Yesterday I had a conversation with a lost boy and I asked him if he ever got lonely.

“I have a brother in the tree above mine,” He said, “swinging on his branches, he likes how they feel. There’s another boy below my tree if you go down the wavy bridge you will find him inside the trunk of this big boy we call the giant, it’s the biggest tree in the forest. There are lost boys everywhere, I can’t be lonely.”

“What about nostalgic?”

“What is that?” he asked, shaking boredom from his legs as he stood and threw fairy dust on us. While floating I explained, pausing often, I did not know how to fly.

“It’s like, missing something, do you miss your life, before?”

He flew in circles as he answered. “No,” he said, “before I wasn’t happy and I had no friends to play with and I was never allowed to eat pies at dinner.”

I managed to stand straighter as we weaved through leaves. “And your sister?”

He was quiet as we passed his home, then suddenly he took my hand and pulled me. I had been a girl once but now I was a woman and not easily swayed. It was odd how the pixie dust made me so light. With ease the lost boy dragged me through the air and he told me that to fly I had to believe I could. I hadn’t believed in magic since I was a kid and was told about neverland and its wonders during bedtime. I wasn’t used to magic nor fond of it, I had a doctorate in science and it was always the one thing i couldn’t explain.

“I-”

“Don’t talk, DO.”

He let me go and flew off. I thought of flying and told myself over and over to go, I pictured a car moving forward, I tried to picture myself doing the same, but a few minutes later I was still stuck and the lost boy had came back. He asked me what I was thinking of, i told him and he laughed.

”No silly! Cars stay on the ground, you are flying, what flies?”

I thought of a plane and felt my body jolt, then slowly I put my arms out and I began to glide. The lost boy laughed again and followed skillfully over me, praising my form. We flew over the island and the sea and the sun until the pixie dust started to fade and the night began to rise. We were supposed to go back to the lost boys tree but as we got closer to the ground we saw a bonfire. The lost boy pulled me towards it and we joined the others and got plates of food while watching the festivities. Soon after, we went and sat off to the side of the event, alone under the stars where I didn’t expect the lost boys voice to come out so sad.

“My sister doesn’t miss me. We were so different when i was home. She never believed in anything and was always so much like our parents.” He turned to me, bread crumbs on his cheek, “When I told her about neverland, she didn’t believe me, I told her about Tink and she rolled her eyes. She had to see them to finally stop calling me a liar. And when Peter Pan came to take me away, she didn’t want to come.”

The lost boy seemed to mature with his memories, i saw the subtle lines of aging gracing his face, and still he spoke unwavering.

“She said she didn’t want to be lost, that she liked being seen by the world and that she wanted me to stay too. I couldn’t take one more second in that house, and I told her that I couldn’t. We said our goodbyes then, and she promised to make something up to mom and dad.”

I didn’t know what to say so i said nothing. His face went to the fire, the light transforming him back into a child like his peers, but his voice was still old with pain.

“You know i go looking for her sometimes. In the real world and on other islands, but peter says the real world is harsh and I’ve seen it so i try to stay away. I don’t like it there. But i want to see my crybaby sister. Every day i think of her and i tell myself that if only there was a band of lost girls for her to join, then we could be lost together and I could go see her.”

“But she never wanted to be lost”

He shed a tear and quickly wiped it away, “No.”

We were silent for the next few minutes until he began to chuckle, then laugh, tears streaming down his cheeks as he covered his eyes.

“You know the best part about being lost?” He said.

“What?”

“I wont remember this tomorrow!” He laughed harder and looked at me with a smile on his face. I watched how this moment of clarity seeped through his eyes, the disdain for the fact that in neverland, nothing ever changes. They are lost boys because they cant even find themselves. And I already knew this.

“You didn’t remember this conversation yesterday either, or the day before that, or the one before that. I’ve been coming here for 15 years and you never remember me.”

He watched my eyes, then started examining me as he did many times before. My nose, my hair, the iron burn on my right hand, he looked me over until his eyes got wide, then he whispered my name and I nodded with a smile and a tear sliding down my chin. My big brother could be so dense.

“Hello Ollie.”