Cappie stretched his arms above his head as he sauntered up to the bar. They were taking a fifteen minute break from the trivia for people to refresh their drinks, order food and the like. Cappie was feeling achy from being hunched protectively over his team’s answer sheet for the past half an hour. The short trip to the bar and back was exactly what he needed.
“Uh, a beer, please, my good fellow,” Cappie called out to the bartender, stepping forward to take the place of a person who had just left. His shoulder collided with someone who had, obviously, had the same idea and Cappie put out his hand to steady the woman he’d knocked into.
“I’m sorry,” he said, casting the blonde an apologetic smile. “Usually I try to sweep women off their feet, not knock them off them.”
Wendy was enjoying this little night out by herself. She had managed to join a team of very nice people who didn’t seem to mind she had practically no knowledge of this new era.
She offered to grab some drinks and possibly some food when they announced the break. It was the least she could do. She was about to order when someone bumped into her and almost made her lose her balance. Thankfully the same man who had collided with her saved her from falling. “It’s alright,” she said with a sweet smile on her face. “I’m a little clumsy myself, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I ended up on the floor.”
“Clumsy?”Cappie frowned quizzically, looking the woman up and down from head to toe. “That can’t be right. You definitely strike me as the graceful type.” She was very attractive in a British kind of way, with a smooth, pale complexion and the faintest flush of rose pink in the apples of her cheeks. Cappie had to force his eyes to behave themselves and mentally gave himself a firm telling off - he was taken.
“What’s your name?” he asked, reaching for a nice, safe topic.
Wendy couldn’t help but blush lightly at his words. “Well, thank you,” she said with a smile that curled her lips. She wasn’t too clumsy, just enough to not look very graceful in certain situations. Although she liked to think she had got better with age. And her dance lessons her mother made her take.
“Wendy Darling. And yours?”
“Wendy Moira Angela Darling?” Cappie asked, his eyes widening a little in wonder, completely forgetting to reply to her question.
Wendy’s eyes widened just as much as the young man’s in front of her. How did he know her full name? “How... How do you know my name?” she asked curiously.
Cappie paused for a moment, looking awkward. How much did she know about her canon material? Surely he couldn’t be the first person here who had made the connection.
“I, erm… I’ve read your book,” he replied, figuring honesty was the best policy. “People have a habit of comparing me to your friend Peter, actually,” he chuckled, shaking his head and looking down at the bar. He felt a bit embarrassed at even saying that to the real Wendy.
“Oh, right, the book,” she said with a nod, smiling at him. She kept forgetting Mr. Barrie had written a book about her and Peter’s adventures. And there was also a film, which she was curious to watch if she had to be honest. “Do they really? Well then I’m sure we’ll get along rather well... Although I still don’t know your name.”
“Cappie,” Cappie replied, remembering too late that she’d asked him that question before.
The bartender placed his drink down on the bar at that moment and asked if there was anything else he wanted. Cappie glanced at Wendy and lifted his eyebrows.
“Can I get you a drink?”
“Cappie,” she said. “That’s an interesting name.” And she knew a lot about interesting names after knowing all the Lost Boys’ names and the others in Neverland.
She smiled and nodded, telling the bartender what she was drinking. “Thank you, Cappie.”
Cappie shrugged off her thanks with a smile, consciously not elaborating on the subject of his “interesting name”.
“I’ve got my own bunch of Lost Boys at home,” he remarked proudly, a grin spreading across his face as it always did when he thought of his brothers.
“There’s Beaver, Spitter, Spidey, Anthony Hopkins, Woodchuck, Arrowhead, Gonzo, Dump Truck, Pickle, Ben Bennett, Heath… Wade and Jeremy used to be members but they got expelled.” Cappie stopped, realising that Wendy would have absolutely no idea what he was talking about. “Kappa Tau Gamma,” he explained. “It’s a Fraternity. I’m President.”
“Oh goodness, those are a lot of Lost Boys,” she said with a smile. Mentioning the Lost Boys made her think of her own. She wondered if they would ever show up here. Or even Peter. She thought Peter would like this place. It seemed to have lots of adventures on every corner. “They must think very highly of you when they made you president,” she smiled.
A warm glow spread through Cappie’s chest. He guessed they must have. They were a ragtag band of misfits but his brothers meant the world to him and it was always nice to think that they felt the same way about him.
“Beaver was here for a while,” he told her. “But he had to go home - he was thinking of the children.”
“Was he a teacher?” She asked. She couldn’t imagine her life as anything other than a daycare teacher, at least here in Atlantis. Children were such wonderful things, she loved teaching them and also learning from them.
“Yeah, that’s what he’s studying to be,” Cappie replied a little incredulously. No one had ever worked out what the hell the Kappa Taus were talking about whenever they told Beaver to think of the children before. “How did you guess that?”
She shrugged lightly. “You said he was thinking about the children. That’s what I do too, and I’m a teacher,” she smiled. “A daycare one, but a teacher nonetheless.”
“I think you would have liked Beaver,” Cappie replied with a chuckle. Beaver certainly would have liked Wendy.
The bartender returned with Wendy’s drink and Cappie paid what they owed.
“You’re going to have to get back to your team,” he commented, noticing that people were moving back to their seats again after the break.
Wendy grabbed her drink and thanked Cappie again for it. “You’re very sweet,” she said.
“Right,” she nodded. “It was very nice to meet you, Cappie. I hope we see each other again,” she smiled.
“We will,” Cappie assured her. “Atlantis isn’t that big a place and I have a good memory for pretty faces.” He grinned cheekily.
“And I apologise in advance that my team is going to beat yours,” he laughed, beginning to back away towards his own table.
“We’ll see about that,” she laughed back, waving goodbye at Cappie as she headed to her table.