Her look turns steel cold. Her eyes fill with tears as her body trembles beneath me. Pushing against my chest, she forces me off her as she scrambles to her feet.

“You did, Peter.” A darkness descends over us, a shadow blocking the entrance to the cave as the sounds of bells stop. “You did.”

Chapter 12

Wendy

“Fairies have to be one thing or the other. Because being so small, they only have room for one feeling at a time. At present, she was full of jealousy of Wendy… What she said in her lovely tinkle sparkle… I believe some of it was bad words… Tink hated her with the fierce hatred of a very woman.”

Peter & Wendy

- J.M. Barrie

SEVENTEEN YEARS AGO

The sounds of parrots and wild exotic birds fill my ears as I follow Peter through Tiki Forrest. Glancing up, a mother monkey glides back and forth through the tall trees, her two infants swing behind her, barely holding on to the vines as they quickly try and catch up. It all feels like a dream. The larger-than-life trees. The large mystical plants. The mist and the thick, cool breeze. Where sunlight is blessed enough to hit the floor of the forest, flowers like I have never seen before smile back at me, thankful to be alive and gracing me with their intoxicating presence.

“Watch out!” Peter shouts suddenly. I look his way just as his body glides back effortlessly through the air, his arm circles my hip, and he lifts me from the ground just in time to avoid a pit of quicksand.

“Oh my,” I gasp. “For a place as beautiful as this, I wouldn’t think there would be such danger.”

We float down to the ground a few paces in front of the daunting pool of sand, and Peter glances down into my eyes, his arm never leaving my side.

“There is beauty in danger, Wendy,” he smiles. “Suspense. Thrill. The rush of the escape.”

It’s only then that I notice my heart beating faster than ever before as he holds me close. He’s saved me once again from peril. It’s exhilarating. Stimulating like something I’ve never felt before. At least, before Peter that is.

“You like danger,” I realize as he holds me close in his arms. “Maybe more than you like anything else, I’m guessing.”

He cocks his face to the side and studies me. “I’ll never deny whatever it is that makes me feel alive. I love the feeling of letting go until the brink of darkness, then suddenly feeling myself jolted back to life.” He glances down, his thumb runs softly across my bottom lip making me shiver. Looking back up in my eyes, he whispers, “Something tells me you desire that too. Light through darkness. Pleasure found with the brush of pain.”