Peter and Alice by John Logan

lost George…
    Light like rippling water begins to isolate MICHAEL and PETER PAN .
    BARRIE : But this year, in the month of May, 19th of the month, Michael and his friend Buxton went to Sandford Pond, a few miles south of Oxford. Perhaps you recall it? It’s a place where many of the boys swim…
    PETER : I went there later, Mrs. Hargreaves. The water is placid.
    BARRIE : They stepped into the water together…
    PETER : Witnesses saw two men holding each other, not struggling, quite still in the water…
    PETER PAN : The most haunting time to see the mermaids is at the turn of the moon, when they utter strange wailing cries; but the lagoon is dangerous for mortals then…
    BARRIE : The distance from bank to bank is too small for the question of swimming capacity to enter into it at all…
    MICHAEL : Two small figures were beating against the rock; the girl had fainted and lay on the boy’s arms. With a last effort, Peter pulled her up the rock and then lay down beside her. He knew that they would soon be drowned…
    ALICE IN WONDERLAND : Wendy was crying for this was the first tragedy she had seen…
    PETER PAN : Peter had seen many tragedies; but he had forgotten them all…
    PETER : The rock was very small now; soon it would be submerged…
    BARRIE : They were not struggling. They were not trying to save each other…
    MICHAEL : By and by there was to be heard a sound at once the most musical and the most melancholy in the world: the mermaids calling to the moon…
    BARRIE : Or maybe, Arthur, in the end they did save each other…
    PETER : Peter Pan was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last…
    ALICE : A tremor ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea…
    MICHAEL : But the next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him…
    PETER PAN : To die will be an awfully big adventure!
    Lights change .
    BARRIE stands in shock .
    PETER is in his own thoughts .
    ALICE has remained seated .
    PETER : And you wonder I call it a lie ? … That play… That book.
    ALICE : Oh yes, it’s a lie.
    PETER : Maybe there was a time I believed it, but life, Mrs. Hargreaves…
    ALICE : Oh yes.
    PETER : Peter and Alice… Shards of youth… I’m no more Peter Pan than you’re Alice in Wonderland. We are what life has made us.
    He looks to BARRIE .
    PETER : Even he finally had to realize the same thing I have: the only reason boys don’t grow up is because they die … Isn’t that true, Uncle Jim?
    Beat .
    BARRIE : It is.
    He leaves the stage, and the story .
    PETER : There are no mermaid lagoons; there are still, deep waters where lonely boys drown themselves. There are no pirate captains; there are trenches and bullets and razor wire. We do not fly, Mrs. Hargreaves, nor could we ever.
    PETER PAN : Speak for yourself!
    PETER : Stop it.
    PETER PAN : Don’t you ever get tired of blaming me for your miserable life?
    PETER : You’re the glass that distorted everything.
    PETER PAN : Honestly! I fly through the night, skip on the clouds, sing in the forest, fight me some pirates, what harm have I ever done you? If you’re broken, you broke yourself. I won’t even remember you tomorrow.
    ALICE : You talk to him like he’s real.
    PETER PAN : I am real!
    PETER : He’s not.
    ALICE : Hard to tell sometimes.
    PETER : Not for me .
    ALICE IN WONDERLAND : But then you think you’re going mad.
    PETER PAN : We’re all mad here.
    PETER : Be quiet!
    PETER PAN : Someone get him his mouth guard.
    PETER : He doesn’t exist! – ( To ALICE IN WONDERLAND .) – Neither do you! This is demented.
    PETER PAN : You’re the expert on that.
    PETER : None of this is real.
    ALICE : I wonder who’s more real, Peter Davies or Peter Pan?
    PETER PAN : Bully for her!
    ALICE : In a hundred years no one will ever remember Alice Liddell. And no one will ever