Slightly dragged Curly to the eastside low-rent apartment complex. He’d had to resort to bribing him with money and video games to get him there. He lost almost more than his wallet and had to promise not to make eye contact or touch the raven-haired teen. Curly was probably one of the most self-absorbed boys at Neverwood but it was easy to understand someone like him because Curly had never heard the word “no”. Everyone was too afraid of his gift of compulsion.

Despite his nickname, Curly didn’t have a lick of curls on his dark head. Years ago, Ditto dubbed him Curly because of his long feminine lashes, and the nickname stuck. But it didn’t bother Curly in the least; because of his power, he could have persuaded them to change the name if he wanted. That was why he was so dangerous.

Curly had the gift of persuasion. He only had to touch someone and speak a command, and they would fall under his spell.

“Are you sure this is where she is?” Slightly looked at the building and began to doubt his plan. Every time they would find Dr. Mee, she would move and hunker down farther and cover her trail better. Through trial and multiple errors, they finally hit the right neighborhood.

Curly shrugged. “Well, I don’t think the two people I interrogated lied to me. My gift makes it almost impossible to, unless they believe what they’re saying is the truth, but I would have thought she’d have picked somewhere with better rent control.”

“Where better to hide from a predator than with the rats?” Slightly answered. He pushed the buzzer on the building and waited until a burly man in a white tank and tattoos came and opened the door.

“Buzz off!” the man yelled, a cigar latched between his beefy lips. “No soliciting. Can’t you read the sign?” He pointed at the faded white placard that was barely attached.

“We’re looking for a Dr. Mee.”

“Don’t got any fellas by that name here.” His breath was worse than the cigar smell.

“Well, Dr. Mee is not a guy. She’s an old lady, about yay high.” Slightly used his hands to approximate her height.

“Nope, no women either. Now, scram!”

Slightly sent Curly a pleading look, and the handsome boy sighed. He ran his hand through his long hair, visibly cringing before he reached out to touch the man’s sweaty arm.

“Where is Dr. Mee?”

The landlord faltered, his eyes glazing over as the cigar fell from his slackened lips. One word slipped out. “Basement.”

“See, told you.” Curly grinned at Slightly. “No one can hide from me.”

“Well, now, we just have to see if she’s here now.” Slightly was careful to lead the landlord into his small, cat-infested apartment. He sat him down on the stained recliner and turned expectantly to Curly.

“What?” he whined from the front door, not willing to enter the pigsty.

“Can you help?”

“No, I’m not going in there. It smells of cat and desperation.”

“You can help with that, if you tell him to change.” Slightly tried not to cover his nose with his hand to combat the smell. He knew that Curly could, if he wanted to, change that man’s life.

“Fine.” Curly pulled his shirt over his nose and rushed into the apartment. He took in the surroundings before reaching down to touch the man on the wrist with two fingers. It looked like he was checking his pulse.

He sighed and mumbled, “Take a shower, clean up this place, and don’t overcharge your tenants.”

He turned to walk back out the door. Slightly coughed and made a gesture toward the man a second time.

Curly rolled his eyes, turned around again, and touched him one more time. “And sign up for an online dating site. Not a free site, but a paid one, and be genuine.” He turned and gave Slightly a pleading look. “Better?”

“Yes, better. Now, let’s get out of here.”

“I’ve been trying too,” Curly grunted and ran out into the hall. He shuddered and brushed off his clothes as if he could remove the feeling of being in that man’s apartment.

“You know, you can do a lot of good, Curly, with your gift.” Slightly patted Curly’s back, but the teen just shrugged him off.

“Yeah, I could, but where’s the fun in that?”

Slightly knew to let the subject drop before he pushed Curly too far and ended up running around, clucking like a chicken, which happened to Onyx just last week. It was always better to give Curly a wide berth and stay just off his radar. Unfortunately, most of the boys and teachers at the school didn’t know him that well. His gift turned him into a loner and an outsider, the last to be invited places, the one that was usually forgotten. But it seemed like he was okay with that.

Curly was getting impatient. “So, where’s this basement?”

At the first glance, the building didn’t appear from the outside to have a basement; the stairs weren’t easily accessible either. They were down a back hallway, partially hidden by piles of garbage and stacks of boxes.

“This way” Slightly beckoned Curly and headed down the steps.

Curly balked at the top. “Whoa, the smell gets worse down here.”

“Baby,” Slightly chuckled as they headed into the dank storage area, where cracked linoleum had peeled back, revealing the cement floor. They pushed past pallets and metal containers of old clothes before coming to a heavy door, a paper sign with “KEEP OUT!” taped to it.

“Well, this is the only door down here,” Curly pushed past Slightly and rapped on the door three times. No answer. “I guess no one’s home. Your turn.” Curly motioned to Slightly, who moved in to assess the door.

Slightly stretched his right arm, his muscles growing rapidly in size, and with superhuman strength, he ripped the door out of the frame and set it to the side.

“Oops, my bad.” He laughed and looked inside the dimly lit room.

The boys crossed the threshold into what appeared to be a basement apartment, but a crash from the shadows up ahead, followed by growling and snuffling, caused them to halt and exchange worried glances.

Two German shepherds darted around a table and lunged at them. Curly fell with a scream as one dog latched on to his arm. Slightly shifted and caught the other dog mid-air, holding its snarling and snapping head at a distance.

He worked his way further into the apartment and maneuvered toward a kennel he spotted by the fridge. Being careful not to hurt the dog, he was able to lock him in the kennel, receiving minimal cuts and scrapes.

Panic set in as Slightly turned to aid Curly with the other shepherd.

“Shh,” Curly said softly to the dog latched onto his arm, his face a mask of pain as he fought to make eye contact with the furious dog. After a few moments, the canine settled, unclamping his jaw to lick at the arm he had released. “That’s a good boy. Yeah, you didn’t mean it. I know.”

After a few more pats, Curly sat up and stared into the dog’s eyes, silent communication passing between them. The dog whined and took off down the hall.

“Follow Leader,” Curly ordered.

“Leader?” Slightly asked as he followed them. “How do you know the dog’s name?”

“I don’t. That’s just what the dog calls himself.”

The dog scurried to a large metal cabinet on the wall and sniffed, scratching and whining, by the doors. The cabinet creaked as someone or something inside it moved.

“Careful, could be a trap.” Curly held back, keeping his distance.

“I think they were the trap,” Slightly answered as he hesitated, his hand on the silver handle. He mentally counted down and swung the door open, revealing a cowering and scared Dr. Mee, her hands held over her head as if to block an attack.

“Hey, Dr. Mee, it’s us.” Slightly backed away, holding his hands in the air. “It’s okay.”

She looked up, her face a mask of confusion and surprise. “Slightly . . . Curly? What are you doing here?”

“We need your help,” Slightly said, sitting on a stool by a lab table.

“N—no, no. I told you, I’m done helping. I can’t get wrapped up in this anymore.”

Curly, with Leader at his heels, made his way over to a table and began to search through the paperwork carefully organized in a stack of file folders. He didn’t seem at all interested in Neverland’s former psychiatric doctor’s plight or her current state of mind.

“What did you do to my dog?” she asked, pushing herself up off the cabinet floor and stepping into the room. She tried to straighten her messed-up ponytail, but it only drew attention to what a mess she was. Her makeup was days old, and it looked like she had been living off microwave meals, based on the pile of boxes in the garbage.

“Nothing, Leader’s fine.” Curly didn’t even look her way, just continued to snoop through her stuff.

“His name is Max,” she corrected.

“He hates Max,” Curly answered as he carelessly knocked over a stack of papers.

“Don’t touch that!” She panicked and rushed to pick up his mess while he carefully folded a piece of paper into fours and tucked it in his pants pocket. “What do you boys want?” she finally said, clearly desperate and upset by their presence.

“We found her. Wendy. And she’s just like Peter—she can pan,” Slightly said. “Which is the current problem. Neverland’s after her, and she recently panned, and we need her to remember, quickly.”

“What? Wendy?” Dr. Mee pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “The one we lost at sea?”

“Yeah, after all these years, she showed up, like a lucky penny.”

Dr. Mee paced the room, mumbling to herself, “That’s no good. No, we can’t interfere. I’ve done enough harm. No, no, no.” She chewed on her thumb, her brows furrowed, showing signs of anxiety.

Slightly was demoralized at how much Dr. Mee was losing herself, much like Dr. Barrie. He rifled through her desk, convinced she must be working on something important to be living in this condition, and the fact that she was slowly losing her mind. Neverland safeguarded all of their secrets and anyone in their employ was drugged. Walk away from the company and their minds would deteriorate, and they would slip into early Alzheimer’s. She hadn’t been in the greatest psychological shape a few years ago, and then, he wasn’t sure if she could function in the normal world anymore.

His phone buzzed, and he went to the door and answered it, cupping his ear so he could hear. He wasn’t getting the best reception in the basement and didn’t pay attention to Curly pocketing more items—especially, focused as he was on his conversation with Peter, who had news that wasn’t stellar.

He turned, his face grim as he went to confront Dr. Mee.

Curly could read his body language. “What’s going on?”

“We need her help. Something’s happened.” Slightly planted himself in front of the pacing Dr. Mee, and she almost ran into him. “Dr. Mee, please, we need your help. We need you to help our friend.”

Dr. Mee shook her head and spun, her hands covering her ears. Her eyes looked wild, like those of a scared rabbit. “No. No. He will find me if I help.”

Fed up, Curly moved to her and gripped her upper arms, looking into her eyes. “You are not scared of Neverland. They cannot get you.” With each sentence, her breathing became less punctuated and slowed. Her brown eyes became glassy with tears. “You are Dr. Mee, a highly decorated but secretive psychiatrist. You are smart, intelligent, fearless.” She took a deep breath and stood taller. Her eyes became focused as she blinked, and then tears ran down her face, her mouth twitched, and a corner of her lip rose in a smile.

“You’re doing it, Curly!” Slightly cheered.

“Now, give me the serum you used to help Peter after he panned.” He pushed her away, and she stood unmoving in the middle of the room. His last command was so forceful that it shook her. She made her way to a locked filing cabinet, where she fumbled for the key and opened it. Slipping her hand inside, she pulled out a small vial filled with clear liquid.

“Not cool, dude,” Slightly chastised. “You shouldn’t have forced her.”

Curly shrugged. “It smells, and this place is a dump. The sooner she helps us, the sooner we leave. Now, we got what we came for. Can we leave now?” He headed to the door, the dog still at his heels.

Slightly followed but paused when a picture of a child that had fallen out of one of Dr. Mee’s folders caught his eye. It was one of the folders that Curly had knocked off the table. He picked the photo of the younger version of himself and stared at it with sadness. He gently began to thumb through the other folders. They were Dr. Mee’s psych evaluations from her time at Neverland. He thought they were all destroyed. He was surprised that she had them and was still going through them. He put the picture in the file and closed it. He had no desire to revisit that chapter of his life or learn her medical opinion of him as a child. But he didn’t stop his search until he found Wendy’s file.

“Hello!” Curly said impatiently. “Can we go?”

“No, we can’t leave yet. Not without Dr. Mee,” Slightly said, heading to the closet, then pulled out a long blue jacket. “This is something that only the two of you can pull off. I need you to prep her as we get into the car.” He coaxed Dr. Mee into the blue jacket and handed her the folder.

Curly didn’t look pleased that he had to help further.

“Where are we going now?” Curly grumbled.

Slightly pushed his glasses up his nose. “The police station.”