Disney Fairies: The Trouble With Tink

by Kiki Thorpe

  Tink’s smile faded. She tugged at her bangs. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. There’s nothing wrong with my talent,” she said irritably.

  “Don’t worry, Tink,” Prilla said. “I know how you feel. When I thought I didn’t have a talent, it was awful.” Prilla hadn’t known what her talent was when she first arrived in Never Land. She’d had to figure it out on her own. “Maybe you just need to try lots of things,” she advised Tink, “and then it will come to you.”

  “I already have a talent, Prilla,” Tink said carefully.

  “But maybe you need another talent, like a backup when the one you have isn’t working,” Prilla went on. “You could learn to make fountains with me. Rani will teach you, too, won’t you, Rani?”

  Rani sniffled helplessly. Tink tugged her bangs so hard that a few blond hairs came out in her fingers. What Prilla was suggesting sounded crazy to Tink. She had never wanted to do anything but fix pots and pans.

  “Anyway, Tink,” said Prilla, “I wouldn’t worry too much about what everyone is saying about—”

  “Dinner?” Rani cut Prilla off.

  Prilla looked at her. “No, I meant—”

  “Yes, about dinner,” Rani interrupted again, more firmly. She had dried her eyes and now she was looking hard at Prilla. Rani could see that the topic of talents was upsetting Tink, and she wanted Prilla to be quiet. “It’s time, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” said Tink. But she wasn’t looking at Rani and Prilla. Her mind seemed to be somewhere else altogether.

  Rani put her fingers to her mouth and whistled. They heard the sound of wings beating overhead. A moment later, Brother Dove landed on the ground next to Rani. He would take her to the tearoom.

  But before Rani had even climbed onto his back, Tink took off in the direction of the Home Tree without another word. Rani and Prilla had no choice but to follow.

  WHEN THEY REACHED the tearoom, Tink said good-bye to Rani and Prilla. Rani was going to sit with the other water-talent fairies, and Prilla was joining her. Since Prilla didn’t have her own talent group, she was an honorary member of many different talents, and she sat at a different table every night. Tonight she would sit with the water-talent fairies and practice making fountains in her soup.

  Tink made her way over to a table under a large chandelier where the potsand-pans fairies sat together for their meals. As she took her seat, the other fairies at the table barely looked up.

  “It’s a crack in the bottom, I’ll bet,” a fairy named Zuzu was saying. “I mended a pewter bowl once that had had boiling water poured in it when it was cold. A crack had formed right down the center.” Her eyes glazed over happily as she recalled fixing the bowl.

  “But don’t you think it could be something around the drain, since the water leaked out so quickly?” asked Angus, the sparrow man who had fixed the whistling teakettle in the kitchen earlier that day.

  A serving-talent fairy with a large soup tureen walked over to the table and began to ladle chestnut dumpling soup into the fairies’ bowls. Tink noticed with pride that the ladle was one she had once repaired.

  She leaned forward. “What’s everyone talking about?” she asked the rest of the table.

  The other fairies turned, as if noticing for the first time that Tink was sitting there.

  “About Queen Ree’s bathtub,” Zuzu explained. “She’s asked us to come fix it tomorrow. We’re trying to guess what’s wrong with it.”

  “Oh, yes!” said Tink. “I’ve been thinking about that, too. It might be a pinprick hole. Those are the sneakiest sorts of leaks—the water just sort of drizzles out one drop at a time.” Tink laughed.

  But no one joined her. She looked around the table. The other fairies were staring at her, or looking awkwardly down at their soup bowls. Suddenly, Tink realized that the queen had said nothing to her about the bathtub that afternoon in the gazebo.

  “Tink,” another fairy named Copper said gently, “we’ve all agreed that Angus and Zuzu should be the ones to repair the tub, since they are the most talented pots-and-pans fairies…lately, that is.”

  “Oh!” said Tink. “Of course.” She swallowed hard. She felt as if a whole chestnut dumpling were stuck in her throat.

  Now all the pots-and-pans fairies were looking at Tink with a mixture of love and concern. And, Tink was sad to see, pity.

  I could just tell everyone that I lost my hammer, Tink thought. But if they asked about the spare…

  Tink couldn’t finish the thought. For a long, long time, Tink had neglected her pots and pans to spend all her time with Peter Pan. It was something she thought the other pots-and-pans fairies would never understand.

  At last the fairies changed the topic and began to talk about the leaky pots and broken teakettles they’d fixed that day. As they chattered and laughed, Tink silently ate her soup.

  Nearby, a cheer went up from the water fairies’ table. Tink looked over and saw that Prilla had succeeded in making a tiny fountain in her soup.

  Prilla has two talents now, Tink thought glumly. And I haven’t even got one.

  As soon as she was done with her soup, Tink put down her spoon and slipped away from the table. The other potsand-pans fairies were so busy talking, they didn’t notice her leaving.

  Outside, Tink returned to the topmost branches of the Home Tree, where she’d sat the night before. She didn’t want to go back to her workshop—there were pots and pans still waiting to be fixed. She didn’t want to go to her room, either. It seemed too lonely there. At least here she had the stars to keep her company.

  “Maybe it’s true that I’ve lost my talent,” Tink said to the stars. “If I don’t have a hammer, then I can’t fix things. And if I can’t fix things, it’s just like having no talent at all.”

  The stars only twinkled in reply.

  From where she was sitting, Tink could see the hawthorn tree where Mother Dove lived. Between its branches, she could make out the faint shape of Mother Dove’s nest. Mother Dove was the only creature in the fairy kingdom who knew all about Tink and Peter Pan. Once, after the hurricane that broke Mother Dove’s wings and nearly destroyed Never Land, Tink had sat on the beach with Mother Dove and told her tales of her adventures with Peter. She had also told Mother Dove about the Wendy, and how when she came to Never Land, Peter forgot all about Tink.

  What a comfort it would be to go to Mother Dove. She would know what to do.

  But something held Tink back. She remembered Mother Dove’s words to her on her very first day in Never Land: You’re Tinker Bell, sound and fine as a bell. Shiny and jaunty as a new pot. Brave enough for anything, the most courageous fairy to come in a long year. Tink had felt so proud that day.

  But Tink didn’t feel very brave right now, certainly not brave enough to go to Peter’s and get her spare hammer. He was only a boy, but still she couldn’t find the courage.

  Tink couldn’t bear the idea that Mother Dove would think she wasn’t brave or sound or fine. It would be worse than losing her talent.

  “Tink,” said a voice.

  Tink turned. Terence was standing behind her on the branch. She’d been so wrapped up in her thoughts, she hadn’t even heard him fly up.

  “I haven’t fixed the ladle yet,” Tink told him miserably.

  “I didn’t come because of the ladle,” Terence replied. “I saw you leave the tearoom.”

  When Tink didn’t explain, Terence sat down next to her on the branch. “Tink, are you all right? Everyone is saying that…” He paused. Like Queen Ree, Terence couldn’t bring himself to repeat the gossip. It seemed too unkind.

  “That I’ve lost my talent,” Tink finished for him. She sighed. “Maybe they’re right, Terence. I can’t seem to fix anything. Everything I touch comes out worse than when I started.”

  Terence was startled. One thing he had always admired about Tink was her fierceness: her fierce dark eyebrows, her fierce determination, even the fierce happiness of her dimpled smile. He had never seen her look as defeated as
she did now.

  “I don’t believe that,” he told her. “You’re the best pots-and-pans fairy in the kingdom. Talent doesn’t just go away like that.”

  Tink said nothing. But she felt grateful to him for not believing the rumors. For still believing in her.

  “Tink,” Terence asked gently, “what’s really going on?”

  Tink hesitated. “I lost my hammer,” she blurted at last.

  As soon as the words left her lips, Tink felt relieved. It was as if she’d let out a huge breath that she’d been holding in.

  “Is that all it is?” Terence said. He almost laughed. It seemed like such a small thing. “But you could borrow a hammer,” he suggested.

  Tink told Terence about the hammer she’d made from a pebble and the one she’d borrowed from the carpenter fairy. “Neither of them works,” she explained. “I need a tinker’s hammer.”

  “Maybe there’s a spare—” Terence began.

  “I have a spare,” Tink wailed. She’d already been over this so many times in her own mind. “But it’s…I…I left it at Peter Pan’s hideout.”

  “He won’t give it back?” asked Terence.

  Tink shook her head. “I haven’t asked.” She looked away.

  Terence didn’t know much about Peter Pan, only that Tink had been friends with him and then—suddenly—she wasn’t. But he saw that Tink was upset and ashamed, and he didn’t ask her anything more. Again, Tink felt a surge of gratitude toward him.

  They sat silently for a moment, looking up at the stars.

  “I could go with you,” Terence said at last. “To Peter Pan’s, I mean.”

  Tink’s mind raced. Perhaps if someone else came along, it wouldn’t be so hard to see Peter.…

  “You would do that?” she asked.

  “Tink,” said Terence, “I’m your friend. You don’t even need to ask.”

  He gave Tink a sparkling smile. This time, Tink saw it and she smiled back.

  EARLY THE NEXT morning, before most of the fairy kingdom was awake, Tink rapped at the door of Terence’s room. She wanted to leave for Peter’s hideout before she lost her nerve altogether.

  Terence threw open the door after the first knock. He grinned at Tink. “Ready to go get your talent back, Tinker Bell?”

  Tink smiled. She was glad Terence was going with her, and not just because it would be easier with someone else along.

  They left Pixie Hollow just as the sun’s rays shone over Torth Mountain. They flew over the banana farms, where the Tiffens were already out working in the fields. In the distance, they could hear the laughter of the mermaids in the lagoon.

  “See that peak?” Tink told Terence. She pointed out a chair-shaped spot at the top of a hill. “That’s called the Throne. When the Lost Boys have their skirmishes, the winner is named king of the hill. Of course, if Peter is there, he always wins. The Lost Boys wouldn’t dare to beat him, even if they could,” Tink explained.

  “And that stream,” she went on, pointing to a silver ribbon of water winding through the forest below, “leads to an underground cavern that’s filled with gold and silver. Captain Hook and his men have hidden away a whole pirate ship’s worth of treasure there.”

  Tink remembered how she had found the cavern. She had been racing along the stream in a little birchbark canoe Peter had made for her. Peter had been running along the bank. When the stream suddenly dove underground, Tink had plunged right along with it. Peter had been so thrilled with her discovery that Tink hadn’t even minded the soaking she got when the canoe splashed down in the cavern.

  “You must know Never Land better than any fairy in the kingdom,” Terence said admiringly.

  Tink looked at the island below her and felt a little twinge of pride. What Terence said was true. With Peter, Tink had explored nearly every inch of Never Land. Every rock, meadow, and hill reminded her of some adventure.

  Of course, they also reminded her of Peter.

  Tink felt a flutter of nervousness. How would it be to see him? What if the Wendy was there, or Peter had found someone else to play with? What if he ignored her again?

  Tink fell silent. Terence, sensing that something bothered her, said nothing more for the rest of their trip.

  When Tink reached the densest, darkest part of the forest, she began to glide down in a spiral. Terence followed her.

  They plunged through a canopy of fig trees and landed on a white-speckled mushroom. The mushroom was nearly as wide as a Clumsy’s dinner plate. Terence was surprised to feel that it was quite warm.

  “It’s Peter’s hideout,” Tink explained. “They use a mushroom cap to disguise the chimney to fool Captain Hook.”

  After they’d rested for a moment, Tink sprang from the mushroom and flew up to a hollow in the trunk of a nearby jackfruit tree. She was about to dive inside when Terence grabbed her wrist.

  “What about owls?” he said worriedly. If there was an owl living in the hollow, it might eat them.

  Tink laughed. “Anything that lived here would be terrorized by the Lost Boys. This is the entrance to the hideout!”

  Peeking inside, Terence saw the entire tree was hollow, right to its roots. He followed Tink as she flew down the trunk. They came out in an underground room.

  Terence looked around. The floor and walls were made of packed earth. Tree roots hung down from the ceiling, and from these, string hammocks dangled limply. Here and there on the ground lay slingshots, socks, and dirty coconut-shell bowls. The remains of a fire smoldered in a corner. The whole place had the dry, puppyish smell of little boys.

  But there were no little boys in sight. The hideout was empty.

  He’s not home, Tink thought. She felt both disappointed and relieved.

  Just then, they heard whistling coming from somewhere near the back of the den.

  Tink and Terence flew toward the sound. Their glows made two bright spots of light in the dim room.

  At the back of the hideout, they spied a nook that was tucked out of sight from the rest of the room. The whistling was coming from there.

  When they rounded the corner, Terence saw a freckled boy with a mop of red hair sitting on a stool formed by a thick, twisted root. In one hand he held a jackknife, and he whistled as he worked it over a piece of wood. A fishing pole leaned against the wall behind him. Looking more closely, Terence saw that the boy was carving a fishing hook big enough to catch a whale.

  Tink saw her old friend, Peter Pan.

  Taking a deep breath, Tink said, “Hello, Peter.”

  But Peter didn’t seem to hear her. He continued to whistle and chip at the wood.

  Tink flew a little bit closer. “Peter!” she exclaimed.

  Peter kept on whistling and whittling.

  Was he deaf? Or could he be angry with her? Tink wondered with a sudden shock. The thought had never occurred to her. She hovered, unsure what to do.

  Then Terence took her hand. They flew up to Peter until they were just a few inches from his face. “Peter!” they both cried.

  Peter lifted his head. When he saw them, a bright smile lit his face.

  Tink smiled, too.

  “Hello! What’s this?” Peter said. He looked back and forth between the fairies.

  “Two butterflies have come to visit me! Are you lost, butterflies?”

  Tink’s smile faded. She and Terence stared at Peter. Butterflies?

  Tink thought, Has he forgotten me already?

  Peter squinted at them and whistled low. “You’re awful pretty. I just love butterflies,” he said. “You’d make a fine addition to my collection. Let’s see now, where are my pins?”

  He began to search his pockets. As he did, small items fell onto the ground beneath his seat: a parrot’s feather, a snail shell, a bit of string.

  “Here it is!” he cried. He held up a straight pin with a colored bulb on the end. It was big enough to skewer a butterfly—or a fairy—right through the middle.

  “Now hold still,” Peter said. Gripping the pin in one
hand, he reached up to grab Tink and Terence with the other.

  “Fly!” Terence screamed to Tink.

  Just before Peter’s stubby fingers closed around them, the fairies turned and fled toward the exit.

  BUT AS THEY reached the roots of the jackfruit tree, they heard a whoop of laughter behind them.

  Tink stopped and glanced back over her shoulder. Peter was clutching his stomach and shaking with laughter.

  “Oh, Tink!” he gasped. “You should have seen the looks on your faces. Butterflies! Oh, I am funny. Oh, oh.” He bent over as another round of laughter seized him.

  Terence, who had been just ahead of Tink, also stopped and turned. Frowning, he came to hover next to her. He had never met Peter Pan face to face before, and he was starting to think that he wasn’t going to like him very much.

  But Tink was smiling. It had only been a joke! Peter did remember her!

  At last Peter stopped laughing. He bounded up to Tink and Terence, his eyes shining.

  “Tink!” he cried. “It’s awful great to see you. Where’ve you been hiding?”

  “Hello, Peter,” Tink replied. “Meet my friend Terence.”

  “A boy pixie! Fantastic!” Peter cried, turning to stare at Terence.

  The grin on his face was so wide and enthusiastic that Terence’s heart softened. The thing was, it was impossible not to like Peter Pan. He had the eagerness of a puppy, the cleverness of a fox, and the freedom of a lark—all rolled into one spry, redheaded boy.

  “You’ll never guess what I’ve got, Tink. Come see!” He said it as if Tink had been away for a mere few hours and had now come back to play.

  Peter led Tink and Terence over to a corner of the hideout and pulled a wooden cigar box out of a hole in the wall. The word “Tarantula” was burned onto the lid. It was the name of the cigars Captain Hook liked to smoke. Peter had found the empty box on the beach, where Hook had thrown it away.

  “I keep my most important things in my treasure chest,” Peter explained to Terence, gesturing to the box. “The Lost Boys know better than to go poking around in here.”