The Monster Inside Peter Pan (ouat)//(Robbie Kay)

Chapter Forty Eight

"I need to get some air," she said as she got up and almost ran out of the room.

I watched her go mournfully. It hurt me to make her think that I was still a monster but if I told her the real reason, if I told her that I loved her, it would be catastrophic. She didn't want to have any feelings for me. That was all.

I was finally doing something selfless, putting her wellbeing over mine. So why did it hurt so much?

***

Alianna's point of view

I breathed in the fresh air in relief. I shouldn't have let our conversation hurt me to such a deep level, but I couldn't help it. I told myself over and over that he was still a monster, despite those rare and tiny moments where he was gentle and caring. But every time, I'm naive enough to think that I see something behind his walls, that I see an emotion that isn't hate or indifference, quite the opposite. But of course that's just my imagination. I'm just stupid and hopelessly naive. Always believing in second chances for everybody, even the monsters like Pan that have already had a thousand second chances.

I couldn't think about those things. Not now. My brain still felt fuzzy and sluggish, not good for deep thoughts.

I headed towards the training center where I was sure to find Ethan and Jake. I had to get my mind off things. When I arrived there, it seemed pretty full. Literally all the Lost Boys were there, even Felix. Pan was the only one missing. Good.

"Oh hey Ali," Jake said with a warm smile as I approached them. "Glad to see you're still alive." He obviously tried to sound joking and carefree, but I could tell that he'd been worried about me.

"Hey," I replied with a huge smile.

Ian waved towards me in a friendly gesture, Ethan hugged my midriff like he usually did, and Sam gave me a light punch on the shoulder; his usual greeting.

"So what are you doing?" I asked curiously, gesturing at all the Lost Boys. There weren't more than fifteen, but after getting used to having no more than five people at a time in here, it felt like a crowd.

"Oh, we're having this sort of tournament," Jake answered. "A thing we do when we try to lift the mood."

"That's so cool, right Alia?" Ethan interjected. "There are five disciplines, archery, hand to hand combat, rock climbing, sword fighting and one hundred meter race. Jake won the race already! He's so super fast, you should've seen him!"

I smiled.

"No, he's serious," Sam said. "Jake is really fast. Not really fair huh? We're exactly the same down to the last freckle but he gets to be ten times faster than me." He chuckled as Jake punched him playfully.

"You're better at sword fighting," Jake reminded him.

"Oh, but that's just skill," Sam laughed.

My smile widened, it felt nice to be around them after the few hard days I'd spent alone, trying to make sense out of the turmoil of my emotions.

"So what's next?" I asked.

"Hand to hand combat," Sam smiled dangerously.