'The Grim Adventures of Patrick & Peter' [Patrick Stump/Pete Wentz]
Title: 'The Grim Adventures of Patrick & Peter'
Author: that_1_incident
Fandom: Fall Out Boy
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: AU, crack!fic, incomplete, profanity
Pairing: Patrick Stump/Pete Wentz
Word Count: ~4,100
Summary: “You don’t look like Death,” Patrick said lamely.
The man rolled his pretty dark eyes. “Okay, so technically I’m not, but Death is sick and I needed the money, so…” he shrugged and turned his hands palms-upward, as if to say ”here I am.”
Disclaimer: In 1911, J. M. Barrie published “Peter Pan & Wendy.” I borrowed some of his characters, descriptions, etc. but I changed some of Peter's qualities, making him less rude & more empathetic. I absolutely have no intention of trying to rip off a literary classic. Plz to not be suing =D
Author Notes: This is the fic that almost never was. My hard drive crashed a little while after I wrote it (of course, I hadn’t done anything so sensible as to back it up) and Staples was all "Yeah, we need a thousand bucks to see if we can get anything off it," and I was all "Um, I don't have a thousand bucks, Staples.” Fortunately the Geek Squad were all "Yo, we'll do it for one fifty" and I ended up getting my fic back.
The other thing about the fic is that it is obviously unfinished. I would dearly love to work on it again at some point because it was one of my more popular fics and people really seemed to warm to it. We shall see.
--->--->--->---@
Patrick blinked and squinted at the hooded figure that had suddenly and unexpectedly materialized in his bedroom. He wasn’t asleep yet - at least, he thought he wasn’t. “Er,” he began somewhat stupidly. Patrick Stump was very hard to ruffle, but this situation had him beat. “How exactly - who are - what?”
“I’m Death,” the figure said calmly.
Patrick snorted. “No you’re not.”
The figure’s robes rustled, and then a hand appeared. Patrick didn’t notice the hand itself, however - rather, he noticed the fearsome scythe it was clutching.
“Well, fuck.” Patrick winced, sat up, hugged the bedcovers closer to his body then asked tentatively, “I figured I had at least a couple of decades until my arteries clogged up. Did I really eat that many cheeseburgers?”
“Something like that,” the figure responded vaguely, drawing back his hood. Patrick was expecting something fearsome - a ghastly white, pallid complexion, gaping black recesses in place of eyes or worst of all, no skin whatsoever. In fact, he was confronted with the polar opposite: deep, sparkling brown eyes and healthy, tanned skin that had a natural glow to it.
“You… you don’t look like Death,” Patrick said lamely.
The man rolled his pretty dark eyes. “Okay, so technically I’m not, but Death is sick and I needed the money, so…” he shrugged and turned his hands palms-upward, as if to say ‘here I am.’
Patrick felt an absurd smile begin to cross his lips. “Death is sick?” he repeated incredulously.
The man returned his smile tenfold with a beaming, megawatt grin and some more sparkles in those lovely eyes. “I don’t have a permanent job,” he explained. “I earn enough money to live on by subbing for otherworld entities when they need a break. I’m the first person they call when they’re feeling under the weather, or they’ve just booked a vacation to Fairyland or whatever.”
“Fairyland,” Patrick said weakly, wondering whether he could manage to surreptitiously pinch his arm in an attempt to wake up from what surely had to be the most cracked out dream he’d ever had in his life.
“Yeah, Fairyland,” the man said, as matter-of-factly as if he were standing in front of a map of the United States and discussing precipitation levels in the Midwest - ironic, because Patrick was most definitely not in Kansas anymore. “As a matter of fact, that happened last weekend. The Tooth Fairy had to go to her cousin’s wedding and her apprentice has the flu, so she called me.”
“The Tooth Fairy isn’t real,” Patrick scoffed. He felt a little like he was talking to a 12-year-old who, by now, really should know better.
The man looked wounded. “You know, every time you say that, a fairy dies.”
Patrick shook his head vehemently, so engrossed in his argument that he was all too willing to temporarily forego his disbelief over discussing fairy mortality with the Grim Reaper (or his understudy, or whoever the hell this guy was). “That’s just in Peter Pan. That’s not real.”
The man affixed him with a steady, searching look. “What do you mean it’s not real?”
“It’s… it’s not real,” Patrick repeated, feeling vaguely nervous. “It’s a story. Fiction. Somebody made it up.”
The man’s eyes flashed. “They most certainly did not,” he said hotly, and Patrick looked at him, confused. Death (or his understudy, or whoever) extended the hand that wasn’t holding the scythe. “Nice to meet you. I’m Peter.”
Patrick blinked. “Pan?” he asked stupidly.
“Yes, Pan,” Peter said, still a little huffy. “And that fiction you speak of happens to be my biography.”
Patrick snorted. He couldn’t help himself. “No it’s not!” Peter glared at him, and Patrick exclaimed, “You’re too old!”
Peter shrugged. “I’m the same age I always was, I just shape-shifted to make myself look older. The magical realm is just like here in some respects - one of them being that nobody takes kids seriously.”
“Wait a minute,” Patrick said, frowning, “there was nothing in the book about Peter Pan shape-shifting.”
Peter looked amused. “Of course not. I don’t want that knowledge getting into enemy hands.”
“What enemies?” Patrick asked scathingly.
“Uh,” Peter said in a tone of voice that implied he couldn’t believe Patrick didn’t know. “Hook?”
Patrick’s mouth dropped open. He blinked, closed his mouth, and cleared his throat. “…Oh.”
“Yeah,” Peter said, and the amused expression was back on his face. It softened his features, Patrick noticed. It almost made him look - no, Patrick caught himself right at the last minute, no it did not. “So, uh…” Peter continued, “it’s been a while since I’ve done this. Take my hand.”
Patrick’s heart thudded in his chest. “What?” he croaked, throat suddenly bone dry (no pun intended).
Peter rolled his eyes. “How this works is, you take my hand, I wave this little, uh…” he gestured to the scythe.
“Scythe,” Patrick supplied.
“Yeah, sure,” Peter conceded. “Then this whole, like, portal through the microcosmos opens up - there’s a green light and shit; it’s pretty cool - I drop you off in the underworld and uh, that’s it really,” he finished, shrugging.
“Um,” Patrick said in a small voice. “But. I don’t want to die.”
Peter squinted at him for a second then rifled through the contents of one of the pockets in his dark robe. His hand emerged holding a looseleaf notebook. “Stump, Patrick Martin.” He paused, then snickered. “Dude, your initials -”
“I know,” Patrick said irritably.
Peter’s grin faded. “Okay, let’s see… dude, what day is it?”
Patrick blinked at him. “Uh. Thursday. Well, Friday morning, I think. Is it after midnight?”
“In which time zone?”
“Central Daylight Time. We’re in Chicago.”
“Okay, cool, then it is. And it’s 2067, right?”
“…You mean the year?”
“Duh,” Peter retorted with a playful expression on his face that Patrick was pretty sure he recognized from watching the Disney version of the man’s story.
“No, man. It’s 2007.”
Peter laughed. “Is not.”
“Turn around.”
“Huh?”
“Turn around. There’s a calendar on the wall behind you.”
Peter did so. “Oh… shit.”
“Yeah…” Patrick said, trying very very hard not to laugh.
“I knew I should’ve taken a left when I got to that intersection in the time tunnel.”
“Time tunnel,” Patrick repeated faintly. He almost didn’t want to ask.
“Yeah, you know, the thing you use for time-travelling,” Peter answered matter-of-factly. “I mean, if you can’t fly between different worlds like I can. Or… if you’re me but you’re kinda tired because you were up all last night watching every single one of the Back to the Future movies.” He winced. “That may be one of the reasons I can’t hold down a steady job.”
Patrick let himself laugh out loud at this. “Okay, so, wait, what you’re saying is I’m not supposed to die until 2067?”
“Uh…” Peter squinted at the scribbles in his notebook. “I guess not. Sorry to have bothered you. You can go back to sleep now.” He raised the scythe and prepared to make a dramatic exit.
“No, Peter, wait!” Patrick cried, with an urgency that startled him as much as it did Peter. “I… tell me more about your life.”
Peter cocked his head. “My life?” he questioned, sounding truly bewildered by the notion that someone would think to ask him about it.
“Yeah. Like… what’s it like in Neverland? Are there really Lost Boys and mermaids and Indians? I mean, Native Americans.”
Peter shrugged. “We call them Indians. We’re not very politically correct in Neverland.”
Patrick chuckled. “And what about the others?”
“Well, it’s kind of different now. There are a lot more portals, so there are a lot more people popping in and out. I actually wanted to explore other places too, but I didn’t wanna grow up and if I’d left Neverland I would have.”
“So what did you do?”
“Nothing at first,” Peter said. “I just flew around and battled Hook and stuff - same old, same old, you know?” Patrick nodded, incredulous at how this magical person could think his life so ordinary. “And then one day, Father Time came to visit, and we got talking, and he kinda seemed to like me for some reason. He told me to call him Justin.”
“Justin?” Patrick frowned. That seemed like far too ordinary of a name for someone of such importance.
“Yeah, Justin Time,” Peter said vaguely. “Anyway, Justin came by and I started telling him about my big dilemma, and he was like ‘Dude, I can totally hook you up’, so he did this crazy freakin’… I don’t know, time mojo shit, and now I can travel wherever I want, stay as long as I want, and still never grow up.”
“Whoa,” Patrick breathed in awe. “That’s cool.”
“I know,” Peter said with a grin. “Nice guy, too. The downside is that in other places you actually need to earn money to live comfortably, but I can deal with that.”
Patrick nodded his agreement. “So there really are mermaids?”
“Yeah.” Peter made a face. “I don’t have much to do with them though.”
“How come?”
He shrugged. “They just sit around and comb their hair all day. I have more important stuff to do - like chat to cute humans with really pretty eyes.”
“Um.” Patrick felt his cheeks go hot. “…Thanks, I think.”
Peter shot him a smile. “You’re welcome,” he replied, and then the most amazing thing happened. As Patrick looked on, Peter rose a good couple of feet above the ground. Patrick’s mouth dropped open.
“Uh… Peter, you… you’re…”
Peter looked down. “Oh, yeah! I didn’t notice.”
“…So you didn’t mean to do that?”
“Dude, I thought you’d read my biography. When I’m happy, I float.”
“Oh,” Patrick responded, because he really couldn’t think of anything else to say. “Ah… I’m glad I could make you happy,” he said tentatively.
Peter beamed at him. “Me too, Stump.”
Just then, a distant noise shattered the peace and tranquility of Patrick’s bedroom. It sounded like a grandfather clock chiming from very far away, but it was loud enough not to be ignored.
“Oh, fuck,” said Peter.
“What is it?” asked Patrick, alarmed.
“Nothing, I just, I have to go. I’ve gotta reap a couple hundred more people before sunrise.”
“Damn,” Patrick said softly. “I was just getting to know you.”
“Well…” Peter began, then stopped and shook his head. “No, never mind.”
“Go on.”
“I should only be filling in for Mikey for a few days, and after that I don’t have anything lined up for a little while, so I could come back and hang with you if you want?”
Patrick grinned. “That’d be great!” he enthused sincerely. “But wait, who’s Mikey?”
“Oh, he’s Death. Death is just his street name.”
“His… street name.”
“Yeah. Like, no offence to anyone with the name Mikey, but it doesn’t strike fear into the hearts of men in quite the same way as the name Death does.”
“True,” Patrick mused.
The clock chimed again, more insistently. Peter rolled his eyes. “I’m coming, I’m coming,” he muttered. “So, Stump -”
“Patrick,” Patrick insisted. If Father Time allowed Peter to call him by his first name, then there was no reason why Patrick should not.
“Stump,” Peter repeated, smiling at Patrick with his eyes (Patrick couldn’t understand how he did that, but he did it nonetheless), “what are you doing this time next week?”
“Uh… sleeping, probably,” Patrick answered truthfully.
“Alright, well, meet me at your window, and be prepared to think happy thoughts.”
“Okay,” Patrick agreed readily. Then… “Wait, my window? Why?”
Peter winked at him. “Why do you think?” he asked warmly. “I’m going to take you flying.”
--
The following Friday (Saturday, really, because Patrick's alarm clock had just flashed midnight), Patrick found himself sitting nervously on the end of his bed and seriously questioning his sanity. When Peter had been in his room last week it hadn't felt like a dream, but when Patrick reflected upon it in the cold light of day, he concluded that it must have been. These things didn't happen in real life, not to anybody, and especially not to Patrick. He was really starting to believe that he must have imagined the whole thing, especially as the minutes ticked by and there was still no Peter.
"This is stupid," he muttered finally, tugging off his sweatshirt and trying not to be too disappointed. He was wearing a short-sleeved T-shirt under it, and a long-sleeved one underneath that because when he'd checked the weather forecast (twice) it had said there'd be a distinct chill in the air after sundown and he'd wanted to dress accordingly for, you know, flying. He winced at the implausibility of it all. Generally he considered himself to be a rational person, but Peter had really got him going.
It was at that point that Patrick heard a tap at his window. His head snapped up so fast that his vision blurred, and he had to take a moment to blink back into focus. He was confronted by a rather bedraggled Peter Pan, who was apparently hovering outside his third-floor apartment. He got up at once to let the other man (boy, magical entity, thing...) in.
"Why didn't you just come right in like last time?" Patrick chided gently, offering Peter the blanket from the end of his bed.
"I always wait to be invited in," Peter said rather primly, wrapping the blanket around his shoulders, "unless I've, like, lost my shadow or something. Would you just barge into people's houses without being asked?"
"Well, no," Patrick admitted, "but last week-"
Peter rolled his eyes. "If Death required an invitation, do you think the mortality rate would be as high as it is?"
Patrick thought about this, then felt faintly silly. "Oh. Probably not, no."
Peter smiled. "So. Are you ready?'
Patrick looked out into the dark night. "Is it raining?"
"Um." Peter bit his lip. "Not here. It is on the other side of town." Patrick looked at him curiously, and he fidgeted slightly. "Okay, you know Wendy?"
"Darling?"
Peter nodded, but didn't meet Patrick's eyes. "She has a great-grandchild," he said simply.
"In Chicago?"
"Yeah. I followed her family here from London when they moved."
Patrick's heart melted a little. That was really sweet, he thought, especially as Wendy had chosen growing up over staying with Peter. When he'd read the book, he got the sense that Peter felt very betrayed by what happened. Patrick wasn't sure he would want anything to do with the descendents of someone who'd done that to him, and thought Peter very pure-hearted for looking out for them. "What's his name?" he asked.
Peter frowned. "Her grandchild?"
"Uh-huh. Like, I know it's a long shot, but I might know him or something."
"She's a girl," Peter corrected him, smiling sadly. "Her name's Jeanae."
"I'm sorry," Patrick said after a moment of thought. "I don't know her."
"That's okay. Thank you for asking."
"Of course," Patrick whispered.
Peter flashed him a grin, held out his hand, and suddenly seemed to shake off the sadness. "Did you wanna see Chicago from the air or what?"
Patrick grinned back. "I'd love to," he said, taking Peter's hand.
Peter used his free hand to take a small sachet out of his pocket. Now that he didn't have to dress in the garbs of the Grim Reaper (that he'd presumably borrowed from Mikey, because now that Patrick thought about it, the robe had appeared rather too long), he seemed much more comfortable in his apparel. He was clad in tight, stonewashed jeans and a loose, moss-green tunic, with some kind of intricate pattern of vines embroidered on the sleeves and by the bottom hem. The cuffs of the tunic appeared to be made out of skeleton leaves and had a pearlescent quality to them resembling the juices that ooze out of trees. "You know what this is, right?" he asked Patrick, dangling the sachet.
"Um. Fairy dust?"
Peter beamed. "Got in it one." He sprinkled a little of the dust over Patrick's head and Patrick held in a sneeze. "Okay, so you remember what I said about happy thoughts?"
"Yeah."
Peter squeezed his hand and instantly began to rise off the ground. "Start thinking them."
Patrick closed his eyes and bit his lip. Nothing happened at first, but then Peter rubbed his thumb-tip gently across the back of Patrick's hand, and Patrick felt the happiness bubble up inside him. When he opened his eyes, he found he was floating almost a foot off the ground.
"What did you think about?" Peter whispered into his ear, breath warm on the side of his neck. Patrick couldn't understand the need to whisper but he found it endearing, like Peter didn't even want the spirits of the house or the fireflies outside the window hearing the ingredients of Patrick's happy thought.
Patrick's cheeks burned hotly. "Nothing," he mumbled, embarrassed.
Peter looked a little disappointed, but nodded eventually and glided over to the window. "Now, jump."
Patrick looked panicked. "Just jump? Aren't you going to give me like, flying tips or something?"
Peter seemed honestly puzzled. "Um, you just... spread your arms and kinda point your body. Once you've jumped on the wind's back, you just go."
"There should be a flying handbook," Patrick said mulishly.
"You worry too much," Peter told him, then gave him a kiss on the nose.
Patrick found himself rising higher from the ground before he could stop himself. Sheepishly, he put his hands up to prevent hitting his head on the ceiling. "Er." He cleared his throat. "Anyway."
Peter's eyes twinkled. "I know your happy thought!" he said gleefully, then let go of Patrick's hand and promptly threw himself off the window ledge. Patrick muttered a quick prayer, crossed himself although he hadn't been to church in years, squeezed his eyes firmly shut, and jumped. The next thing he knew...
"That wasn't so bad, was it?!" Peter was asking him brightly.
Patrick cracked an eye open, realised he was suspended several feet above the garden's tallest tree, and whimpered.
"Oh, stop it," Peter said gently, taking his hand again. "There. Now even if the fairy dust wears off - which it won't," he said hurriedly, noticing Patrick's alarmed expression, "I won't let you fall."
Patrick let out a shuddery breath. "Okay. Okay, I can do this." Peter nodded encouragingly. "So, which way to Neverland?"
"Uhhhm..." Peter looked up and surveyed the night sky. "It's the third - no, the second - wait." He peered down at his hand, trying to make something out in the weak light of the moon.
"Second star to the right?" Patrick volunteered helpfully.
Pete stared at him in disbelief. "How the fuck did you know that?"
"Um. The." If Patrick had been on the ground, he would have shifted his weight awkwardly from one foot to the other. He attempted the same motion in the air but it didn't give quite the same effect. "The book."
"Oh, right," Peter said with great relief. "I forgot about the book for a second there."
"Sorry I freaked you out," Patrick mumbled, looking down at the treetop.
"No, it's okay," Peter reassured. "It's good to have someone with me who can navigate. I have to write the directions on my hand every time." He showed his left hand to Patrick and there, sure enough, smudged on the side of his middle finger were the markings '2*R'. "The stars aren't terribly friendly to me most of the time, and they know I use them to navigate, so sometimes they play tricks on me."
Patrick tilted his head. "I thought the stars liked everybody," he said curiously, then caught himself. "I mean, how can they have emotions? They're just balls of gas."
Peter gave him a Look, like he couldn't believe Patrick had resorted to science, of all things. "Do you really believe that?"
"I don't know," Patrick said hesitantly. "When I was a kid I thought they had personalities, and that they'd wink at me and stuff, but, you know. We learnt that they were just gases in middle school."
Peter sighed. "I don't understand why adults insist on forcing their nonsense onto young children who are perfectly correct."
Patrick didn't really know how to respond to this, so instead he asked, "Why don't the stars like you?"
Peter fidgeted a little in the air. "I kind of like to creep up behind them and try to blow them out."
Patrick couldn't help but chuckle. "That's a pretty good reason. Hey," he exclaimed, looking at a spot somewhere over Peter's head, "I can see downtown from here!"
"We'll see more of Chicago as we get higher," Peter said, then looped his arm through Patrick's. "Shall we?"
Patrick spread his free arm out to the side, pointed his feet, and nodded. Before long, they were flying.
--
They really seemed to be flying for a dreadfully long time. At first, Patrick tried to keep track using the hours of light and darkness, but because they were passing through time zones this wasn't terribly effective. He berated himself for leaving his watch on his bedside table. "Peter?" he asked cautiously.
"Mmm?" Peter responded, looking over at him.
"You don't happen to be wearing a watch, do you?"
Peter laughed, then rolled both of his sleeves up to his elbows. Patrick hadn't seen his arms before - he'd always been wearing long sleeves. "There's no room." And sure enough, every inch was covered in monochrome inked swirls.
"Where did you get those?" Patrick gasped. He hadn't thought there were tattoo parlors in Neverland.
"The second star to the left," Peter replied matter-of-factly. "I was going home from the human world and I must have taken a wrong turn. Nice guys, though. Very artistic."
They flew on in silence for a little while - a comfortable silence that left Patrick to his own thoughts. Presently, something struck him. "Hey, Peter?"
"Right here, Stump," Peter responded, reaching out to squeeze his hand. After they'd been flying for a while, Patrick had felt sufficiently confident to let go of Peter and fly by himself, but it was still nice to get the reassurance that Peter was by his side - not to mention the fact that a tingle went through him every time he touched Peter's body.
"Where's Tink?"
Peter giggled. "You mean my fairy?"
"Yeah..." Patrick couldn't understand what was so funny.
"Do you know when my biography was published?" Peter asked him, not unkindly but with the hint of a laugh still in his voice.
"Umm, like, the early 1900's or something?"
"1911."
"Wow. How old are you?"
Peter shrugged. "Quite young. Do you know when women in England got the vote?"
Patrick blinked at him. "I. What? What does that have to do with Tinker Bell?"
"Women's liberation," Peter explained patiently. "When women's suffrage was granted in England in 1928, the fairies staged an uprising."
"You're kidding."
"I'm not. I haven't seen Tink in almost eighty years."
Patrick gasped. "Well, aren't you sad about that?!"
Peter shrugged. "Things have changed in Neverland. She didn't need me anymore, and I try my very best not to need anyone, so. Besides, you should be glad she's not here." He gave Patrick a sideways glance that Patrick couldn't quite interpret. "She'd be jealous of you, for sure, and you know what happens when Tink gets jealous."
Patrick frowned. "Um?" He must have forgotten this part. It had been a good ten years since he read the book, to be honest. He'd actually seen it in a bookstore the other day but stopped himself from buying it because he thought it too childish.
"When I first brought the Darlings to Neverland, the pirates started shooting cannonballs at us before we could land. John and Michael got separated from me, and then I got separated from Wendy. Tink was with Wendy because Wendy was carrying her in John's hat so the pirates wouldn't see her light, and she guided Wendy down to the island and told the Lost Boys to shoot their arrows at her."
"Oh!" Patrick gasped. "Well, yeah, that wouldn't be too good, but I don't think you'd have to worry, Peter. Tink was only jealous because Wendy was a girl, so she felt threatened. You know, because she was afraid you liked another girl more than her."
Peter giggled again, and Patrick fancied it was one of the nicest sounds he'd ever heard. "She needn't've worried," he told Patrick whimsically. "I like boys better."
---<---<---@
Author: that_1_incident
Fandom: Fall Out Boy
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: AU, crack!fic, incomplete, profanity
Pairing: Patrick Stump/Pete Wentz
Word Count: ~4,100
Summary: “You don’t look like Death,” Patrick said lamely.
The man rolled his pretty dark eyes. “Okay, so technically I’m not, but Death is sick and I needed the money, so…” he shrugged and turned his hands palms-upward, as if to say ”here I am.”
Disclaimer: In 1911, J. M. Barrie published “Peter Pan & Wendy.” I borrowed some of his characters, descriptions, etc. but I changed some of Peter's qualities, making him less rude & more empathetic. I absolutely have no intention of trying to rip off a literary classic. Plz to not be suing =D
Author Notes: This is the fic that almost never was. My hard drive crashed a little while after I wrote it (of course, I hadn’t done anything so sensible as to back it up) and Staples was all "Yeah, we need a thousand bucks to see if we can get anything off it," and I was all "Um, I don't have a thousand bucks, Staples.” Fortunately the Geek Squad were all "Yo, we'll do it for one fifty" and I ended up getting my fic back.
The other thing about the fic is that it is obviously unfinished. I would dearly love to work on it again at some point because it was one of my more popular fics and people really seemed to warm to it. We shall see.
--->--->--->---@
Patrick blinked and squinted at the hooded figure that had suddenly and unexpectedly materialized in his bedroom. He wasn’t asleep yet - at least, he thought he wasn’t. “Er,” he began somewhat stupidly. Patrick Stump was very hard to ruffle, but this situation had him beat. “How exactly - who are - what?”
“I’m Death,” the figure said calmly.
Patrick snorted. “No you’re not.”
The figure’s robes rustled, and then a hand appeared. Patrick didn’t notice the hand itself, however - rather, he noticed the fearsome scythe it was clutching.
“Well, fuck.” Patrick winced, sat up, hugged the bedcovers closer to his body then asked tentatively, “I figured I had at least a couple of decades until my arteries clogged up. Did I really eat that many cheeseburgers?”
“Something like that,” the figure responded vaguely, drawing back his hood. Patrick was expecting something fearsome - a ghastly white, pallid complexion, gaping black recesses in place of eyes or worst of all, no skin whatsoever. In fact, he was confronted with the polar opposite: deep, sparkling brown eyes and healthy, tanned skin that had a natural glow to it.
“You… you don’t look like Death,” Patrick said lamely.
The man rolled his pretty dark eyes. “Okay, so technically I’m not, but Death is sick and I needed the money, so…” he shrugged and turned his hands palms-upward, as if to say ‘here I am.’
Patrick felt an absurd smile begin to cross his lips. “Death is sick?” he repeated incredulously.
The man returned his smile tenfold with a beaming, megawatt grin and some more sparkles in those lovely eyes. “I don’t have a permanent job,” he explained. “I earn enough money to live on by subbing for otherworld entities when they need a break. I’m the first person they call when they’re feeling under the weather, or they’ve just booked a vacation to Fairyland or whatever.”
“Fairyland,” Patrick said weakly, wondering whether he could manage to surreptitiously pinch his arm in an attempt to wake up from what surely had to be the most cracked out dream he’d ever had in his life.
“Yeah, Fairyland,” the man said, as matter-of-factly as if he were standing in front of a map of the United States and discussing precipitation levels in the Midwest - ironic, because Patrick was most definitely not in Kansas anymore. “As a matter of fact, that happened last weekend. The Tooth Fairy had to go to her cousin’s wedding and her apprentice has the flu, so she called me.”
“The Tooth Fairy isn’t real,” Patrick scoffed. He felt a little like he was talking to a 12-year-old who, by now, really should know better.
The man looked wounded. “You know, every time you say that, a fairy dies.”
Patrick shook his head vehemently, so engrossed in his argument that he was all too willing to temporarily forego his disbelief over discussing fairy mortality with the Grim Reaper (or his understudy, or whoever the hell this guy was). “That’s just in Peter Pan. That’s not real.”
The man affixed him with a steady, searching look. “What do you mean it’s not real?”
“It’s… it’s not real,” Patrick repeated, feeling vaguely nervous. “It’s a story. Fiction. Somebody made it up.”
The man’s eyes flashed. “They most certainly did not,” he said hotly, and Patrick looked at him, confused. Death (or his understudy, or whoever) extended the hand that wasn’t holding the scythe. “Nice to meet you. I’m Peter.”
Patrick blinked. “Pan?” he asked stupidly.
“Yes, Pan,” Peter said, still a little huffy. “And that fiction you speak of happens to be my biography.”
Patrick snorted. He couldn’t help himself. “No it’s not!” Peter glared at him, and Patrick exclaimed, “You’re too old!”
Peter shrugged. “I’m the same age I always was, I just shape-shifted to make myself look older. The magical realm is just like here in some respects - one of them being that nobody takes kids seriously.”
“Wait a minute,” Patrick said, frowning, “there was nothing in the book about Peter Pan shape-shifting.”
Peter looked amused. “Of course not. I don’t want that knowledge getting into enemy hands.”
“What enemies?” Patrick asked scathingly.
“Uh,” Peter said in a tone of voice that implied he couldn’t believe Patrick didn’t know. “Hook?”
Patrick’s mouth dropped open. He blinked, closed his mouth, and cleared his throat. “…Oh.”
“Yeah,” Peter said, and the amused expression was back on his face. It softened his features, Patrick noticed. It almost made him look - no, Patrick caught himself right at the last minute, no it did not. “So, uh…” Peter continued, “it’s been a while since I’ve done this. Take my hand.”
Patrick’s heart thudded in his chest. “What?” he croaked, throat suddenly bone dry (no pun intended).
Peter rolled his eyes. “How this works is, you take my hand, I wave this little, uh…” he gestured to the scythe.
“Scythe,” Patrick supplied.
“Yeah, sure,” Peter conceded. “Then this whole, like, portal through the microcosmos opens up - there’s a green light and shit; it’s pretty cool - I drop you off in the underworld and uh, that’s it really,” he finished, shrugging.
“Um,” Patrick said in a small voice. “But. I don’t want to die.”
Peter squinted at him for a second then rifled through the contents of one of the pockets in his dark robe. His hand emerged holding a looseleaf notebook. “Stump, Patrick Martin.” He paused, then snickered. “Dude, your initials -”
“I know,” Patrick said irritably.
Peter’s grin faded. “Okay, let’s see… dude, what day is it?”
Patrick blinked at him. “Uh. Thursday. Well, Friday morning, I think. Is it after midnight?”
“In which time zone?”
“Central Daylight Time. We’re in Chicago.”
“Okay, cool, then it is. And it’s 2067, right?”
“…You mean the year?”
“Duh,” Peter retorted with a playful expression on his face that Patrick was pretty sure he recognized from watching the Disney version of the man’s story.
“No, man. It’s 2007.”
Peter laughed. “Is not.”
“Turn around.”
“Huh?”
“Turn around. There’s a calendar on the wall behind you.”
Peter did so. “Oh… shit.”
“Yeah…” Patrick said, trying very very hard not to laugh.
“I knew I should’ve taken a left when I got to that intersection in the time tunnel.”
“Time tunnel,” Patrick repeated faintly. He almost didn’t want to ask.
“Yeah, you know, the thing you use for time-travelling,” Peter answered matter-of-factly. “I mean, if you can’t fly between different worlds like I can. Or… if you’re me but you’re kinda tired because you were up all last night watching every single one of the Back to the Future movies.” He winced. “That may be one of the reasons I can’t hold down a steady job.”
Patrick let himself laugh out loud at this. “Okay, so, wait, what you’re saying is I’m not supposed to die until 2067?”
“Uh…” Peter squinted at the scribbles in his notebook. “I guess not. Sorry to have bothered you. You can go back to sleep now.” He raised the scythe and prepared to make a dramatic exit.
“No, Peter, wait!” Patrick cried, with an urgency that startled him as much as it did Peter. “I… tell me more about your life.”
Peter cocked his head. “My life?” he questioned, sounding truly bewildered by the notion that someone would think to ask him about it.
“Yeah. Like… what’s it like in Neverland? Are there really Lost Boys and mermaids and Indians? I mean, Native Americans.”
Peter shrugged. “We call them Indians. We’re not very politically correct in Neverland.”
Patrick chuckled. “And what about the others?”
“Well, it’s kind of different now. There are a lot more portals, so there are a lot more people popping in and out. I actually wanted to explore other places too, but I didn’t wanna grow up and if I’d left Neverland I would have.”
“So what did you do?”
“Nothing at first,” Peter said. “I just flew around and battled Hook and stuff - same old, same old, you know?” Patrick nodded, incredulous at how this magical person could think his life so ordinary. “And then one day, Father Time came to visit, and we got talking, and he kinda seemed to like me for some reason. He told me to call him Justin.”
“Justin?” Patrick frowned. That seemed like far too ordinary of a name for someone of such importance.
“Yeah, Justin Time,” Peter said vaguely. “Anyway, Justin came by and I started telling him about my big dilemma, and he was like ‘Dude, I can totally hook you up’, so he did this crazy freakin’… I don’t know, time mojo shit, and now I can travel wherever I want, stay as long as I want, and still never grow up.”
“Whoa,” Patrick breathed in awe. “That’s cool.”
“I know,” Peter said with a grin. “Nice guy, too. The downside is that in other places you actually need to earn money to live comfortably, but I can deal with that.”
Patrick nodded his agreement. “So there really are mermaids?”
“Yeah.” Peter made a face. “I don’t have much to do with them though.”
“How come?”
He shrugged. “They just sit around and comb their hair all day. I have more important stuff to do - like chat to cute humans with really pretty eyes.”
“Um.” Patrick felt his cheeks go hot. “…Thanks, I think.”
Peter shot him a smile. “You’re welcome,” he replied, and then the most amazing thing happened. As Patrick looked on, Peter rose a good couple of feet above the ground. Patrick’s mouth dropped open.
“Uh… Peter, you… you’re…”
Peter looked down. “Oh, yeah! I didn’t notice.”
“…So you didn’t mean to do that?”
“Dude, I thought you’d read my biography. When I’m happy, I float.”
“Oh,” Patrick responded, because he really couldn’t think of anything else to say. “Ah… I’m glad I could make you happy,” he said tentatively.
Peter beamed at him. “Me too, Stump.”
Just then, a distant noise shattered the peace and tranquility of Patrick’s bedroom. It sounded like a grandfather clock chiming from very far away, but it was loud enough not to be ignored.
“Oh, fuck,” said Peter.
“What is it?” asked Patrick, alarmed.
“Nothing, I just, I have to go. I’ve gotta reap a couple hundred more people before sunrise.”
“Damn,” Patrick said softly. “I was just getting to know you.”
“Well…” Peter began, then stopped and shook his head. “No, never mind.”
“Go on.”
“I should only be filling in for Mikey for a few days, and after that I don’t have anything lined up for a little while, so I could come back and hang with you if you want?”
Patrick grinned. “That’d be great!” he enthused sincerely. “But wait, who’s Mikey?”
“Oh, he’s Death. Death is just his street name.”
“His… street name.”
“Yeah. Like, no offence to anyone with the name Mikey, but it doesn’t strike fear into the hearts of men in quite the same way as the name Death does.”
“True,” Patrick mused.
The clock chimed again, more insistently. Peter rolled his eyes. “I’m coming, I’m coming,” he muttered. “So, Stump -”
“Patrick,” Patrick insisted. If Father Time allowed Peter to call him by his first name, then there was no reason why Patrick should not.
“Stump,” Peter repeated, smiling at Patrick with his eyes (Patrick couldn’t understand how he did that, but he did it nonetheless), “what are you doing this time next week?”
“Uh… sleeping, probably,” Patrick answered truthfully.
“Alright, well, meet me at your window, and be prepared to think happy thoughts.”
“Okay,” Patrick agreed readily. Then… “Wait, my window? Why?”
Peter winked at him. “Why do you think?” he asked warmly. “I’m going to take you flying.”
--
The following Friday (Saturday, really, because Patrick's alarm clock had just flashed midnight), Patrick found himself sitting nervously on the end of his bed and seriously questioning his sanity. When Peter had been in his room last week it hadn't felt like a dream, but when Patrick reflected upon it in the cold light of day, he concluded that it must have been. These things didn't happen in real life, not to anybody, and especially not to Patrick. He was really starting to believe that he must have imagined the whole thing, especially as the minutes ticked by and there was still no Peter.
"This is stupid," he muttered finally, tugging off his sweatshirt and trying not to be too disappointed. He was wearing a short-sleeved T-shirt under it, and a long-sleeved one underneath that because when he'd checked the weather forecast (twice) it had said there'd be a distinct chill in the air after sundown and he'd wanted to dress accordingly for, you know, flying. He winced at the implausibility of it all. Generally he considered himself to be a rational person, but Peter had really got him going.
It was at that point that Patrick heard a tap at his window. His head snapped up so fast that his vision blurred, and he had to take a moment to blink back into focus. He was confronted by a rather bedraggled Peter Pan, who was apparently hovering outside his third-floor apartment. He got up at once to let the other man (boy, magical entity, thing...) in.
"Why didn't you just come right in like last time?" Patrick chided gently, offering Peter the blanket from the end of his bed.
"I always wait to be invited in," Peter said rather primly, wrapping the blanket around his shoulders, "unless I've, like, lost my shadow or something. Would you just barge into people's houses without being asked?"
"Well, no," Patrick admitted, "but last week-"
Peter rolled his eyes. "If Death required an invitation, do you think the mortality rate would be as high as it is?"
Patrick thought about this, then felt faintly silly. "Oh. Probably not, no."
Peter smiled. "So. Are you ready?'
Patrick looked out into the dark night. "Is it raining?"
"Um." Peter bit his lip. "Not here. It is on the other side of town." Patrick looked at him curiously, and he fidgeted slightly. "Okay, you know Wendy?"
"Darling?"
Peter nodded, but didn't meet Patrick's eyes. "She has a great-grandchild," he said simply.
"In Chicago?"
"Yeah. I followed her family here from London when they moved."
Patrick's heart melted a little. That was really sweet, he thought, especially as Wendy had chosen growing up over staying with Peter. When he'd read the book, he got the sense that Peter felt very betrayed by what happened. Patrick wasn't sure he would want anything to do with the descendents of someone who'd done that to him, and thought Peter very pure-hearted for looking out for them. "What's his name?" he asked.
Peter frowned. "Her grandchild?"
"Uh-huh. Like, I know it's a long shot, but I might know him or something."
"She's a girl," Peter corrected him, smiling sadly. "Her name's Jeanae."
"I'm sorry," Patrick said after a moment of thought. "I don't know her."
"That's okay. Thank you for asking."
"Of course," Patrick whispered.
Peter flashed him a grin, held out his hand, and suddenly seemed to shake off the sadness. "Did you wanna see Chicago from the air or what?"
Patrick grinned back. "I'd love to," he said, taking Peter's hand.
Peter used his free hand to take a small sachet out of his pocket. Now that he didn't have to dress in the garbs of the Grim Reaper (that he'd presumably borrowed from Mikey, because now that Patrick thought about it, the robe had appeared rather too long), he seemed much more comfortable in his apparel. He was clad in tight, stonewashed jeans and a loose, moss-green tunic, with some kind of intricate pattern of vines embroidered on the sleeves and by the bottom hem. The cuffs of the tunic appeared to be made out of skeleton leaves and had a pearlescent quality to them resembling the juices that ooze out of trees. "You know what this is, right?" he asked Patrick, dangling the sachet.
"Um. Fairy dust?"
Peter beamed. "Got in it one." He sprinkled a little of the dust over Patrick's head and Patrick held in a sneeze. "Okay, so you remember what I said about happy thoughts?"
"Yeah."
Peter squeezed his hand and instantly began to rise off the ground. "Start thinking them."
Patrick closed his eyes and bit his lip. Nothing happened at first, but then Peter rubbed his thumb-tip gently across the back of Patrick's hand, and Patrick felt the happiness bubble up inside him. When he opened his eyes, he found he was floating almost a foot off the ground.
"What did you think about?" Peter whispered into his ear, breath warm on the side of his neck. Patrick couldn't understand the need to whisper but he found it endearing, like Peter didn't even want the spirits of the house or the fireflies outside the window hearing the ingredients of Patrick's happy thought.
Patrick's cheeks burned hotly. "Nothing," he mumbled, embarrassed.
Peter looked a little disappointed, but nodded eventually and glided over to the window. "Now, jump."
Patrick looked panicked. "Just jump? Aren't you going to give me like, flying tips or something?"
Peter seemed honestly puzzled. "Um, you just... spread your arms and kinda point your body. Once you've jumped on the wind's back, you just go."
"There should be a flying handbook," Patrick said mulishly.
"You worry too much," Peter told him, then gave him a kiss on the nose.
Patrick found himself rising higher from the ground before he could stop himself. Sheepishly, he put his hands up to prevent hitting his head on the ceiling. "Er." He cleared his throat. "Anyway."
Peter's eyes twinkled. "I know your happy thought!" he said gleefully, then let go of Patrick's hand and promptly threw himself off the window ledge. Patrick muttered a quick prayer, crossed himself although he hadn't been to church in years, squeezed his eyes firmly shut, and jumped. The next thing he knew...
"That wasn't so bad, was it?!" Peter was asking him brightly.
Patrick cracked an eye open, realised he was suspended several feet above the garden's tallest tree, and whimpered.
"Oh, stop it," Peter said gently, taking his hand again. "There. Now even if the fairy dust wears off - which it won't," he said hurriedly, noticing Patrick's alarmed expression, "I won't let you fall."
Patrick let out a shuddery breath. "Okay. Okay, I can do this." Peter nodded encouragingly. "So, which way to Neverland?"
"Uhhhm..." Peter looked up and surveyed the night sky. "It's the third - no, the second - wait." He peered down at his hand, trying to make something out in the weak light of the moon.
"Second star to the right?" Patrick volunteered helpfully.
Pete stared at him in disbelief. "How the fuck did you know that?"
"Um. The." If Patrick had been on the ground, he would have shifted his weight awkwardly from one foot to the other. He attempted the same motion in the air but it didn't give quite the same effect. "The book."
"Oh, right," Peter said with great relief. "I forgot about the book for a second there."
"Sorry I freaked you out," Patrick mumbled, looking down at the treetop.
"No, it's okay," Peter reassured. "It's good to have someone with me who can navigate. I have to write the directions on my hand every time." He showed his left hand to Patrick and there, sure enough, smudged on the side of his middle finger were the markings '2*R'. "The stars aren't terribly friendly to me most of the time, and they know I use them to navigate, so sometimes they play tricks on me."
Patrick tilted his head. "I thought the stars liked everybody," he said curiously, then caught himself. "I mean, how can they have emotions? They're just balls of gas."
Peter gave him a Look, like he couldn't believe Patrick had resorted to science, of all things. "Do you really believe that?"
"I don't know," Patrick said hesitantly. "When I was a kid I thought they had personalities, and that they'd wink at me and stuff, but, you know. We learnt that they were just gases in middle school."
Peter sighed. "I don't understand why adults insist on forcing their nonsense onto young children who are perfectly correct."
Patrick didn't really know how to respond to this, so instead he asked, "Why don't the stars like you?"
Peter fidgeted a little in the air. "I kind of like to creep up behind them and try to blow them out."
Patrick couldn't help but chuckle. "That's a pretty good reason. Hey," he exclaimed, looking at a spot somewhere over Peter's head, "I can see downtown from here!"
"We'll see more of Chicago as we get higher," Peter said, then looped his arm through Patrick's. "Shall we?"
Patrick spread his free arm out to the side, pointed his feet, and nodded. Before long, they were flying.
--
They really seemed to be flying for a dreadfully long time. At first, Patrick tried to keep track using the hours of light and darkness, but because they were passing through time zones this wasn't terribly effective. He berated himself for leaving his watch on his bedside table. "Peter?" he asked cautiously.
"Mmm?" Peter responded, looking over at him.
"You don't happen to be wearing a watch, do you?"
Peter laughed, then rolled both of his sleeves up to his elbows. Patrick hadn't seen his arms before - he'd always been wearing long sleeves. "There's no room." And sure enough, every inch was covered in monochrome inked swirls.
"Where did you get those?" Patrick gasped. He hadn't thought there were tattoo parlors in Neverland.
"The second star to the left," Peter replied matter-of-factly. "I was going home from the human world and I must have taken a wrong turn. Nice guys, though. Very artistic."
They flew on in silence for a little while - a comfortable silence that left Patrick to his own thoughts. Presently, something struck him. "Hey, Peter?"
"Right here, Stump," Peter responded, reaching out to squeeze his hand. After they'd been flying for a while, Patrick had felt sufficiently confident to let go of Peter and fly by himself, but it was still nice to get the reassurance that Peter was by his side - not to mention the fact that a tingle went through him every time he touched Peter's body.
"Where's Tink?"
Peter giggled. "You mean my fairy?"
"Yeah..." Patrick couldn't understand what was so funny.
"Do you know when my biography was published?" Peter asked him, not unkindly but with the hint of a laugh still in his voice.
"Umm, like, the early 1900's or something?"
"1911."
"Wow. How old are you?"
Peter shrugged. "Quite young. Do you know when women in England got the vote?"
Patrick blinked at him. "I. What? What does that have to do with Tinker Bell?"
"Women's liberation," Peter explained patiently. "When women's suffrage was granted in England in 1928, the fairies staged an uprising."
"You're kidding."
"I'm not. I haven't seen Tink in almost eighty years."
Patrick gasped. "Well, aren't you sad about that?!"
Peter shrugged. "Things have changed in Neverland. She didn't need me anymore, and I try my very best not to need anyone, so. Besides, you should be glad she's not here." He gave Patrick a sideways glance that Patrick couldn't quite interpret. "She'd be jealous of you, for sure, and you know what happens when Tink gets jealous."
Patrick frowned. "Um?" He must have forgotten this part. It had been a good ten years since he read the book, to be honest. He'd actually seen it in a bookstore the other day but stopped himself from buying it because he thought it too childish.
"When I first brought the Darlings to Neverland, the pirates started shooting cannonballs at us before we could land. John and Michael got separated from me, and then I got separated from Wendy. Tink was with Wendy because Wendy was carrying her in John's hat so the pirates wouldn't see her light, and she guided Wendy down to the island and told the Lost Boys to shoot their arrows at her."
"Oh!" Patrick gasped. "Well, yeah, that wouldn't be too good, but I don't think you'd have to worry, Peter. Tink was only jealous because Wendy was a girl, so she felt threatened. You know, because she was afraid you liked another girl more than her."
Peter giggled again, and Patrick fancied it was one of the nicest sounds he'd ever heard. "She needn't've worried," he told Patrick whimsically. "I like boys better."
---<---<---@