in which they found themselves in. The only conclusion that they had managed to come up with during the five minutes of their heated discussion (which had developed after John stopped reading the clippings) was that they needed go out of the room and explore this new place where they found themselves in order to decide what to do next. After the first changes had begun to occur in Neverland (which now seemed centuries away to them) the children had developed a habit of discussing the steps that they should take instead of going headlong into something, which they had done previously. This change was partially due to their current situation and their unawareness of what exactly was the right thing to do in such a strange world. They could also use the discussion as a good excuse to mask their fear and thus postpone them from regretting a decision later, had they jumped headlong into it as they had done before.
Whatever decision of finding a way out of the unexpected situation that they now found themselves in, they didn't have time to agree on a course of action. Slightly was trying to convince his friends that the best thing to do would be to open the window and just fly away in order to get a better perspective on their new surroundings, when he was abruptly cut off, and remained frozen with his mouth open as the doorknob grated and the white painted door opened.
For the woman who entered the room, the sight of the children gathered in the small room was undeniably a much bigger shock to her than it could have been to the young runaways from Neverland. The woman, wearing a sort of a white gown like the one in which Nibs saw himself during his dream from which everything started, dark skinned and attractive – in fact, very resembling Tiger Lily thirty years later – looked like she saw a ghost. That was the only way in which her reaction to the children she saw so unexpectedly could be described. Her mouth painted with dark red lipstick opened , creating a perfect "o" shape, her eyes widened; the strange lady, frozen on the spot, like suddenly her legs were stricken by a sudden paralysis, raised her hand to cover her mouth, as if not trusting herself that no sound would come out of it.
For a moment, as long as eternity, the woman stared at the children with a look of complete shock, unable to move. She blinked several times, as if hoping that when she opened her eyes the children wouldn't be there. Her lips moved like she was going to say something but before she managed to do it, in a great rush of strength, grabbed a key she pulled out from her pocket and with one fast movement closed the door with it. Having doing this, the woman turned round to ask hoarsely: "Who are you?"
She resembled, at this moment poor Natalie who used to be Iridessa before. The Natalie who had wanted to know if Peter Pan and his friends were real. This feeling grew even stronger in the children when the woman in the white frock mumbled to herself, "They are real."
The events of the next ten minutes could be summarized as the never ending flood of questions and answers on both the sides. Who the mysterious newcomers were, why they were dressed in animal skins, if the little fairy who was with them was a real fairy, what the place they found themselves in was and how they found their way into it. Both sides, having cooled off the initial shock were doing their best to answer the questions asked to one another.
The dark skinned woman's name was Salima Junaid; she was a doctor in the Royal London Hospital – the place they were now. The woman, embarrassed with her exaggerated initial reaction – they were just children, even if wearing their animal skins costumes they weren't a horde of wild beasts going to rush at her – tried to explain the reason of her fear at the beginning. It was going to be a long story but she had to share it with them; they needed to know it, having a right to the truth about them, even if Dr. Salima was wrong about her theory.
"A moment ago you asked me why you arrived in here and I told you I wasn't able to answer this question," started Dr. Salima, carefully, leaning on the small table under the window. The children sat on the floor, listening to her words greedily. In her high pitched sweet voice, so similar to the adult version of Tiger Lily's voice if she could speak thirty years later, a note of barely audible foreign accent appeared. "I don't know if the answer I gave you was a good answer though. We have a lot of time now," she added, looking at her watch. "The nurses aren't going to appear in here today until something wrong starts to happen but I'm not going to call them now. I have already finished my work which means I can spend here as much time as I want. Anyway, the nurses aren't that willing to come to this room when they are not being asked for, you can believe me on this. You'll understand why, when you know the story. You mentioned you had read the clippings." The doctor pointed at the old newspaper articles pinned up to the board at which the children nodded. "You are familiar with Mr. Barrie's story. That's good because there aren't too many things that must be added by me so that you could understand my theory on what you are doing here and what happened to the whole Neverland of yours. Mr. Barrie's story may be – and probably is – strictly connected with it."
Here, Dr. Junaid took a deep breath and looked at the old man's bed before she started to speak again. "As you know, this man has spent practically his whole life except for childhood in the state of dreams. We call it a coma. He was sleeping all this time since he hit his head on the ice but now, as he grew old, his state of health started to worsen rapidly. And many odd occurrences started to take place in our hospital. Yes, your Neverland wasn't the only place where strange things happened recently. Very strange things." The doctor repeated, putting emphasis on this last sentence. She broke off for a moment to take one quick look at "Jimmy", lying in his bed in his faded, blue pajamas, as if the man could have chosen this very moment for waking up and then continued. "Items from his room disappeared mysteriously, not being taken by anybody, as if they just fell to another world." The children exchanged looks for a moment at her words. They knew where those missing items had gone to.
"I saw it with my own eyes sometimes and I think some nurses could have seen it as well. I don't think any of them would admit to this for fear of being labeled as stupid and superstitious but I heard the rumors. Anyway, why would be they so scared to come in here?" Dr. Junaid asked herself, quietly. "The things disappeared. They were here at one moment and at another they weren't there anymore and there was only me in this room, nobody could have put them in another place when I wasn't looking. I came here many times to spend some time with Mr. Barrie. I had my reasons to do it but I'll tell you about it in a moment. Some things that disappeared were my pen. Or my stethoscope when I took it off my neck and put away on the table. My mobile phone even. Even the objects that decorated Mr. Barrie's room. All those fairy and mermaid plushies from his table. Someone could think it was funny to bring them to him, he wasn't a little girl nor even a little boy any more for that matter, of course. But in some sense, it was like he was still a boy – if he ever woke up, he would not know he was adult, like he was frozen in childhood forever. Jimmy – it's easier for me to think about him as Jimmy not the Mr. Barrie that he never had a chance to become – was Scottish and their tradition is full of fairies and similar entities. He would have liked them if he could see them on his table. His family brought them to him – his siblings, later their children and their grandchildren – he became a family legend. But they all disappeared. The same as this little pirate ship in a bottle that stood here as well. Jimmy had it as a child. Nobody stole it, I'm sure. The hospital workers were too afraid to come in here as I said. I was probably the only person who wasn't. I'll tell you why but you must wait a bit for this part of my story. So it went. Some other things that never were in here, materialized in this room as well – children's toys, skates, gloves – like the ones Jimmy needed that fateful winter. There were also other mysterious things Mr. Barrie was the center of. The dreams. Dreams about Neverland if you prefer to call this land that. I wasn't the only one who had them. Dr. Kimball, he is one of my best friends in this hospital, told me he had a series of dreams in which he wasn't himself but a little boy who lived in an island where there weren't any adults with his friends. Dr. Kimball is a neurologist, a brain specialist. It was he who takes care of Mr. Barrie most in here.
"There was also the frost which suddenly started to cover Jimmy's bed. I saw this two times myself but I bet there must have been more times. That's why others were afraid of his room too, for sure, if they saw it indeed. The temperature got much colder in the room then, I could feel it. It was just as cold as it had to be on the day when he fell on the ice and hit his head. Or that nurse, Miss. Willoughby. She got insane and they claim it could have been the influence of this room but I'm not surprised at this – what else could be thought if a normal, healthy woman comes in here and after a couple of minutes runs away, screaming she doesn't know where she is and that it isn't her body? She's in the mental health ward now. She claims she's someone else, a fairy and that her name isn't Natalie but Iridessa. They hope she'll get better soon but judging by what I think I know about what's happening, I wouldn't be so sure of this."
The children didn't say anything as the doctor's voice trailed away. They listened attentively to the story that had been delivered to them, trying not to drop any of her words in which she was explaining the mystery of the changes taking over the whole Neverland. And the lonely room with the sleeping inhabitant in the Royal London Hospital as well, which was the conclusion from Dr. Junaid's story. The appearance of this woman who seemed to hold the key to the solution of this riddle, was unexpected but was a real gift from fate. If not her, they would not know what to do, groping for the answer they might not ever find while the answer for it seemed to be just being handed in to them on a silver plate. The woman's story harmonized with what they already knew – the mysterious objects pulled out by them from the Quagmire of Mermaids which apparently came from this world, Dr. Junaid's friend's dreams being the opposite reflection of the dream of Nibs, Natalie who became Iridessa like the two females – human and fairy ones were two sides of the same coin - the mystery started to unravel. But there was something more to Dr. Junaid's story as she had stated; she had some reasons to be interested in Jimmy's case which led her to his hospital bed again and again making her the only person not being afraid all those mysterious phenomena he was the center of which and this was the thing they waited for her to explain.
Then, Dr. Junaid closed her eyes, as if preparing to share with the children some story the details of which she was trying to elicit from her memory. For a moment the only sound she made was her breathing, slow and rhythmical, until the woman opened her eyes, looking at the faces of her young guests filled with hope. Her mouth opened one more time and the woman started to speak again to share with them the other part of her story.
"When you have heard the second part of what I have to say, you will know everything," she started. "I dare to claim you aren't going to like this but that's the thing I must share with you because I'm the only person who is competent to do it. And this is what I want you to know.
"When I was a little girl I had an accident similar to this which fell to Jimmy's lot. What happened to me then when I was in coma then is what I base my theory on as to what is happening with you now. I fell from the stairs visiting the house of my relatives in Pakistan and hit my head. I wasn't in coma for as long as James Barrie – just less than three months – but that was enough for me to create an imagined world in my head. From the very scratch. I was nine then. I was a child with a vivid imagination. I was lying in a hospital bed all the time but in the dream which was taking place in my head I was in another place. Somehow I managed to build the whole world in my imagination. I lived in it until I woke up one day. I thought all the time when I was living in this dream that it was real, I didn't ever question its reality because when I immersed in this world I forgot completely who I was. I thought I was a different girl. Everything in that world came from the life I used to know before I found my way into it, transformed by the power of my imagination. The name of the girl I was in that dream world wasn't Salima Junaid. It was Anne Shirley. I don't know why but it was my name in this dreamland and I never hit upon an idea to question this. The same as I never questioned that I lived in Canada in the 19th century, not in the early 1970's in England. My family and friends I had there were also just the products of my imagination, all of them. I still remember this well. Diana, my best friend in the world I created in my own head when I was lying in coma was based on our neighbors' daughter. She was a couple years older than me, already a teen and I always looked up to her. I wanted to be like her. She was so pretty and nice, like an older sister I always wanted to have. In the dreamland she became my peer so as we could play together. There was also this boy, Gilbert – that was at least what his name was in there because the name of the real "Gilbert" I knew before I became comatose was Chris and he was my cousin. In the dreamland I lived with a couple of elderly people who took care of me. Their names were Marilla and Matthew. Matthew was based on my music teacher whom I liked. Marilla… well, shortly before I had that accident I saw a photo of a woman looking like her in some magazine. I remember I thought she looked so friendly and warm – like a grandma I always wanted to have. It was a happy life I led in there but three months later from the accident I woke up. I remember how surprised I was, realizing it was just a dream."
The doctor looked at Barrie and then at the children before she continued, "James Barrie has been in a coma since he was eleven. For such a long time he could have created a world similar to mine. In fact I am sure of it because I don't know any other reasonable explanation on how you found yourselves here. The strange things that happened in the hospital I told you about previously, confirm this theory. And my dreams do it too. I had a coupleof dreams in which I was a girl living in an Indian tribe on an island. They were very realistic but it wasn't until I saw you for the first time in here when all the fragments got organized into a coherent whole. It was a shock for me to see you here because I recognized you from my dreams instantly. Especially you." The doctor pointed her finger at Tiger Lily on whose face the look of surprise reflected. "You look exactly like me when I was nine or ten years old. It's like seeing a photo of myself from childhood.
You, boy," continued the woman, addressing Nibs, "very much resemble Dr. Kimball whom I told you about. Although much younger, of course. He is about my age, I'll be thirty-nine this autumn. This child," The doctor continued, pointing at little Michael "is the spitting image of Mr. Barrie's sister's great grandson. I saw him when the whole Barrie family paid a visit to him last January. It's a tradition to visit him on the anniversary of the accident. He doesn't recognize them, of course, but they do it regularly every year. A family tradition." She paused then as if to remember one such time and then went on.
"Speaking of the Barrie family members, this girl---," Dr. Salima said, now pointing at Wendy – "bears a resemblance to Mrs. Ogilvy Barrie. She was Jimmy's mother. Jimmy isn't young Jimmy any more so no wonder she isn't among the living, she died many years ago but I saw her photos. Mr. Barrie became famous throughout the whole country after his accident. He's one of the longest surviving coma patients in the world. I read all those articles on him and his family. I saw the photos of them all. But I never saw any photos of Mrs. Ogilvy Barrie from her childhood but the resemblance of her facial features to those of that girl is striking. Facial features look the same for the whole life even if one gets older. If my theory is correct, then we can safely assume that Jimmy's imagination created Wendy on the basis of his own mother. You told me that Wendy is the mother of Peter" – the mentioned boy nodded, smiling – "the same as the woman after whose facial features, Wendy's have been modeled was James' real mother. In other words, all the pieces of this jigsaw puzzle fit. Wendy Darling is young Margaret Ogilvy Barrie and Peter Pan is young James Matthew Barrie."
The silence that fell after her explanations seemed so thick that one could cut it with a knife. The scary suspicion started to sneak into the children's hearts but none of them, even Peter, so bold and perky for his whole life commented on their new friend's words, knowing what it meant if she was right – and deep in their hearts they knew she was. They were able to only look at each other; their glances expressed the sad understanding.
As if reading their minds, Dr. Salima Junaid's next words constituted the confirmation of what they already knew. "Neverland is dying," she started slowly, like she was trying to do her best to hold back from saying the truth. "Because its creator is dying. The end of his life is probably going to be the end of the life of Peter Pan, the boy who is Mr. Barrie's alter ego and the whole rest of you. When I was in my coma I thought that my life in dreamland as Anne was real, as same as you thought yourself to be real children. And a real fairy" – the doctor from the Royal London Hospital smiled at Tinkerbell sitting on Peter's shoulder.
"I recognize you. In the past Jimmy used to have a fairy plush toy on his table, together with the other ones. It had blonde hair and a green dress. The nurses who took care of Barrie reported that from time to time they could feel some weak movements which meant some part of his brain wasn't sleeping. He was partially conscious and although he couldn't communicate with anybody, he certainly somehow knew by some sixth sense about those who surrounded him to use his surroundings as a base for the world in which he lived in his imagination, the same as I lived as someone else in my own head when I was in my coma.
I think that toy was his friend's gift for him; it was everything he could do to redeem his deed from his childhood. That was at least what he claimed. In the eighties he came out with his own version of how the accident had happened and what Jimmy really looked like. All tabloids wrote abuzz about it but he never managed to prove that what he said was true. But I believe him. Why otherwise would anyone ever have wanted to risk his reputation if not in this aim to soothe the qualms of conscience? He said he pushed Jimmy on ice because he mocked his disability. I don't know if that was true but young Barrie was just a child then not a little saint and children often laugh at others' defects. He visits him here from time to time. He lives here in London so what else does he have to do? He told me during his last visit he'd be in here tomorrow. He keeps having dreams on Neverland too, he told me. I often talk to him, he trusts me. He thought those dreams were just ordinary dreams but I know better what it is about. You can meet him the next day. I think he can be trusted… he's a really good man in spite of what he did to his friend when he was eleven. Now he's atoning for this with the pricks of conscience, poor man. I think you should meet him to assure him his childhood friend had a good and interesting life in the world of his imagination although nobody would describe his state as a life of any kind. He deserves it. The same as you deserved the knowledge of what happened and who you really are. The same as my Anne wasn't a real girl, you aren't real either. Regardless of how real you seem to yourself. You are merely patterns, ideas, repeating motifs. You are living embodiments of human imagination, echoes of reality, pure creation of sub consciousness. And even your existence is brief and bounded and it is coming to an end with the death of your creator."
