Getting Close to Peter
This story is a piece of fiction written on Randy Constan, also known by many as Peter Pan of Pixyland.
In 2001, I was in a bad place. I had just lost my job at Wal-Mart, where I was on the fast track to management. My boyfriend left me for the head cashier. My ferret died. Things were looking pretty bleak.
I did what anyone in my spot would do, though. I left my crappy apartment and lame ex-boyfriend and Wal-Mart stock shares and dead ferret and I drove to Florida. It was a long journey, especially since I only had enough cash to pay for gas halfway there. I started singing in truckstops for whatever spare change those perverts would throw my way, and, slowly but surely, tank by tank, I made it.
When I got there, I got myself an apartment with some spoiled club kids who needed someone to keep the place clean while they were out getting high and partying. The techno music sucked, but it was better than country music and the scent of motor oil and the drunken fumblings of my ex boyfriend trying to get in my pants while I slept.
Days came and went and I really never felt the need to do anything but eat, sleep, and clean the apartment. It was calming. It was easy. It was safe. Things continued like that until one night, I was asked to accompany the roommates to a Guavaween party in Tampa. They were going to try acid and they wanted someone to be around in case they had a bad experience.
When we got there, my roommates disappeared. They were drunk already and I’m not sure if I was supposed to follow them. I didn’t. I was mesmerized by the combination of the sunset and the costumed, swirling bodies around me. They didn’t have anything like this in Iowa. My plain witch costume seemed commonplace and insufficient, given the nature of the evening’s festivities. Everyone else was smiling and laughing, but I stood alone, plain and unwanted. Even the man in the ass-less pirate suit couldn’t break through my gloom.
That’s about the time I felt a fluttering presence at my side. I looked up to see a man in a Peter Pan costume, looking at me with concern in his eyes. “Who are you?” I asked.
“I’m youth, I’m joy,” he told me. “I’m a little bird that has broken out of the egg.”
I looked for signs of urine on his costume. I had heard about people like this before. I come from Ankeny, Iowa, not some no-name town where we don’t hear things.
Before I got the chance to get up, the man sat down on the curb beside me and put his hand on my knee. “You look lost,” he said gently.
I broke down completely. Weeks of nothingness came pouring out in the form of tears. I told him everything. I told him about how my mama turned tricks to get her job at the radio station, and how I never really had a dad, and how I couldn’t go to sleep without first turning around three times, tapping on my head, and wetting myself. And he listened.
I expected him to run away in shock and horror. I expected him tell me I was a worthless pile of flesh that would never amount to anything. I should have known that a guy in a fairy suit would be a little more understanding. Instead of telling me to go to hell, he told me only this:
The second star to the right
Shines in the night for you
To tell you that the dreams you plan
Really can come true
I stared at the sky for a long time afterwards, and when I finally looked back to him, he was gone. His words have always stayed with me, though.