"You are him," he acknowledged, breathing hard. "You are the Pan." He held out the sword to Peter, hilt forward. "It's yours. Take it, jollymon. You can fight, you can fly, you can…"

Words failed him. He swallowed hard. There was disappointment and a trace of resentment reflected in his face, but admiration as well. Peter accepted the sword, stepped away, and drew a line in the earth. Peter and the Lost Boys stood on one side of the line. Rufio stood alone on the other.

Rufio rose to his feet and crossed. The boy that had been and the man that would be faced each other with faint smiles and embraced.

All around them, the Lost Boys cheered.

That night there was a huge celebration in honor of Peter Pan. The Lost Boys painted themselves in their wildest colors, dressed in their finest garb, ate all of their favorite foods until they were full to bursting, and then danced Indian dances before bonfires that lit the darkened skies for miles. Whooping and leaping about, they ringed the fires, lifting their arms and brandishing their weapons fiercely, singing songs in languages both imagined and real. Peter was the center of attention, called upon repeatedly to do flying stunts. He willingly complied, giving exhibitions of barrel rolls, loop the loops, corkscrews, and spins and sweeps so daring that he clipped the ends of branches and the tips of grass. Each new stunt demanded another, and the more daring that one the greater the cry to top it with the next. Peter laughed and joked and played games with one and all, the joy and wonder of his boyhood coming back to him as he did so, the bits and pieces of who and what he had been recalling themselves in a dazzling kaleidoscope of memories.

To think that he had ever given it up! To think that anything could ever have persuaded him to abandon it!

So great was his enthusiasm at rediscovering the boy, so intense his happiness at being shed of the man, that he was lost for a time in the living of the moment, and the larger picture of his life and loved ones became obscured.

Then finally, toward morning, the moons of Neverland gone westward to their rest and the stars grown faint in a gradual brightening of the eastern sky, it occurred to Peter that Tink was missing. She had been with him for a time, celebrating with the rest, but at some point in the festivities she had disappeared entirely.

Peter flew up into the Nevertree, calling her name, thinking that perhaps she had decided to play hide-and-seek with him. He soared to the top of the ancient tree and swooped down again without finding her. He flew 'round about and saw nothing.

At last he arrived at the little vine-covered clock that was her house. He called for her as he flashed by, but there was no response. Below, the Lost Boys danced on, their cries rising up into the deep silence of the Nevertree's limbs. Peter landed on a tree branch, bent down so that he was eye level with Tink's house, and peered inside.

Tinkerbell sat with her back to him, her head lowered into her hands, her shoulders quaking. Peter frowned in confusion, aware suddenly that she was crying.

"Tink? Tink, is that you?" he asked anxiously.

There was no answer. The room was cluttered with strange things. A man's open wallet served as a dressing screen, a spool of thread as a stool, keys as clothes hangers, and loose coins and a few red Life Savers as decorations. A driver's license hung on the wall like a family portrait.

Most of it belonged to Peter, of course, but the little boy he had become failed to recognize them.

"Tink?" he repeated, more insistent this time. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

The crying stopped. "No. I just got some pixie dust in my eye, that's all."

"1 shall get it out for you," he offered, drawing his dagger.

Tink shook her head, still turned away.

"Are you sad, Tink?" he asked.

"No. Please go away."

Peter brightened. "Need a firefly? Or a bit of dewy webbing? I know. You're sick! You need a thermometer. A thermometer will make you all better."

"No, it's not about that."

Peter wasn't listening. "That's how Nibs got the Wendy-girl better after Tootles shot her down, no thanks to you. Nibs put the thermometer in her mouth and she got all better. Don't you remember?"

Tink quit crying and nodded. "Remember how you spoke in Hook's voice and saved that great ugly Tiger Lily and made peace with the Indians?"

"Oh, sure I do." Peter drew himself up. "Ahoy, you lubbers!" he said in his wondrous imitation of Hook's voice. "Set her free! Yes, cut her bonds and let her go! At once, d'ye hear, or I'll plunge my Hook in you!" He laughed merrily. "We had the best adventures, didn't we, Tink?"

Tink's tousled head lifted. Without turning, she asked hesitantly, "Peter, do you remember your last adventure? The one to… to rescue your kids?"

Peter blinked in confusion, then mimicked, "Peter Pan's got kids?"

Tink went very still. "Answer me this: Why are you in Neverland?''

He laughed anew. "That's easy. To be a Lost Boy and never grow up. To fight pirates and blow out stars. Ask me another question. C'mon, I like this game."

"Oh, Peter," she whispered.

She rose to face him.

Then her light began to blaze, flaring so brightly that Peter was forced to back away from the door of the clock house, squinting his eyes protectively. As he did so, his shadow suddenly darted away on its own, startled by what it saw. Tink's clock house suddenly began to break apart. Peter gasped, and his eyes opened wide. The light grew bigger, taller, more radiant before him-as if a piece of the sun had come down from the sky.

And all at once there was Tinkerbell, no longer tiny but grown as large as he was, the remains of her house sitting precariously on her head and shoulders.

Her smile was wondrous. "It is the only wish I ever made for myself," she said.

Peter stared. She was so… large. She wore a lacy gown, long and flowing in the gentle night breeze. Her eyes sparkled and her hair shimmered as if it had been sprinkled with tiny stars. She was only standing there, but she was doing things to Peter inside that he didn't understand.

He tried to speak, but she brought a finger up to his mouth quickly to silence him.

Then she stepped up to him, her arms came about his waist, and her face pushed close to his own.

Peter, a boy now to all intents and purposes, gave her a puzzled look. "What are you doing?"

Tink put her nose against his. "I'm going to give you a kiss."

Peter grinned and squeezed one hand up between them to receive it. For in his boyhood, thimbles and buttons had always been kisses, and it was one of these that he expected to receive now.

But Tink closed one of her hands over his own, pressed herself against him, put her lips on his, and gave him a real kiss.

Then she stepped back again. "Oh, Peter. I couldn't feel this way about you if you didn't love me, too. You do, don't you? It's too big a feeling to feel all by myself, you know. It's the biggest feeling I've ever had. And this is the first time I've been big enough to let it come out."

She bent forward to kiss him again. Peter held himself motionless, liking the feeling that the kiss produced even if he was unsure why, wanting to share her biggest feeling because it was, in some way, his own. But as her lips brushed his he caught sight of the flower she was wearing in her hair.

It reminded him of another.

It reminded him of…

"Maggie," he whispered and pulled back. "Jack. Moira."

There was a shifting within him of time and place, of memories and dreams, and the boy and man readjusted their positions, the boy giving back something of what he had taken, the man accepting what was offered without feeling the need to ask for more.

"Please!" Tink begged, trying to bring him close again. "Please, Peter," she whispered. "Don't spoil it."