To the Waters and the Wild

I'm in love with a boy who never grows up. He came one evening to my window and swept me away, I gave him thimble kisses and empty promises. Out the window we flew, leaving a home that looked more like a dollhouse behind. 

"well isn't this what you always wanted? An adventure to far a far off land, pirate ships and lost boys." 

 "yes. but I didn't know then." 

"know what?"

"know how it felt to be lost."

Everything was lovely for a time, adventures and watching the sun rise from my throne in the clouds, but I still heard the clock chime twelve every night and wondered how much time had passed. I counted my finger, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, trying to calculate how long forever was. 

One night when we watched the fairies in their ancient dance and the moonlight shown on his face I asked him if never growing up meant living forever. Something I didn't know the name for flickered in his eyes for an instant, but then it was gone and he was Fearless Peter again. He reminded me of a reflection, he would smile when I smiled and always listen, but it seemed the only answers he gave were the ones were the ones I put inside his head. He was more like a shadow than any boy I knew. 

At times I would threaten to leave, to return home-  a memory now so faint. But he always knew what I wanted, he knew I wanted him to beg me to stay, to tell me how important I was and he always did just that. But I wondered if he really wanted me to stay or if he was only pretending. I could ever tell with Peter, it seemed like he was playing at love like something out of a book. Maybe I was too. 

As the days went on time became like a giant scaly beast inside of me, holding a ticking clock.  I wondered if my parents were dead and if home was still like home at all. I had nightmares of returning to my house and finding a new family living inside and I was one hundred years too late to say goodbye. 

Time was horrible if you couldn't read it, and yet there was no hiding from it.The signs were everywhere. My nightgown was now pale blue with countless holes and tatters, my shoes were no longer shoes at all and I had nearly forgotten everything. Yet, my reflection always stayed the same. If I went home would I turn to dust? No. I had no home. I was the only lost girl in the world and this neverland, this place that seemed like a beacon to the lost things, was like my cage. 

The sad truth welled up inside me, shaking my rib cage like one hundred paper moths were stuck inside my chest. I wanted home. I was sick of shadows and glimmers of truth in the sea, like tiny fish, swarming about misleadingly. I could never catch much sense here, it was almost like I was see through. When I reached in the pool of answers they just slipped right through my translucent hands. 

Maybe that was why I never changed. I was no longer made of flesh or matter. I was more of a shadow than any girl I knew.