“Wendy, you promise?”
She looked into his impossibly bright blue eyes. “Promise.” Hoping to distract him, Wendy splashed some water on his face and rubbed hard with her hand, attempting to erase the dirt on his cheeks. He laughed and scampered away.
“No cleaning!” Her blue nightgown was draped over a rickety chair—the only actual chair she had seen on Pan Island—and when she picked it up, she was surprised that it had been cleaned. She pressed her nose to the fabric, smelling the aroma of herbs that even the best alchemist wouldn’t recognize. She pulled it over her head and slipped her feet into her black shoes, still crunchy with sand. Her hair—well, the sea had made it curly, and there was no taming it back, and so she simply decided to let it cascade down her shoulders in messy waves. Michael was still wearing the tunic Oxley had given him, but someone had the good sense to cinch it at the waist, and when Wendy looked over, she noted with surprise that he had tied a maroon ribbon across his forehead and tucked some mauve leaves into it so they hung down over his ears. Wendy suppressed a giggle—he looked like a giant puppy. The poor kid.
“That’s interesting. Here, let me fix it for you.” She gently tucked the leaves so they were above his temples. Michael puffed out his chest.
“This is how Peter wants us to wear it. He showed me.”
“Oh, did he? That was nice of him.”
“Yup! He said that all the Lost Boys wear it this way the night before a raid. It shows their lawalty.”
“Loyalty.”
“Oh. Loyalty.”
“Are you ready?”
Michael nodded. “And hungry.”
“Me too. Now, how do we get down again?”
“Oh, Wendy.” Michael giggled all the way over to the tree. “You know how.” Michael climbed up onto her back, and Wendy stared at the trunk once again. Then, without a second thought, she wrapped her arms around the trunk and hurtled down toward the Teepee. Michael shrieked with delight. When she neared the landing, she hesitantly put her foot out to slow her speed, and it hit the landing with a hard thump, wrenching her off the trunk and onto her knees. She stood up flustered but proud. A smile broke open across her face. She was about to say something to Michael when the deafening noise of two hundred boys roared out of the open doors of the Table, a wild, blustery wave of voices. Wendy self-consciously gathered her hair to the side, knowing that all their eyes would be on her when she entered.
“Michael!” she hissed, approaching the outer doors.
“What?”
“Do you want me to hold your hand?” She was suddenly desperate to deflect the attention that would be put upon her. He looked at her with disgust.
“Not in front of them! I’m not a baby anymore, that’s what Peter said!” he scoffed, before sauntering inside, as proud and mature as a five-year-old could be.
With a deep breath, Wendy quietly stepped inside the Table. Once inside, her eyes ate up everything around her; it was the strangest dining room she had ever seen. In the center of the room, there was an enormous round table, made of dark shiny wood, marked with a thousand tiny hatch marks. A chandelier made of broken wine bottles hung overhead, littered with half-burning candles, held up with a tattered rope that looked like it could give at any moment. Frayed ribbons dangled down from the broken bottle necks. One was on fire, a small smoldering flame licking its way up the ribbon to the glass top.
“Pretty great, isn’t it?” Oxley asked, sneaking up behind her and yanking on her hair playfully.
Wendy looked around. “It’s . . . something, indeed.” The circular center table was surrounded by dozens of tiny square tables that were heaped with piles of dirty dishes, stacks upon stacks of them.
“Who . . . washes the dishes?” Wendy asked cautiously, not wanting the job to be assigned to her.
“Oh, we just find the cleanest ones and wipe them down with our rags before we eat,” Ox said, shrugging. Wendy must have made a face because he burst out laughing. “Things are different here, Miss Darling! This is Pan Island! We do not pretend to live like how grown-ups say we should live.”