Title: I will wait for you

Summary: Neverland is gone for good and after being defeated, Peter Pan is stuck in Storybrooke along with Wendy Darling. In the real world, in the twenty-first century, a lot of things has changed. One night Wendy gets drunk and Peter finds himself fighting against who he was and who he could be. AU One shot.

Timeline: AU, completely AU. Peter's not Rumple or anybody's father in here, because as much as I can appreciate their story, it just doesn't work in here.

Main Characters: Peter Pan, Wendy Darling

Disclaimer: I do not own OUAT. I definitely do not.

…and use my head alongside my heart
so tame my flesh
and fix my eyes
a tethered mind freed from the lies

I will wait, Mumford and sons

She shouldn't do that.

She really shouldn't.

But Wendy has never been really good at doing what was proper, what was right.

Like listening to Baelfire when she took the hand of Pan's shadow and flew away to Neverland because she wanted an adventure.

The alcohol flows down and burns her throat but Wendy doesn't stop. She doesn't want to. She just wants to take her mind off of all… that.

She wants to be free. For just one night, she wants to be free.

How long has it been since then? A century? Two?

She can't really tell but she knows with absolute certainty the memory of that night will haunt her for the rest of her life.

Fortunately, everything is changed now.

He is changed.

Peter Pan is no longer king. His crown, braided with dreams and wishes and too much blood for belonging to a young boy, got swallowed by the ground of Neverland never to come back again.

He is no longer the tyrannical ruler of Neverland, because there is no Neverland to rule in the first place in Storybrooke.

There's no Neverland at all. And there's a part of her, the part that used to see only leaves, and trees and stars, so many shining stars, over her head before falling asleep, that can't really wrapped her mind around it.

He is no longer the cheerful (deceiving, deceiving, everything in that island was deceiving simply because its master decided so, because its master was so) boy who showed her the mermaids, the fairies and all sort of mystical creatures, the first time she met him.

He lost himself somewhere in between and Wendy feels it, he is nowhere to be found.

He has that look in his eyes, like something is broken, shattered forever inside of him.

She can see it, she can recognize it so clearly because it's the same look she had in her eyes for over a century. He deserves it, she thinks. He deserves to feel that way, he deserves to be broken.

Wendy tightens her fingers around her glass and sighs.

She doesn't really mean it.

She can't even look at him like that.

It's been months since Neverland was destroyed, since Baelfire and their friends saved Henry and brought them all back to Storybrooke.

And Pan is still some kind of pale reflection of the person (demon, demon, her brain screams, he's a demon. There's nothing human about him.) he used to be.

He doesn't belong to the real world. And even if Storybrooke can only be considered a bizarre imitation of the real world she knows, for him it's the closest thing to it. And he doesn't belong there.

She takes another sip. The liquid is cold and hot at the same time and it's an odd combination that makes her feel dizzy right away. And it's exactly what she needs tonight.

Why does she care anyway?

This is it. This is final. He lost and if he can't deal with it, well, it's his own problem.

He should be glad he didn't die in Neverland. Or that Rumplestiskin or the Evil Queen didn't kill him right away.

A knot tied in her throat as she realizes she knows him so well to tell he would have chosen that.

He'd rather die along with his island, in his island, than live like anybody else, in the real world, among adults. Growing up.

She's not even sure he can grow up. He lost his magic with Neverland but he's never been completely human. (A demon can't be human. A demon will never be human. A demon will remain a demon with or without magic.)

She doesn't care.

She doesn't care about what he thinks, she doesn't care about what he feels (he doesn't. Peter Pan doesn't feel). She doesn't care about him.

She will grow up. Because that's how life is, because that's how things are supposed to be.

She doesn't care about Peter Pan.

She doesn't.

She doesn't.

(Peter Pan may not feel but Wendy Darling does, a voice in her mind speaks again)

Wendy shuts her eyes close. (Not tonight. Just not tonight.)

She swallows her drink with a gulp, her head spinning lightly as she thinks after all this time, she can't even hate him properly.

It escalates fast.

She spots him in a hallway upstairs, at Granny's. She pulls him by his arm and literally drags him into her room.

If she was lucid, she'd chuckle at the irony. She's drunk and he's the one stumbling on his feet.

She slams the door and pushes him against the wall with a strength she's sure never had before. Not against him.

For a second her eyes flashes up his face.

He's stunned, speechless, mouth hanging half-open.

Her head is so light and the vision is so humorous, she wants to laugh out loud.

But Peter seems to find his voice again.

"What the hell are you do-" she cuts him off, her mouth pressing hard on his.

Wendy's hands grabs his hair hard, to pull him down to her level.

It hurts him and it's so strange because she never hurt him. Not like that. (Or any other ways, because Peter Pan has magic and magic is power, no one can really hurt him)

But Pan wouldn't really need any magic to use against her because he is so much taller, so much stronger, he could have broken her like a porcelain doll smashing on the ground, just lifting his fingers.

And he had. He had.

If Wendy would have been in her right mind, maybe she would have told him.

She would have finally yelled that he had broken her.

And even if she wanted to be with him (to be his) at last, it was too late now, because there was no piece of her left for her to give (for him to take. Because that's what Peter Pan does. He takes.)

Except for her body.

But now, under her arms, Peter Pan is powerless. Immobilized, completely overwhelmed by her.

So she just kisses him harder, his lower lip pulled between hers.

Peter closes his eyes.

He remembers holding a thimble between his fingers, he remembers watching as she hangs an acorn (his, his acorn) on her necklace. He remembers as he made them both disappear with just a touch of his magic, the first time she left Neverland. Gone forever as they never existed in the first place.

It doesn't take long. He kisses her back.

If they ever kissed before that moment, Peter cannot tell.

Hands tangles in her hair, shifting her head to the side so he can meet her lips easily.

Was that real life? Was that was he was missing out?

Wendy is fire.

He's always knew that. It was one of the reason he locked her up in the first place. Because sooner or later she'd have jeopardized his plan to find the heart of the truest believer. (And Pan doesn't allow anyone to stand in his way. Because Peter Pan is fire too.)

Peter Pan used to be fire, before it all burnt out along with Neverland.

But now, with her, it's like having it all over again.

Wendy's fire is different from his. It's always been.

It's covered under a thousand ashes of kindness, of gentleness, of goodness, so much goodness that made him want to tear her apart at first.

Tear her whole caring heart apart just because she made his own heart beat in a way it never did before.

And then he saw it.

The fire, (the hate more likely) in her and his heart thumped, thumped, thumped like it wanted to explode.

But tonight she is different.

Her hands roam down his chest, reaching the border of his shirt and slip under it to touch his skin so fast, he barely has time to realize it.

"Take me" she whispers, lips vibrating on his own, "I'm yours"

What?

The word never comes off his mouth because her tongue finds his sooner.

He's not thinking straight, he can't, but something is off.

Something is off with her.

She tastes sweet, so damn sweet but she also tastes like… alcohol.

She's drunk.

She threw herself at him so fast, so desperately, he didn't even notice before. (He didn't want to. Because he was finally having her. He'd won and who cares, if for once, it felt like cheating).

He can smell it now, alcohol all around her.

He can't identified it, she could have drunk Hook's rum, for all he knows.

With a flash of anger blazing in his chest, he really hopes it's not rum, but the thought it's upsetting enough for him to break apart, panting, hands pushing at her shoulder to keep her at distance.

He blinks and the girl in front of him is something he's never dare to dream about.

Her locks are all tangled (he did that?), her cheeks flushed, her lips bright red and swollen in a way that make them appearing a lot more attractive (deliciously sweet) to taste.

Wendy licks her lower lip, his eyes, hypnotized, follow the movement on their own. Her fingers still pulls at his shirt, in attempt to him drag him close.

"Stop it" he says before she can move again, but his voice is weak, hoarse. That kiss blew his mind away and she's still touching him. He can't control how his voice sound. (Peter Pan is in control. Peter Pan is the king.)

But right now, he lost his crown and his realm is gone for good and who could ever call someone a king with neither of them?

"Stop it, Wendy. You're drunk" he tries once more, but his voice is just the same. Rasping, breathless.

Wendy doesn't give a sign of even hearing him. She leans over and kisses the side of his neck, mouth open, tongue swirling on his hot skin.

Peter growls. His head falls back against the wall, his fingers curls, fingernails digging into her shoulders.

"Take me" she whispers again, her breath blowing in his ears.

And just like that, she lets the straps of her dress slip over her shoulders. The dress falls at her feet, letting her standing in her underwear in front of him.

Peter hears his heart pounding in his ears (take me, take me, take me. Peter Pan just takes) as his eyes run, like steel towards a magnet, over her body.

He can't really takes sight of her whole figure, just a glimpse burns out into his retina (the pure, ethereal pallor of her skin shining like ray of light in the darkness of the room), because she quickly presses her body against his own, wrapping her arms around his neck.

Peter breaths heavily, heart beating like a drum. (take me, take me, take me)

Take me, I'm yours.

He tries not to move a single muscle and he has to appeal to what it's left of his control, very little, very, very little, not to grab the back of her head and kiss her again, when her breasts rubs against his chest.

She lets out a giggle, when she feels him, hard, bumping against her stomach.

Her voice turned into an euphoric, breathy sound he never heard from her before.

And that would have been enough to warn him he should stop her right away. He should grab her and shove her away from him as fast as he can.

Take me, I'm yours.

And not listen to that desire of pushing her on the bed, punish her for denying with all her force, with all her will she had inside of her, what he wanted her to be for all these years. (The game he decide to play with her. Because Peter Pan just plays.)

She didn't even have to wish it to make it happen. Not even in Neverland.

Take me, I'm yours.

She's never been his.

But her mouth is on his again and before he can do anything, she pushes him on the bed, straddling him.

Her hand reaches down and strokes him through the fabric of his trousers. He moans, in spite of himself, a rough, strangled sound against her lips.

He doesn't see her smiling, pleased but distant, like she's not really there.

He keeps his eyes close and her hand rise up to caress his cheek.

"Isn't this what you wanted? For me to be yours?" she asked, voice too, too soft in his ears, he feels like drowning into it. And in a cloud of haziness, distant memories fill his mind.

Words hissed, You're mine, Wendy, mine,

shouted harshly, through the bars of a cage,

No! No. I'll never be yours! You can take everything from me but I'll never be yours. You heard me, Peter Pan? Never!

"I am. I'm all yours." Wendy says, her lips brushing the skin under his ear "Take me"

Her fingers moves fast, travels down the waistband of his trousers, but before she can touch him again, he grabs her wrist.

"Wendy, stop" he says, pulling back his neck from her mouth.

"Why? You think you're not grown up enough for this?" She lets out another soft laughter and Peter curses, mentally. Exactly how drunk she is?

"Just… just stop" he hissed, a frustrated note cracking into his voice, as he pushes her away from him.

Wendy lets herself falling on the bed. Her hair spreads on the pillow, she reaches for the blanket but her fingers are slow, clumsy and she doesn't manage to cover herself up entirely. She doesn't even care to

Her eyes pierce into his own and she looks absolutely hurt.

Peter stares and swallows. His throat tightens impossibly.

The fact that the blanket barely covers her keeps distracting him, the sensation of her body pressed against his is so fresh in his memory he has to look away.

(Peter Pan is the king and everybody else is just a pawn on the chessboard he can play with.)

Somehow he missed a piece. He's always missed a piece.

(Everyone is a pawn. Everyone.)

But the queen? Oh, the queen is right in front of his eyes, right now. Almost bare, just for him.

(No. No. Wendy Darling is no queen. He never wanted her to be.)

How did you escape?

He let me go… because he didn't want me.

"You never really wanted me, do you?" she asks, a bitter line, that resembles a smile curves her lips.

Peter doesn't lift his head towards her. He just can't.

She doesn't know how wrong she is.

He wants her. He wants her so badly he can hardly remember a time he didn't want her. If there ever was one.

I don't want a girl in Neverland. I don't want any girl in Neverland! You're leaving and I'm taking your brothers instead.

No! No, you're gonna stay away from them, you monster!

I said leave, now! I don't want you here, I never did.

He doesn't tell her.

He doesn't speak. He just can't.

He just can't have her like that.

He knows she still hates him. He knows she can't forget all the things he's done to her in Neverland.

And he cannot undo them. (He doesn't want to, his mind screams. Peter Pan doesn't regret anything)

But he's changed. (Peter Pan doesn't change. Peter Pan doesn't fail either.)

But apparently he had. It's been awhile now, but he had failed and the loss still burns inside of him. But the desire for revenge is long buried, crashed under the permanent weight of reality.

He can't just take her.

He doesn't have that strength inside of him anymore, and not just because he's lost his magic. (Peter Pan just takes, takes, takes everything he wants and Wendy Darling is no different.)

He can't just take her and be done with it.

Because, deep down he knows, he'll never be done with her.

Neverland is something strange in Peter's mind there in Storybrooke.

Like a foggy but constant reminder of himself. Of his past being.

There was no need to remember in Neverland. The past had no reason to be.

Neverland was a never-ending present.

Everything that had been before was quickly forgotten, everything that will be just was if you wished it. If you believed it.

Something protest in his chest, as his shadow takes Wendy back home, and after a long, long time a storm, harsh and violent, hits Neverland's soil. The lighting tear the sky apart, the thunder rumbles, the rain falls incessantly.

Wendy is gone but she took something with her.

His heart.

But it's alright. It's even better, really.

Because Peter Pan doesn't need it.

Wendy blinks slowly and fights the need to keep her eyes open. She knows if she closes them Neverland will be just brand new under her eyelids.

A scream,

What are you doing?

A struggle. Let me go!

A kick. Let me go! But Pan's grip is like iron around her arm.

A cruel laughter,

Isn't it obvious?

so cruel, no boy should ever laugh like that.

I'm locking you up, Wendy. Because that's where a bird belong to.

Another scream, endless screams, an then her voice disappear in the middle of the jungle.

A cage.

(He trapped her because it amused him to see how long an imprisoned bird would flap her wings before it got tired of it,

"I'm so tired." Wendy whispers, her voice weak, hushed, against the pillow.

before it died, exhausted.)

"I'm so tired, Peter" and then she closes her eyes.

Peter picks up her dress from the floor and struggles to put it back on her.

She's sleeping softly and his arms quiver in the effort of not touching more of her skin than what's strictly necessary. (A puppet in his hands, that's all Wendy ever was. Nothing more.)

When he lays her down, her hair spread around her face like a halo. (Not his queen. Not his queen.)

He tucks her under the covers. (Love is a weakness. And to love is to be weak. And Peter Pan can't be weak because…

When he closes the door behind him, his fingers trembles so much he has to dig his nails into his palm

just to make them stop.

...Peter Pan never fai-)

Wendy wakes up with a pounding in her head.

She presses her fingers to her temples. For a second her head spins lightly.

She blinks and the ceiling, the walls, the furniture around her take a distinct, clear form in front of her eyes. She's in her room at Granny's.

The room that became so familiar to her in the past few months.

She looks down and she sees she still has on the dress she was wearing last night. Why would she slept in it when she bought a brand new pajama? (Emma took her to go shopping, not so long ago.)

She sits up on the bed and then she remembers.

It's still blurry and confused but she remembers. She got drunk the night before.

She kissed Peter.

Take me, I'm yours.

She didn't just kissed him. She throw herself at him.

And he rejected her. You never really wanted me, do you?

God. She passes a palm on her face. How idiotic she'd been.

Not to mention pathetic.

What did she was trying to do? Offer herself to him in an attempt to bring Peter Pan back?

Why would she even wanted him back when Neverland had been hell for her? He had been hell for her.

And still…

She sighs and throws back her hair from her face.

When she turns, she notices a glass full of water, standing on her bedside table.

And she's sure it's too early for room service.

Wendy Darling got drunk.

It's the only lucid thought that ramble in Peter's mind all day. All the rest is something he can't name, can't comprehend, can't assimilate.

She wanted him? All this time, she wanted him? Everything about her, her lips, her fingers, her fingers tcouhing him, her entire body made him think so last night. (He's won. He's won).

He should be gloating, celebrating because she finally gave up. She finally surrendered.

Surrender to what? Him? There was no Peter Pan with her last night.

He could have her and he didn't take her. He didn't want to.

He doesn't want her like that.

When, if (if, if, if, whoever could think Wendy Darling, in full possession of her mental abilities, would come back to the monster now that's she was finally free? No one but a fool. And he is. Peter Pan's a fool, isn't he? He's such a fool he can't even realize how much of a fool he is.) if that's gonna happen he wants to watch her eyes for real.

He wants to watch her own fire setting her in flames, burning her completely.

Not looking into blurry, glossy eyes hovering around his. Eyes that doesn't really belong to her.

He wants her to want him because she can't take being separated from him. (Because she lost the game. She always looses the game with him.)

But last night, he didn't even know what he was playing at.

He hates himself for being reduced like this. He hates them all, the Saviour, the Prince, Snow White, for defeating him, for being such heroes.

He shouldn't feel these things.

He shouldn't feel at all.

Peter Pan is (was, was, was) made of dreams, not feelings.

But his dreams, no matter how shining and vivid and wonderful, they were just that. Dreams. And they were gone now. They could never live in a place like the real world.

Gone alongside with his island and that part of him, that childhood (immortality, immortality, nothing is more important that stay young forever) that he cherished so much because he thought it was all he was.

He watched Neverland disappear in front of his eyes and he thought he'd die with it. (Peter Pan can never live in the real world, in place different from Neverland. Neverland is the only home he can have.)

But he hadn't. He hadn't die.

So maybe Neverland was not the only thing that defined him.

Maybe he was more than that.

But there, in Stroybrooke, he couldn't find a single reason that was worthy enough for him to start over.

He is empty, vacant, deficient. Has he always been the original Lost Boy?

And then, Wendy happened to him all over, the night before.

Her mouth on his own was real, the flesh under his fingers was real. All of her was real.

She's always been real.

And if he hated her for that once, now he found out he wanted it.

He wanted her reality. Because it was the only thing that was left for him.

After all, he's always been that selfish.

Later that day, when she's showered and dressed and her head doesn't hurt so much anymore, Wendy goes out for a walk.

She founds him standing by the pier.

He likes watching the sea. Or at least she thought so.

She remembers him (when he still hadn't lock her up, when she still could walk freely on the soil of the island) leaving off to the beach sometimes, by himself.

She had watched him standing on the top of a tree, an elbow resting on his bent knee, his eyes lost into the blue in front of him.

She remembers thinking he seemed at peace for once.

Not quite like in that moment.

He stands tall, but his shoulders are stiff, and she can't see his face but she could tell he's has a frown crumpling his forehead.

Wendy takes some steps towards him and Peter turns around immediately.

His eyes meet hers and Wendy holds his gaze.

Her gaze is clear now, Peter notices. So clear it's almost blinding in the first light of the afternoon. (And Peter Pan likes darkness, only darkness).

He breathes in, doesn't want to listen to his brain.

Her cheeks barely rosy, her lips still red in the whiteness of her face. He can't believe he kissed that mouth, he tasted those same lips under his own just the night before.

And she wanted more, she wanted to go on, to go further. Take me, I'm yours.

He blinks every thought, everything, away quickly.

The hem of Wendy's coat flutters in the wind, brushing her knees.

She looks good. She looks fine. Nothing like she was the night before. Not quite the same Wendy she was in Neverland but he thinks it's only fair. He's not the same Peter either.

"Thank you" she says.

She doesn't add for taking care of me last night, (for not taking advantage of me last night. Because that's what monster do, Wendy), her mind says, but Wendy doesn't listen.

She just stands still, in front of him.

She doesn't add anything else.

She doesn't apologize either. Even if she wants to. Because she feels terrible (ashamed, so , so ashamed) for how she behaved. So immaturely.

She doesn't add anything else.

But if there's a pro in having known him for over a century is that sometimes words are not needed.

Thank you.

His memory is not the most relatable thing, but he's pretty sure it's the first time he's ever heard her saying those words to him. Maybe the first time someone ever said them to him.

It's an odd feeling, like something warm wrapped around his heart, and it's enough for him to wish he could rip it out of his chest and make it go away.

But his mind flows faster, forming words to say.

You're welcome.

He looks at her, green, bright eyes and blond hair shining in the sunlight, and he still cannot speak.

He nods imperceptibly and sits down on the bench behind him.

After a moment, Wendy sits down too, right next to him. Her pinkie brushes his by mistake, as she leans back on the bench.

She hears him inhaling deeply, the soft, ocean breeze filling his lungs as well as hers.

Neither of them move their hand.

There you go. Fallen right into the Darling Pan ship. But I couldn't really help it. Peter Pan has been one of my favorite books/movies for a very long time.

Hope you enjoyed.