Always Neverland (13 page)

Chapter 21.
I Catch a Little Lightning

T
hat night, for the Lost Boys' bedtime story, I recited “The Night Before Christmas” from memory. When I couldn't remember the details, I made some up. I figured that they probably wouldn't know the difference, but apparently the Lost Boys had gotten a few of their Christmas memories back.

Halfway through, Prank said suspiciously, “I don't remember Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer making a gingerbread house out of mini marshmallows and gumdrops.”

“Or Santa installing a hot chocolate machine in the kitchen,” said Kyle, and I squirmed uncomfortably, wondering if I could convince them that Santa's elves rewrote the story recently.

“Maybe my mom skipped that part when she read it to me,” Dibs murmured sleepily.

“I think we're getting Ashley's new and improved version,” Button said from the branch where he was rigging up a new hammock for me, but he said it fondly. All the Lost Boys smiled.

A gust of wind whistled through the leaves. The branches around us tossed and pitched.

I drew my golden coat tighter around me, hunching up against the unexpected cold. A huge raindrop landed on my shoulder, splashing my neck.

“Storm's coming,” Peter said, his eyes glittering. He said it like the storm was an enemy he was eager to fight.

The rain came harder, striking the ground with sharp plops, and I knew it was about to pour.

Peter didn't seem worried. He just flew up and up, higher than the tallest tree, and crowed at the sky, like he was challenging it.

I wasn't finished with the story, and I didn't want to go to bed just yet. I looked around for a covered area where we could all fit. “Lost Boys! Under Peter's house!” I ordered.

“You know, since you got crowned queen, you've started to be as bossy as Peter,” Prank said offhandedly as we rose in the air.

“What? You normally sit out in the open and get soaked during every thunderstorm?” I pointed out, feeling more raindrops. “It's for your own good.”

“Mothers say that too,” said Dibs with a small smile.

“Do you want me to finish the story or not?” I said, hands on my hips.

Dibs, Kyle, and Prank zipped up and dived under Peter's house, settling in the branches there, eager to hear the end. But not Button.

As the rain fell faster, he made straight for the staircase, pulling back the leaves that covered his carvings and sketches. “Oh no!” he murmured, and with a pang of sympathy, I knew that the rain had washed away the charcoal drawings, the ones he hadn't gotten a chance to carve yet.

White chunks of ice joined the rain and thunked against the ground. The hailstones stung where they hit my shoulder, even through my new coat. It had to be even worse for the Lost Boys.

“Button!” I called worriedly. “Come on.”

Defeated, Button climbed up to us and dropped heavily to a seat, head bent.

He looked so sad, blinking hard at the branch right below him.

“I'm sorry about your drawings, Button,” I said softly, and he just shrugged, Peter-like, as if it didn't matter to him.

“What drawings?” Dibs said curiously, which I took as a good reason to change the subject.

“Where was I?” I asked brightly.

“Donner was snacking on the gingerbread house,” said Kyle excitedly.

Then I launched straight into the part where Prancer and Blitzen started arguing over the last candy cane so loudly that it woke the children up.

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!” I finished, three minutes later.

The Lost Boys all clapped, even Dibs.

“I think I like this version better,” Prank whispered to Kyle, and then thunder rumbled in the distance, making us all jump.

Peter landed on the branch next to me, his feet slapping against the bark. “It's time for an adventure.”

“Now?” I asked skeptically. I mean, it
was
raining. Besides, I
had
just finished a bedtime story. That usually meant it was time for bed.

“A storm's the best time for this,” Peter said mischievously, and he jumped from the branch and glided away. “Come on.”

“Lightning?” Dibs asked excitedly, jumping into the air.

Prank grinned. “What else?”

I remembered the fairies. “You mean, lightning
catching
?” I asked, flying behind the Lost Boys.

“We'll show you,” Button said as Kyle grabbed my hand, tugging me faster.

Then Peter zipped through the trees, and we flew after him. Thunder cracked again, closer this time.

I was the only one who jumped. “Is it safe to be in the forest? I mean, at home, lightning can kill people.”

“Scared of a little storm, Wendy girl?” Prank teased.

“Hey, if I can handle a few pirates, then I can definitely handle a little thunder,” I replied hotly, but I still looked up just in case a bolt surprised us on the way.

“Don't worry. They try never to fall this far inland,” Button explained.

That
made me curious. The Lost Boys talked like the lightning bolts were living people.

In the dark, you couldn't really see the forest. The trees just seemed like huge crooked shapes, trunks and limbs we swerved to avoid. The air was full of the sound of raindrops plopping on leaves and the wind whistling through the branches.

Then the trees ended suddenly, and we came to the shore. Waves crashed at the base of the cliff we stood on, throwing up water so high that I tasted salt on my lips.

The Lost Boys all turned to see my reaction, but it took me a moment to realize what I was looking at.

Hundreds of lights—purplish, white, and blue—swarmed over the ocean's surface, darting this way and that, like they were searching for something. Even over the sound of the waves and the storm, I heard their anxious chimes.

“But I don't see any lightning,” I said.

With one of his pleased smirks, Peter pointed at the sky.

Gray clouds sat on the horizon, lit by the lightning that crackled within. Then, one bolt broke free. Instead of appearing all at once like a jagged glowing line, this lightning fell slowly. It meandered from point to point, leaving a trail behind it like a comet, cutting the sky in half.

The fairies zoomed across the water toward it, but too late. With a merry twinkle, the lightning dived into the sea and winked out.

“And . . . safe,” Prank said, like an umpire at a baseball game, half grinning.

When the thunder reached us, it sounded suspiciously like a chuckle.

Disappointed, the fairies gathered together in one big swarm of lights, searching the sky again.

Something about the way the lightning had twinkled seemed very familiar, almost like I had seen it before someplace else. “The lightning bolts,” I said excitedly, “they're not falling stars, are they?”

Peter laughed, delighted. “Of course they are. I knew you were a smart Wendy girl.”

We watched another star fall, hopping down the sky from point to point, creating a trail of lightning behind it.

“At home, my teachers say that lightning is electricity, caused when molecules in storm clouds rub together,” I murmured.

“Grown-ups,” Peter said scornfully. “They don't know anything.”

Then Button added, very quickly, “But lightning
is
dangerous where you come from. The stars get angry, because they can't fall the way they want to, like they can in Neverland.”

“I wish they could,” I whispered as another star wiggled down the sky and the fairies rushed toward it. “They're beautiful.”

Peter stepped off the cliff, hovering in the air across from me. “Want to catch one?”

“Do they really give you a wish?” I asked excitedly.

“Duh,” said Dibs. “That's why we're here.”

“Anything you want!” Kyle cried, squeezing my hand harder in anticipation.

“You know what they say about wishing on falling stars,” said Prank.

“But I caught a star on the way over here,” I pointed out. “A bunch of times.”

Dibs rolled his eyes. “
Falling
was the operative word there. You can't expect any wishes if the star is still in the sky.”

Then Peter grabbed my other hand, dragging Kyle and me over the water. We went so fast that I could hear Kyle giggling with delight.

The fairies guessed what we were up to, and they didn't want to share. When we flew close, they reached out to grab our clothes, our hair, our toes; but Prank and Button cut them off. Laughing, Peter twisted out of the fairies' reach, taking Kyle and me with him.

I laughed too, looking back. For a second, I thought I saw Tinker Bell, but when Peter swerved again, I lost sight of her.

“There!” Kyle shouted, pointing.

Another star emerged from the storm clouds, cartwheeling down to the ocean. Peter flew faster, tugging us along with him.

Maybe Peter could predict where the star was headed. Maybe the star recognized Peter and arched our way. But the star fell straight toward us.

Peter's hand stretched out. I thought he would catch it, but at the last second, he pulled me in front of him and let go of my hand.

The star fell into my palm instead. It buzzed a little, warm and pleasant, and I felt it over my whole body, like leaning against a dryer. For a minute, I could only stare.

“Well?” Peter said eagerly.

“Make a wish,” Kyle said, letting go of my hand so that I could cup the star between both palms.

Over his shoulder, I saw Prank, Button, and even Dibs grinning widely—as happy as they would've been if they had caught the star themselves.

“Go on,” urged Peter.

In my hand, the star wiggled impatiently, like it agreed with him.

I could've wished that Tiger Lily would like me, or Tink, but after everything that had happened that day, making that change didn't feel so important. Actually, I wanted just one more thing from my trip to Neverland: not to get in trouble when I went home.

The star glowed a little brighter, its rays shooting past my fingers. It had heard me.

“Now let it go,” Peter said.

I kissed the star good-bye—the buzzing tickled my teeth—and then I opened my hands. The star dived into the water with a fizzing sound and swam out of sight.

When I looked up, Peter and the Lost Boys beamed at me so widely that I wondered what exactly they thought I'd wished for.

Chapter 22.
The Never Birds Donate Feathers

I
had never been in charge of a Christmas celebration before. It had a weird effect on me. Making plans this time, I wanted to make it special
for other people
.

As soon as I woke up the next morning, I grabbed my backpack and flew into the forest, far enough away from the Tree Home that the others couldn't see me. I searched the front pocket of my bag and found what I'd been looking for—a small Baggie full of cookies, candy canes, and chocolate. My teacher had handed them out before she dismissed class a few days before.

The trip to Neverland had clearly been kind of rough. The contents had broken into bits. Only crumbs were left.

I smiled. That actually helped me.

With a sharp stick, I dug a hole in the ground and poured the crumbs inside. Then I patted dirt over them and Pretended as hard as I could: it would sprout sometime before night fell, a food tree with a Christmas tree shape. Instead of ornaments, it would have gingerbread cookies, candy canes, and other treats.

My fingers and toes tingled a little, and I knew that it had worked.

After breakfast, I decided that as the youngest Lost Boy, Kyle should pick out the Christmas tree. Dibs was the only one who protested, and I told him not to spoil it for Kyle or I would tell Santa not to bring him any presents. That was what Mom always told me around Christmas to make sure I obeyed her. Dibs put Hook's hat back on to make himself feel better.

Kyle chose a ten-foot-tall fir about thirty paces from the Tree Home. The actual decorating slowed us down a little, because we had to
make
all of the decorations. It took a while for the Lost Boys to understand how it worked.

Prank, for example, took the red-and-beige seashell I handed him and threw it at the Christmas tree. When the shell bounced down through the branches and landed on the forest floor, he said, “Ashley, I think this ornament's broken.”

I couldn't answer at first. I was laughing too hard.

“What about this?” Button said, raising the conch shell I had given him a moment before. He had wrapped a slender vine around and around the middle of the shell and knotted the excess vine to make a loop.

“Exactly!” I said, and Kyle clapped happily.

Peter flew closer and inspected the ornament carefully. “I decree that this is the very first Christmas ornament in Neverland.”

“Put it on the tree,” I ordered.

Button smiled bashfully as he found a branch he liked and placed Neverland's first ever ornament on Neverland's first ever Christmas tree.

“Do you think Santa knows how to get to Neverland?” Kyle asked me.

“I don't know,” I said, a little surprised at the question.

“He might not know to come—because we're celebrating Christmas on a different day than other people,” Button said hesitantly, and then all the Lost Boys looked a little worried.

I hadn't thought about it before. But I couldn't imagine a Christmas without presents. If no one else was bringing them, that just meant I had to take matters into my own hands.

Flying off as sneakily as I could, I started gathering materials. I would have to make some gifts, but I had brought most of them with me in my backpack.

The problem was that there was nowhere to
wrap
the presents. Someone turned up everywhere I tried to hide. When I hid behind an oak tree at the edge of the clearing, Button came, searching the ground for new acorns he could use for the garland. When I hunched down in my hammock, Prank came up to get a bunch of gray and light-green feathers out of his hiding place—the foot-long ones he had yanked from the Never birds' tails months before.

Finally, I slipped into Peter's house, feeling a little guilty. I was pretty sure I wasn't allowed in there uninvited, but I was kind of desperate. I tried to hurry—to keep from getting caught.

Sitting on the floor between the window and the bed, I pulled the Lost Boys' presents out of my backpack and wrapped them first. At home, I would've had wrapping paper and ribbons, but I made do with flexible leaves and bits of vine.

While I was at it, I went ahead and made the presents I'd planned. I took all the seashells that were too small to make good tree ornaments and used a very skinny vine to string them together. Maybe it wasn't the most artistic necklace in the world, but Neverland seashells are so bright and colorful that it looked pretty anyway. As I wrapped it, I was sure Mom would like it. Maybe she would even like it so much that she would rethink grounding me for accidentally feeding her iPod to the Neverland crocodile.

I knew exactly what I would give Dad, too. Other people might think that nobody would ever like to get a bunch of leaves for Christmas, but my dad taught botany. He
loved
stuff like that. Actually, if he found out that I went to Neverland
without
bringing back leaf samples, he might be
more
likely to punish me.

The last present was almost impossible. What could I possibly give to Peter Pan? I mean, he had kind of given me a falling star the night before. It was hard to compete with that.

Finally, after thinking for a long time and flipping through the Polaroids in my backpack, I had an idea. I just didn't know if I would be brave enough to give it to him. I pulled aside four sticks and started to tie them together, but then the door creaked open.

It was Peter, staring at me.

I shoved all the wrapped gifts into my backpack and out of sight, and then I turned guiltily to the doorway, not sure if I could talk myself out of this one. “Hey, it's not like you didn't show up in
my
room uninvited a few days ago when you came to take me to Neverland. I was just working on the presents.”

Then I waited for him to tell me that no Lost Boy or Wendy girl was allowed in his house without permission.

But he just laughed, opening the door wider. “I guess we're even then. Come on—the Lost Boys want you to check the Christmas tree and see if they've decorated it right.”

I was kind of shocked that he handled it so calmly, but I wasn't about to question it. Not getting in trouble was definitely a happy thought.

I glided across the room and through the doorway, smiling quickly at Peter before flying down. Prank, Button, and Dibs had set up a workstation next to the Christmas tree—a red blanket over the grass, with piles of acorns and feathers.

“Are there any other kinds of decorations?” Button asked, looking up from the acorns he was linking together. “It's just ornaments and garland and the star on top?”

I examined the tree carefully. I didn't know what kind of tree I would end up having when I got back home. I wanted this one to be perfect. “Usually, there are lights, too.”

Prank passed me a new feather ornament he'd just made, and I held it up, admiring the way it looked almost silver in the sunlight.

“Too bad we can't convince some fairies that this is a great place to sleep,” Prank said, looking thoughtful. “Tink might be able to do it—”

“Tink is banished,” Peter reminded us all in a thunderous voice. It was true. We hadn't seen even a fairy glimmer all morning. Then, softening a little, he added, “At least until after Christmas.”

“There aren't very many left,” Dibs complained, poking through the broken and bent feathers.

There was a flutter of wings on the far side of the clearing. A dozen Never birds burst through the leaves and sailed over to us.

Prank's eyes widened nervously. “You don't think they want their feathers back, do you?” he whispered.

I hid the new feather ornament behind me as the Never birds landed in a semicircle around us, eyeing me with dark beady eyes. Spot clucked hello. As we watched, their feathers lost the gray and green of the Never trees and started to look more and more like the red blanket on the forest floor.

“If you challenge Ashley, you challenge Pan,” said Peter loyally, drawing his sword. I thought it was very noble of him, but I put a hand on his arm to make sure he didn't overreact like he had during the muffin incident.

But the Never birds just spread their wings and bent so low that their beaks almost brushed the ground.

“Did they just
bow
?” asked Dibs incredulously, peering at them from under Hook's hat.

“Maybe they heard that you were the queen of Neverland,” Prank said, half joking, but Spot nodded eagerly.

“They came to pay their respects,” Peter said, sounding smug, like he'd arranged the whole thing.

“But it's just
Pretend
,” I whispered back.

“Where's Kyle?” Prank asked as the Never birds straightened back up. “He would
love
this.”

“He went to go see the mermaids,” Dibs said. “He wanted to get a starfish or a sand dollar for the top of the tree.”

“I'll get him,” Button said, and I heard the leaves rustle as he flew toward the mermaids' new home.

The Never birds all turned around abruptly. At first, I thought they were going to fly off, but then they all reached back, took the longest and fluffiest of their own tail feathers in their beaks, and yanked.

The Lost Boys stared.

In a tidy line, the Never birds waddled over to me. When Spot stopped and made a sort of honking noise, I stretched out my hands, palms up. One by one, the birds deposited the tail feathers into them.

“Not fair,” Prank muttered.

“Thank you,” I said, admiring the feathers. They were as red as the blanket the Never birds had been standing on.

The Never birds all turned around again, and each grasped another tail feather in its beak.

“No!” I cried, and the Never birds looked up at me with their beady eyes. “No, thank you, but you don't have to. If you give me too many, you might affect your ability to fly.”

The Never birds turned to each other with excited little trills, as if they were discussing a new development.

“What did I do?” I asked as Spot began to rub her head against my leg, like a cat.

“You proved yourself a wise and judicious ruler,” Prank said, half joking again, and three of the Never birds nodded, trilling happily.

They weren't the only ones to hear about me being crowned queen.

The lion arrived just three minutes later, before Button and Kyle came back.

One minute, Prank and I were putting up the string of acorns that Button had made, and the next, all the Lost Boys were up in the air, shouting at the top of their lungs.

I understood what Dibs was saying first. “Lions! Lions!”

Still on the ground, Peter and I turned at the same time. A lion stalked into the clearing. He shook his mane and blinked at me with big, topaz eyes.

I gulped and stopped myself from taking a step back. “I didn't know that there were lions in Neverland.”

“Yep, lions. And tigers,” Prank said, starting to count on his fingers again. “And bears.”

“Wolves, too,” Peter added.

“They
can
eat you,” Dibs said sharply.

With sleepy, half-closed eyes, the lion started to walk slowly across the clearing, lashing his tail.

I looked at Peter, who didn't move. I decided that if Peter wasn't afraid, then I wasn't going to be either. We would make a united front as queen and emperor of Neverland—for the Lost Boys' sake.

“He doesn't seem hungry,” I said, trying to reassure myself.

He really didn't. He came up very close, so close that I could feel his hot breath on my face.

Peter smiled at me, the smile that carried a hint of pride. “He heard that you were the queen of Neverland too.”

The lion yowled in agreement.

Suddenly, I wondered if my ability to Pretend was a little too strong for my own good.

But really, I didn't mind it all that much. My fingers and toes tingled. Pretending to be Queen Ashley, Lion Tamer, had its perks.

I stretched out an arm toward the lion slowly, ready to fly up and join the Lost Boys if he attacked. But the big cat just thrust his head into my hand and began to purr. His mane was incredibly soft.

“Aww, I think he likes me,” I said.

When I offered him my other hand, he licked it. His tongue was so scratchy it tickled, but I didn't giggle. Laughing might hurt his feelings.

Peter put his hands on his fists, looking on smugly.

“Whoa,” Dibs said, impressed.

“Kyle
really
has to come back,” Prank said.

The lion leaned forward suddenly. Dibs and Prank shouted, worried that the cat was getting ready to pounce, but he just knelt, looking at me expectantly. I had a pretty good idea what he wanted.

I flew up a little and landed gingerly on his back. The lion roared with delight and took off at a run. I had to grab his mane to keep from falling off.

“Not so fast,” I said, steering him back to the Lost Boys.

“You're riding a
lion
,” said Prank, as if it was a trick he had always wanted to try.

I shrugged. “I saw it in a movie once.”

“Kyle
has
to see this,” said Dibs, and Prank nodded.

“He—,” said someone on the other side of the clearing. We all turned. Button stood on the ground, grasping a tree for support, as if he couldn't think of a thought happy enough to get him into the air.

His face was white. “Kyle's been captured!”