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Jungkook refuses to believe.
His mother tells him that he very much should believe, but he doesn't want to. It's all Peter Pan this, and Peter Pan that. Every other seven-year-old always fawns over the books their parents read aloud to them with wide eyes and swoon for the cartoons with dreamy sighs, but no, Jungkook refuses to believe in this boy of mermaid lagoons and one-handed pirates who will lead him away, up and into the air, far, far, away.
Jungkook huffs at the storybook his mother has set before him with a, "Read it yourself, sweetheart, and believe," and the click of the door's lock- he always has a bedtime story read to him by his mother or father before he drifts off to sleep, but tonight, his mother has decided that he ought to read a book himself.
And of all stories to have to read, he has to read Peter Pan.
Stupid Peter Pan.
Jungkook groans as he sits up in his bed, staring down at the drawings of a red-headed boy in green clothes leading Wendy, John, and Michael Darling with pixie dust to Neverland. He scoffs because it's all so ridiculous and unbelievable, (that's right, he won't believe a single word of this nonsense) but he still has to read it. Hmph. He'd much rather read the Avengers book on his bookshelf.
"What're you reading there?"
Jungkook shoots up from his bed at the sudden voice, heart leaping forward at the speed of a race car. His eyes dart around the room wildly, fingertips shaking - he had practically tossed his storybook when he hopped onto the ground - before they finally rest on a shadow over his window.
Jungkook squints and gingerly edges closer with a frown to get a better view until he's roughly a yard away. He sees not a shadow, but a boy around his teenage years dangling one leg into the night air outside and resting one on the windowsill. This boy, this stranger, whoever he may be, has hair that Jungkook has never seen before - it looks like the cosmos and has an extraordinary, captivating magic to it, all bewitching locks of black, blue, and purple mixing and swirling with winking glimmers that look like stars in orbit.
Stars in his hair, Jungkook thinks, and almost giggles.
The boy looks lithe but broad, and much taller than Jungkook, his form covered in a white dress shirt - like the one Jungkook's father wears to work, except this one has colorful doodles of clouds and butterflies - peeking out from beneath a dark blue coat with its hood down. He wears black slacks but no shoes, is barefoot, which Jungkook finds strange. Then again, he also finds it strange that a complete stranger is suddenly on his windowsill, but there's some captivating aura to this boy that keeps Jungkook from screaming in fear, so he merely stares holes into the boy's face, which is all shining eyes and full lips.
Stars are written in the stranger's eyelids and moon dust is on his eyelashes as he peers down at Jungkook curiously. "Hey," he greets softly, and Jungkook takes a few steps back in surprise.
"P-Peter Pan?" He stammers with saucer eyes. He grimaces at his voice because he sounds so small when he's supposed to sound big and brave.
The boy cocks his head to the side in intrigue, a smile playing at the corner of his lips. "'Peter Pan'?" He repeats it as a question, and Jungkook can't help but notice the patterns of Corona Borealis and Libra mapped out in those amber-tinted irises and dark, warm pupils. (It's pretty cool, though he'll never admit that aloud.) "That's interesting. My name isn't Peter Pan, though."
Jungkook feels his eyebrows furrow. "T-then what is it?" Curse the stuttering.
The boy swings his left leg from outside to the other side of the windowsill."I'm Park Jimin. What's your name?"
Jungkook mentally corrects his thought earlier to Stupid Park Jimin. He feels slightly guilty because this Jimin seems alright - friendly enough, at least - but he ignores the feeling and responds, "Jeon Jungkook." Pride blooms in his chest as he hears that he doesn't stumble over his words and his voice is steady.
"Well, Jungkook," Jimin croons. Now, his eyes look like the melted chocolate Jungkook's mother loves to give him on winter nights near the fireplace to chase away the cold. "Seems like you've heard of me." The boy points down to the storybook Jungkook has left thrown on his bed. "Do you know of Neverland then?"
"Yeah." It's not Jungkook's intention to sound grumpy as he mumbles that, but it comes out that way.
"Oh, dear." Jimin laughs airily. "You're not very fond of it, are you?"
Jungkook recalls all the other children obsessing over this boy before him - this weird, starry boy that isn't even that great! - and makes an effort to have his tone as icy as it possibly can be at such a high register when he coolly responds, "I don't believe in it." He adds as an afterthought, hoping it really stings, "I don't believe in you."
To the little boy's dismay, Jimin does not look wounded or even fazed. He simply tilts his head again, a humor in his twinkling eyes that baffles Jungkook. "But, I wouldn't be here if you didn't believe in me, would I?"
Jungkook frowns at the logic, rendered a bit speechless. "Well.."
"Let's say," Jimin interjects gently, "You and I try believing. Do you want to try believing, Jungkook?"
Jungkook purses his lips stubbornly, but a little pout peeks out. "I-I don't believe in you."
Jimin's lips twitches in knowing amusement, silver casting into the dark hues of his hair like light reflecting off of the moon, and he lets out a soft chuckle. "That's alright," he sings. He observes Jungkook silently for a little bit before shaking his head, "You're a first, you are."
Jungkook doesn't say anything. A first? What was that supposed to mean?
"But that's alright," Jimin continues, nodding a bit to himself. "Some pixie dust will help that!"
Jungkook instantly opens his mouth to protest, "I don't-"
"You don't believe in pixie dust," Jimin finishes for him, rather drolly, and Jungkook nods timidly.
He frowns mentally. How was it that this boy knew what he had been about to say? Was he a mind-reader? Jungkook inwardly shivers at the thought, fear crawling up the bumps of his spine.
"How about a song first, then, hmm?" Jimin doesn't wait for Jungkook's answer and pulls out an instrument- one with pipes strapped together that Jungkook doesn't know from his Monday Music classes - from his hood, though it looks for a second like it simply materializes into his hands. He raises it to his lips and plays an unknown tune that Jungkook has never heard but somehow remembers, tingling at the back of his brain, a tune that is melodic and sweet with all of the right notes and all of the right pitches. It reminds him lightly of lost stars and wandering dreams, everything beautiful but with a small, orphic melancholiness, as if lost and waiting to be found. Jungkook absentmindedly starts swaying.
The wordless song stops, but Jungkook is still swaying. "We play it in Neverland all the time," is Jimin's quiet utterance, breezy and musical. "Would you like to see Neverland, Jungkook?"
Jungkook gives a tiny, unconscious nod of his head, and Jimin grins- so widely and happily that Jungkook sees sunshine and daisies on a colorful, pretty summer day. Jimin seems to be like the universe and the seasons, with his astronomical eyes, circling galaxy hair, warm gaze, and sun-bright smiles.
Said boy puts his instrument somewhere back into his clothes- or maybe they disappear into thin air, Jungkook doesn't know- and pulls out a brown pouch.
"Faith, trust, and pixie dust," he recites to Jungkook, who gazes back with saucer eyes of viridity. "Just believe."
Jimin pushes himself off of the windowsill forcefully, and for a second Jungkook is about to yell a warning of "No, don't!" and winces, expecting a loud crash, but nothing comes, so he experimentally cracks an eye open. A second passes and Jungkook opens the other to find Jimin grinning crookedly at him- or, rather, down at him, because he's in the air.
Jungkook gapes at the flying figure, who only giggles and sticks a cupped palm into his pouch. When he removes his hand, Jungkook sees something flashy in the older's palm, like gold glitter and shiny snow with low light coruscating onto both of their faces, glinting sparkles of beautiful yellow and white winking at him just as Jimin does now.
He says nothing and only watches in awe when Jimin dumps the pixie dust - that's what Jungkook figures that this bright, shimmering thing must be - onto his head. He feels a new feather-light weight as tiny pieces settling into his dark hair, and it feels odd but nice.
Jungkook closes his eyes as Jimin begins humming that tune from before, and he feels warmth pooling in his little chest, completely absorbed in the giddy feeling in his stomach. The music is lacing euphoria into his bones and etching comfort into his skin, and Jungkook sighs, watching as it tattoos onto his eyelids images of tackling hugs with his parents after work, descents into leaf piles of brilliant red and yellow, hyperactive chases with their family dog, giggle fits with his beaming friends, so, so many happy images he never wants to forget. And he imagines, just for a second, getting tugged softly by Jimin, his own Peter Pan, to a land where time and age are non-existent, where he can bask in these memories forever and ever, get trapped in them and never let go.
This isn't believing, right?
Yeah.
It isn't.
Because Jungkook doesn't believe.
Not as he becomes a golden ball of light when the pixie dust starts glowing and lifting him off the ground and into the air; not as Jimin gives him that grin of sunshine and flowers and laughs a laugh that tinkles like bells in his ears, the constellations in his eyes firing up and his voice crying, "You believe! Up and away, we shall;" and certainly not as Jimin takes Jungkook's small hand in his and pulls him along into the air closer and closer to the night sky, to the clouds, to Neverland.
Oh, no, Jeon Jungkook is definitely not believing.