Lost Boi (2 page)

I kept saying that he should go up to her after she read. “Sir, you are the bravest and most handsome boi. She wouldn't say no to you,” I'd tell him again and again. Pan never did get the nerve to approach Wendi; his dog Erebos did it for him.

Erebos was a little pit-bull cross with a deep-bluish-black coat and a white star on her chest. Pan pulled her out of the dumpster where her litter had been thrown by an evil grownup. All the puppies died except for Erebos, whom Pan bottle-fed with a washed-out syringe and some puppy formula he shoplifted from the pet shop by the river. Grownups will cross the street when they see us coming with Erebos, but she only looks mean, like us. Grownups are always making assumptions, thinking they know everything about a dog or a boi before giving any of us a chance. Pan named the dog Erebos after the Greek god of shadows, and she never once left his side, except for when she went after Wendi that night. Pan had been watching Wendi read when Erebos jumped onto the stage, pulled at Wendi's backpack, and ran off into the crowd. Wendi had been reading a story about a femme princess kneeling before her buxom prince, hands bound behind her back, but she raced off the stage after the strange shadow of a dog. Pan, laughing, ran after her, and together they chased Erebos through the bookstore as she wove in and out of queers sitting on folding chairs then out onto the sidewalk. Pan tried to tackle Erebos, missed, and crashed into
a phone booth. It was then that Erebos came right up to Wendi and dropped the backpack with a wag of her tail. Pan, who had picked himself up off the pavement, was forced to introduce himself. Wendi had, of course, noticed him sitting in the back of the room all those weeks, but she didn't let on.

It was the next morning that Mrs Darling first learned about Pan. She knew, of course, where the children kept their diaries and made a regular practice of reading them. Like all parents, she liked to know what was happening in her children's minds. If she could have, Mrs Darling would have tidied things up, ripped out pages, and burned them in the fire, but she knew the real world was not so simple. Still, she was concerned when she read in Wendi's diary about someone whose gender she could not determine who seemed much older, and yet, as Wendi described in excruciating detail the baggy sweatshirt, work pants, boots, and red hair, this … this person seemed perhaps to be no older than the children in her care. Mrs Darling was worried that this mysterious—boy? woman?—who lurked at the back of the room at open mics could be just the kind of distraction that her Wendi didn't need.

2

The Stars

I
'm sure by now you are wondering who I am and what business I have telling these stories that aren't mine. Well, at least not entirely mine. The name's Tootles. I was lead boi in service of Pan, leader of us lost bois in Neverland. Who are the lost bois, you ask? To be a lost boi, you must be brave, strong, and above all loyal, but beyond that, we're hard to define. To write about who we were and what we always had been feels inadequate. Never in my life has there been anything as important as pleasing Pan. Magic is the only word for it. In Neverland I felt like anything was possible. Pan was a strict leader, but he brought bois alive and gave us a world few others ever saw.

It wasn't always easy. Sometimes it seemed like I missed all the big adventures. I'd be out dumpster diving so we could have dinner, and when I got back, there'd be blood everywhere. I never minded, really, nor would I have hesitated to pull my knife and fight for Sir if I'd been called to. Sure, our
world was violent, it had to be, but it was also bonfires, fucking, and skinny-dipping in the river. Often I was the only boi who Pan would talk to. I loved that. Until Wendi came, he'd always tell me about the mischief he'd gotten himself into, like fighting with the urban primitives outside the food co-op or tricking the pirates into thinking their house had rats. Fun shit like that. Sometimes Pan would go after bigger things, like pilfering a boi's Child-Protective-Service records from the briefcase of a new social worker, or starting things up again with Hook—but now I'm getting ahead of myself.

Above all else, Pan believed in the power of make-believe. I never knew which stories of his to really believe, but I also knew better than to doubt. When you became Pan's, you swore an oath that you would never doubt or question him. That's what kept the magic alive. Truth is a funny thing: it matters the most to grownups. To us bois, it never was very important. Besides, Pan has always liked a good story, especially if it's about him. I just liked Pan; he was everything to me back then, and I would've done anything if I thought it pleased him, but no matter how special our bond, I never could compete with Wendi. A grrrl is worth more than twenty bois, he would remind me when my jealousy got the better of me. I didn't understand what was so special about grrrls, especially that grrrl. No, actually, Wendi was a good Mommy to us all, and I served her with nearly as much loyalty as I showed Pan. It's just hard to talk about him and the way we were back then, after everything that's happened, but
again I've said too much, and you don't even know the story yet. The last thing I want is to disrespect him more than I already have.

I was telling you about myself, though there isn't much to say. I fell out of my pram, and no one came looking. Little bois who don't get claimed (and we're never claimed because no one ever wants us) are sent away to all kinds of places. I was one of the lucky ones. I made it to Neverland.

I'll never forget my first night with him. Pan found me at the all-night diner, sitting alone in a booth, drawing. My pack was propped up on a chair like a silent dinner guest, and I was curled into the booth, trying not to fall asleep in my fries. I sipped coffee, which I hated because it made me think of my dad. The bells on the door jingled as Pan walked in, black boots beaded with rainwater. He sat at the counter and ordered a chocolate milkshake, pulling off his green baseball cap, running those little tattooed hands through his fiery red hair. I could see a black handkerchief shoved into his back left pocket, along with a slingshot. I wasn't sleepy anymore. I turned to a new page in my notebook and began to write. Back then, I carried a journal everywhere. It was filled with little sketches and accounts of my days. I was worried about forgetting. I must have been really into my writing, because I looked up and there he was, standing over me, with a smirk on his face and those green eyes of his sparkling like stars. Pan had his milkshake in hand, cap back on his head. He sat down at my table without asking permission. I pushed
my fries toward him. I knew that I would give him anything before I even knew his name.

Pan took me to Neverland that night. I didn't know what to expect. It was not the first time I'd played these games, but this—this was different. There was no fucking, no build toward something as simple as sexual release. He cut me. He took his knife from its leather holster and traced it across my throat. I didn't know this powerful boi. Everything about my world then was dangerous. I knew danger, tasted it on my dry morning lips and held it at bay from my hiding spot in the shadows as the grownups rushed to and from their offices. I was as friendly with danger as I was with uncertainty, but as Pan's knife trailed across my body, I was actually afraid. It was the first time in a very long time I felt anything. He came up behind me and whispered in my ear:

“Boi, to call Neverland home, you must wear our sign, two stars on your right shoulder.”

I turned to face him and he pulled his shirt off before turning away from me. Above his Ace bandage I saw two stars scarred into his shoulder. I looked at the clean lines and shivered.

“I will wear your stars with pride,” I replied and pulled off my grimy T-shirt.

Pan laid me down on a rough wooden bench. I flinched as he pulled off my binder but didn't resist. It was freezing in Neverland, yet his hands were warm as they felt the muscles in my shoulder. He traced the shape of two stars with the cold, wet ink of a permanent marker.

“You sure you want to be mine, boi? Do you swear to never grow up?” Pan growled.

“Yes, Sir!” I had never really belonged to anyone before. I was ready. I came alive, and I became his. I had no idea what I was consenting to or how deep the knife went, but I wanted more.

Pan led me, raw skin and oozing wounds, to a hammock, my hammock. The other lost bois had already put my pack under it, knowing that he was jumping me in and that I would be staying. I can't remember their names—bois came and went so fast, and if you stayed long enough, you learned that Pan was right: anyone who left wasn't worth a memory. That night, I was high on him, on the world he promised me, gazing at the faint glow of stars through the city haze and filthy windows. I got to belong to someone, and not just any someone—I got to belong to Pan. It's all I'd ever wanted. Pan was good to me, took me in, claimed me. He taught me to battle. He was also strict, demanding, and utterly unpredictable. You never knew when he would tell us bois to go out and dumpster for dinner, but really what he meant was that we should blacken his boots. Everything was always adventure. It was hard to stay scared or sad for very long.

3

Runaway! Runaway!

T
his wasn't all Pan's doing. Wendi might have looked sweet, but she knew she wove powerful spells with her stories. These spilled onto paper late at night when the Darlings thought her asleep and then shot from her drugstore-pink lips on the open mic stage. The way Pan told it, he'd just wanted to hear how the story about the princess ended. It was the stories that made him secretly follow her home that night, for Wendi didn't see Pan and Erebos trail her down sidewalks and through back alleys back to 14 London Street.

Pan later told me that he almost turned around then, seeing that she lived in such a nice house. It sat in the middle of an average suburban neighbourhood at the corner of Kensington Avenue and London Street. Money was tight, but the Darlings had done well for themselves, and the house with the manicured yard that Mr Darling mowed on Sunday afternoons was their prized possession, the proof
that they were respectable community members. It was everything that Pan hated. It was almost enough to make him walk away from a pretty grrrl, but then on the mailbox he read “T
HE
D
ARLINGS
' H
OME
F
OR
G
IRLS
,” and he knew his plan would work.

Pan watched Wendi go into the house, and a few minutes later a light came on upstairs. He left Erebos on the ground and climbed a tree that reached to the second storey. Then he waited. He should probably have felt a little creepy watching through the window as Wendi undressed, but he enjoyed the show. He didn't mean anything disrespectful—he never analyzed pleasure, just appreciated it. Wendi's room was tidy and organized, with light-pink walls and books neatly lining the shelves. Black-and-white photo-booth strips and concert tickets precisely arranged to look haphazard were taped to the mirror of the white vanity that stood next to her bed. The room looked like a clipping from a decorating magazine. Only the two kids, with their ragged edges, were out of place in this pretty little room. Watching Wendi slip into her nightgown and comb her long, dark brown hair, Pan wanted to take her away, to show her another world. Erebos had fallen asleep at the foot of the tree, and Pan's feet were tingling, but still he waited. Finally, the nightlights went out, and only then did he creep to the window ledge and into the room.

Pan had been surprised to see John Michael, and for a moment thought Wendi had a boyfriend, or a boi. Then, he
remembered the group-home sign out front. Later, he told me how he'd almost walked away when he heard Wendi wish John Michael goodnight. Whatever their relationship was, it was clear they were a package deal. But what is one more boi? Especially if that deal is sweetened by a grrrl. John Michael must have been a deep sleeper, because she later swore that she never stirred as Pan cracked the window open and slipped past her bed, but the rustling of feathers and Pan's tears (that he will always deny having shed) woke Wendi.

Tink, of course, had followed Pan all the way to Wendi's and flown into the bedroom. Then, finding herself trapped inside the room, she began to panic, throwing herself into the walls, looking for the window. Tink crashed into a framed poster of white kittens and disappeared behind a dresser. Pan, convinced Tink was dead, couldn't keep from crying. The sound woke Wendi, who switched on her bedside lamp and gasped when she saw Pan standing at the foot of her bed, more alive than in the dream she'd just awoken from.

Tink would peck my eyes out if she thought I'd gotten this far into the story without properly introducing her. Tink is Pan's fairy. Unlike loyal and obedient Erebos, Tink is a jealous creature. Pigeons are so small that, unlike dogs, they can only hold one emotion at a time, and with Tink it is usually not a very nice one. Especially if there is a grrrl involved. She wants to be the only grrrl in Pan's life. When she gets into a mood, there's no reasoning with her, and no reminding her
that she's a bird and no one will take her place. I see that confused look. Fairy? Pigeon? There is magic everywhere around you, but most people are too busy being grownup to notice it.

I'm not sure how Pan first met the pigeons; they must have been the feral ones nesting in the rafters of Neverland. Back before Pan was leader of the lost bois, he was alone with no one to talk to except for the pigeons. It didn't take long for them to adopt him into the flock. When a boi is brought into Neverland, he is given a pigeon. It's part of how you know that you're home, and it means you're never alone.