Tigger gave me a strange look as he approached.  I could only imagine what that meant.  Probably that by the end of the night I was going to be hanging upside down by one foot with the bearskin hanging from my head.  At the very least.

"You know that grove by the Big Bear River?"

"Yeahhh," I said cautiously.

"Someone wants you to meet them there."  I waited for the punch line and guess my skepticism must have shown.  "No seriously, it's an elf with wings.  She said her name was Alida and wondered if I'd give you the message that she'd like to see you."

I think I groaned as guilt began filling me.  Last week had not been a good week as far as getting my elven recommended daily allowance of exercise.  It was the usual stuff.  Other Lost Boys to mend, a few places to explore, the Bucking Star to visit.  "Did she sound, you know, upset or anything?"

"Good grief, Cubby.  All she asked was if you could come by the grove.  She said she hadn't seen you for awhile or something like that.  It didn't seem like any big deal."

I mulled that for a moment and suddenly realized the location we were talking about.  "Wait a second.  The Big Bear?  Isn't the grove we're talking about on the other side of the river?"

He looked thoughtful and said so innocently that I knew he actually had, "You know, I didn't think about that.  I do believe you're right."

"Oh, great.  How am I supposed to get across there?  Have you seen how high the river is?  I don't think any of the fords are passable right now.  I wonder how she got across?"

"Hellloooo!  Winged elf.  Probably flies.  Think about it."

"Well I can't do that."

He looked at me in a speculative manner and finally shook his head.  "Nope, I'd agree with that.  You'd need some awfully big wings.  Tink says you already need a double handful of pixie dust."

I lunged at him, but he was quick enough to jump back out of the way.  I wouldn't have known what to do with him if I had caught him anyway.  The last time I threw him up in a tree, but he just climbed back down.  It didn't bother me when any of the Lost Boys commented about my size anyway.  With them I knew it was all in fun.  It was those who inhabited the 'real' world I wasn't so sure about.

"No worries, Cubby.  You'll be back in the wolf pelt before you know it."  He took off towards Hangman's Tree and I wandered towards my appointment across the Big Bear River.  There wasn't really anything to be upset about, was there?  I had done okay the previous week, it was just last week that things had happened and problems had arisen and obstacles encountered.  I had slipped a little in the consumption department as well, but not in the sugary, chocolate way.  I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.  Good that it hadn't been too horribly, awfully bad.  Bad in that if I had cheated, why couldn't it have been with a huge bar of chocolate or a chocolate sundae or one of those insanely rich cream cheese filled, dripping with frosting cinnamon buns that the Bucking Star made warm and fresh everyday with the aroma filling the air as you walked by the store and...  I stopped myself before the front of the bearskin was covered in drool.

It was dark by the time I got to the Big Bear River, but there was enough moon and starlight to see that the water hadn't gotten any lower, and if anything was actually running higher than it was the other day.  There were a lot of trees in the area though, and some branches from trees on opposite sides of the river met over it.  I didn't really want to climb a tree at the moment, I was sort of tired, although it wasn't as though I had done a lot that day.  I forced myself to find a likely candidate, took a deep breath, and started to climb.  It had been awhile since I had climbed a tree, at least awhile as often as I normally climb them.  About fifteen minutes into it, I realized that it really felt pretty good climbing again, even though my arms and legs were beginning to ache a little.  It was a good ache though.  I also noticed I wasn't feeling quite as tired as I had.

I climbed until I got to what appeared to be a very sturdy limb that led over the water and looked as though it intertwined with a branch from a tree on the other side of the water.  I slowly started crossing the limb, listening to it creak alarmingly, the farther I got out.  By the time I reached the middle of the river and the other limb, the branch I was on was beginning to sway with each movement I made.  I reached over as far as I could, grabbed the branch from the tree across the way, and swung off the one I was on.  The branch I was swinging to didn't even creak.  It simply collapsed.

The other end of the branch stayed connected to the tree, and I held on to the branch as I swung gracefully into the tree trunk as though I was on a vine or something.  I hit the trunk with enough force to see stars for a moment and put both hands on my head to make sure it was still attached.  It was at that time I realized that I was in free fall.  I bounced off a couple of branches on the way down and saw a fresh field of stars as I fell flat on my back on the ground.  It wasn't as bad as it could have been though.  Apparently someone had collected a massive pile of pine needles which had broken my fall.

I lay there listening to the water running by and looking at the stars, both real and imagined, when a voice above me said, "Very impressive indeed.  You do that well.  Have you ever thought about becoming a professional in the art of falling out of trees?"

"I'm a Lost Boy," I told the winged elf.  "All of us are professionals at falling out of trees."

"True," she said, "but you seem to be the only one who practices it on a regular basis.  I haven't seen you in awhile and just wondered how things were going."

"Wellll... okay, I guess."  There was silence.  "I mean..."  More silence.  "Aww, I screwed up and didn't run as much as I should have and stopped climbing trees and, well, maybe didn't eat the way I probably should have and...  It's just frustrating.  Sometimes I don't think I can do it.  It's so hard, and it's not fair, and I just want to yell and scream about it."

"Why don't you then?"

"Why don't I, what?"

"Yell and scream.  If you seriously think it will help, then go for it.  Sometimes it does good to get things like that out of your system.  I'm sure the birds won't care and the other Lost Boys will figure you're just doing something 'Cubbyish.'"

There was more truth than fiction in that statement.  "Maybe I'll try it if I think it'll help."

"Good.  Have you given up?"

I pondered on the variety of meanings that phrase held.  "No, not really.  Sometimes I feel like it's simply useless and will never work.  I mean I did so good before and then all of a sudden everything seemed to come undone and now I'm always trying to play catchup."

"Well you're only human."  I gave her a look and she smiled.  "Okay, you're only 'slightly less than human'.  It just means that you aren't perfect and shouldn't keep yourself to a perfect standard.  Consistency is the key, both in what you do and the way you do it.  If all you eat is a handful of blueberries all day, then you can't expect yourself to think that a piece of waybread is going to take you through the rest of the day.  You're cutting back, not trying to starve yourself.  Remember how you did it the first time and follow through on that."

What she said made sense.  I seemed to be seesawing back and forth between feast and famine.  It seemed logical to maybe add a bit more so I wouldn't be tempted to add tons more later.  Maybe there was some truth in trying to be 'too good'.  "Can I ask you something?"

"You can always ask, but I don't promise I'll give you an answer."

"Why are you, you know, so concerned about me sticking to the things I'm supposed to stick to?"

"That's easy," she replied.  "I made a promise to Roo that I'd keep an eye on you and help you when I could when it came to this."

"Really?  Roo did that?  How come?"

"Because you are the first Lost Boy to get diabetes and that makes it a bit harder.  He asked if I would encourage you to do the right things and to listen when you needed to vent about it.  It's not real easy, is it?"

I thought about the day I had found out about it and realized it was a story in itself (no foreshadowing here at all), and was probably one of the most depressing days I had gone through.  I had made bounds in that department since then, but realized that being able to ponder out loud to someone would probably help as well.  "Okay.  Thank you.  It helps."

"Good.  And consistency?"

"Will be my watchword.  Consistency in a more realistic manner and no horrible guilt feelings if I cheat as long as I don't use it as an excuse to totally blow everything I've accomplished so far."

She nodded. "Very good.  Think you'll be up to the balance next week?"

"Yes," I said, suddenly sure I could make a go at it.  "Regardless of whether I succeed or fall off, I will see how many 'rocks' I now balance."

"Very well.  It is time for me to sleep and for Lost Boys to play.  I bid you adieu for now and will check in with you a couple of more times this week."  She grinned.  "Now that wasn't so bad, was it?"

"No, it wasn't.  I'm just... you know.  But I feel better about things now."

She nodded.  "Excellent."  She started to fly off, but stopped and hovered a moment.  "By the way, you're going to have to go through the trees to get back.  If you use that tree about thirty feet from here, you'll find the tree on the other side has a very large pile of pine needles under it.  Just in case."

This is my progress report for the first week of the new journey. I'm not going to bore anyone to tears by listing a blow-by-blow daily account of my quest to fit back into the wolf pelt, but simply summarizing the week before to keep myself 'honest' and provide an incentive to stick to it. Besides, I have to let the elf know how I'm doing *grin*.

"C'mon Cubby, get up. It's time to take a trip."

I opened my eyes to see Ursa standing above me with an expression of mixed amusement and determination. A knothole high above us in the trunk of the tree let in a beam of sunlight that caught some dust and reflected off a spiderweb. The fact that the sun was beaming in through it let me know that it was before noon. "Ursa," I groaned, "what time is it and what did I do to you to make you get me up this early?" I pulled a fur up over my head before he answered.

"Nice try, Cub, but I've been told to make sure you got up and went for a run this moring." Although I had a deathgrip on the covers, Ursa pulled them off me without any apparent effort. He held out his hand for me to take and I went ahead and let him pull me up by it, knowing that it would be useless to try and ignore it.

"Who'd you promise that you'd make me run?" I asked curiously. "And how do you know it's not a trap or something to catch both of us?"

"No one made me promise anything, but an elf with wings suggested that I might want to go for a run this morning and take you with me." He had a bit of a puzzled expression on his face. "I'm not exactly sure why I did it, but she sounded very convincing and at the time it made a lot of sense."

I grumbled simply for the sake of grumbling and followed Ursa out of the Tree and down one of the trails that led towards the ocean. Ursa could run a lot faster than me, but didn't show off as he kept the pace slow enough that I could keep up with him. After the first ten minutes my body was demanding to know exactly what I was up to and why. I knew the reasons, but was at sort of a loss to explain it well enough that it would believe me. By the time the hour ended and we were back at the Tree, I was sweating and doing a fair amount of panting. Ursa looked a little winded, which was almost gratifying, but didn't seem to be nearly as bad off as I was. "This elf," I asked, "Did she say anything else?"

He looked a little embarassed. "Only that I should probably lay off the honey a bit." He gave a grin and told me that he'd see me tomorrow at the same time.

I figured I knew what was expected of me next, so I wandered down the trail until I came to a particular stump. As I thought, there was an elf with wings sitting on it. She gave me a bright smile and greeted me. "How goes the adjustment?"

"Adjustment. That's an interesting word."

She nodded. "Naturally it's an adjustment. It's not a diet. A diet tends to be a temporary measure, something that won't last. An adjustment is a more permanent thing. You were on a diet, and look what happened," she poked my middle. "Now you need an adjustment. See the difference?"

I grudgingly admitted that I did and that she was right on all counts. "I knew you'd see the picture, Cubby. So, how did the adjustment go this week?"

"Welll, the first part of it went well and I did the running I was supposed to for the most part. I sort of crashed towards the end of the week, but I think that was from stuff that was going on and things like that." I sighed. "I stuck to it for the most part, but not as well as I should have."

"Did you give up when you didn't stick to it for the day?"

I thought about that for a moment. "Noooo, I figured that one mistake wouldn't ruin everything unless I let it. I even planned ahead for next week."

"Really? How so?"

"I gathered some greens together and a few things to pop into them to see if I could, you know, do salad. I also figured that I'd look to see if I could find a sort of plan to follow to make it easier."

The elf nodded, apparently figuring I was on the right track. "Good way to do it. Make sure you stick with it and don't give up if it becomes too much to bear sometimes. Just remember that you're only slightly less than human and you'll suffer a setback every now and again. That doesn't mean it's time to give up for that week, day, or even the rest of the hour. Okay?"

"Yeah, I guess so. I'll keep it in mind."

"See that you do. I'll see you next week to see how things are going," she said as she slowly faded away.

The branch that hung over the deep stream creaked alarmingly as I went hand-over-hand along it towards the branch attached to the tree on the other side of the stream.  It was easier to cross the stream this way, than it was to try and cross the overflowing creek on foot.  I'd done it a gazillion times over the past couple of months since we had gotten all that rain from a weather wizard gone awry.  I stretched my hand towards the opposite branch and my fingers just brushed some leaves on the other branch when there was a horrendous crack and I found myself airborne.  I closed my eyes and pinched my nose close with my fingers a moment before I 'cannonballed' into the river spending a tremendous column of water fountaining into the air.

The water was freezing and it took me several attempts to drag myself up the muddy bank.  By the time I found a purchase, I had drifted about a half mile down the stream bank.  I lay on the riverbank gasping from the exertion of pulling myself out of the river and shivering from the cold.  I was pretty much encrusted with slimy mud, but figured I might be able to wipe enough off so that I could avoid the dreaded bath.  After all,. technically I'd just taken one and could probably count that as my 'autumn' bath.  The prospect didn't cheer me up as much as it normally did.

"Hey Lost Boy, have an accident?"

I looked up to see what at first glance appeared to be a female elf sitting on a tree stump and examining me.  Second glance revealed that while she might have looked like an elf, there weren't very many around who had wings or piercings such as this one.  There were also very few of them whose noses didn't stay at about a 45 degree angle when dealing with us 'hopeless' Lost Boys.  I noted hers wasn't elevated at all and that she seemed actually concerned about the dunking I had taken.  "Uh, it's okay.  I tend to fall out of trees sometimes.  I'm used to it."

She gave me a doubtful look.  "Perhaps you were ejected by the tree or there was structural failure on the tree's behalf, but I doubt seriously that you fell the way you imply.  It did make a rather grand splash, though.  Perhaps just a tad less honey next time will keep you from plumetting to earth."

"Honey?  I don't eat honey.  What gave you that idea?"

"I'm sure I don't know," she said with an impish smile.  "Perhaps it was the fact you're wrapped up in a bearskin.  I've heard that bears tend to eat honey.  Although perhaps you've had one too many blueberries rather than honey."  Normally I'd be either embarassed or at least a bit upset that someone was making light (yeah, there's a pun there if you look hard for it) of my eating habits.  Yet her bantering tone and grin seemed to convey more of an interest than condemnation.

"I'm actually supposed to be in a wolf pelt, but I sort of... well... it doesn't quite fit anymore."  She gave an encouraging nod.  "I lost some, but then I sort of didn't pay attention and now I'm going the wrong way and it's hard to get twisted about so I'm heading the right way again."

"That can happen," she said wisely.  "The important thing to remember is not to give up or admit defeat.  One extra blueberry does not a bushel basket make.  Do you get out and run the trails?"

I sighed.  "Sometimes.  I used to be really good about it, but..."

"But Lost Boys have other things on their minds and sometimes it seems that the running part gets in the way of the fun stuff.  Or there's a friend to be rescued or a story to write or simply something else that demands to be done instead."

"Yeah.  How did you know?"  I asked in surprise.  She had voiced it exactly.

"Oh I know a few things about Lost Boys.  Missing a day won't kill you, but you can't let the one day you miss be a foundation for a lot of missing days."

"Easier said than done," I grumbled.  Sometimes it simply felt impossible to eat 'good' or jog like I was supposed to.

"Of course it is," she agreed.  "It's that 'nothing worth doing is easy' type experience.  You've done it before though, and you can do it again if you truly want to.  The key is wanting to do it enough to overcome the want of not doing it.  Consequences and all that stuff, if you know what I mean."

Sadly enought I knew exactly what she meant.  It was time to play the game of deciding if eating a quantity of chocolate and feeling good for an instant meant feeling bad later on, even if the later on didn't occur for a day, a week, or longer.  Us Lost Boys tended to live for the moment for a lot of reasons.  That coupled with, what we belived to be, our invincibility tended to make worrying about tomorrow occur... tomorrow.  I let those things careen around my head for a bit while I studied the ground at my feet.  "Who are you?" I asked, not in an accusatory tone, but simply becuause I was curious about it.

"Ah.  Who am I?  There's a question now.  I can tell my the look on your freckled face you can hardly stand the mystery, can you?"  She laughed.  "Perhaps I should let it be an incentive to help you reach the goal you want to get to."

"Whatcha mean?" I asked, suddenly suspicious.  This elf didn't appear to be a grown up elf, but you could never tell with elves, either.  She actually looked and talked as though she were on the younger side of the adult scale, if in fact she'd even reached it.  Yet it sounded too much like having an adult offer you a cookie if you took a bath and then discovering once you'd gone to all that trouble that instead of a warm, chewy, gooey, bursting with chocolate, chocolate chip cookie, it was some sort of digestive biscuit that had a slight off taste and tended to make your teeth hurt when you chewed it.  I shook my head.  What was I thinking?  Did everything have to be connected to my tummy?

The elf looked as though she had watched the wheels turning in my head and knew exactly what I was thinking and was proud of the fact that I'd caught myself thinking in terms of cookies.  "Tell you what, Lost Boy.  Starting the day after tomorrow, because I have an appointment tomorrow, you meet me here at this decapitated tree and tell me what you ate and whether you walked the trails or did some other form of stuff that Lost Boys are supposed to do... yes, even playing tag counts as long as you run... and we'll find out what direction you're going in.  As long as you work on it, and I don't mean that you're going to have to subsist on waybread and water and you keep the sweetness in your blood where it should be..."

I gaped at her, "How'd you know about that?"

She laughed.  "Maybe you told me about it.  Maybe Roo told me about it.  Maybe the wind knows about it, and you know how well the wind can keep a secret."

"Yeah, I suppose.  So what was that you were saying."

She grinned.  "I figured you'd get back to that eventually.  If you do your best and work at it, then I'll let you know who I am.  Not only that, but I'll show you a wonderful place where all sorts of wonderful possiblities exist and flourish.  And no, it won't be like a digestive biscuit."

I groaned because I was officially hooked.  "And you won't get all mad if I, you know," I said staring at the ground once again.

"Silly Lost Boy.  I don't expect you to be perfect, just that you'll try your best and that if you accidentally take a step back, you'll realize that it's not an excuse to take several more back.  Is it a deal?"

"Deal!" I said.  There was the tingle of magic in the air as whatever it was took note of the latest agreement made on the island and recorded it.

"Now then, why don't you sit over on that log."  She pointed to a large log that was on top of a boulder, almost like a see-saw.  I obiediently walked over and sat on it.  She negligently waved a hand and a large rock flew through the air and landed on the other side of the log.  She repeated the action nine more times and as the last rock landed on the other side of the log, I felt myself lifted up as the log under me was suddenly balanced with the other side.  She nodded in a satisfied way.  "Now you can keep track of where you're at too."  She waved her hand again and there was a click from the boulder the log was lying on.  "You can choose to check it the day after tomorrow, five of the days, a cycle, or whenever."

I slowly slid off the log, but it stayed in place where it had been.  "So now what do I do?"

"Whatever you need to do, Lost Boy.  Go play.  Write.  Discover what's in the cave under the meadow.  Eat a blueberry.  It's not the end of the world, even if it feels that way sometimes.  Just do your best."

There was a noise like windchimes and I looked at her feet to see them slowly dissolving.  I was pretty sure most elves didn't do that.  I watched as she continued to dissolve.  "I'll see you here next time Lost Boy.  Have heart, it'll be okay," she said just before the rest of her vanished.

I stood there for a moment and wondered if maybe my overactive imagination had gone into overdrive once more.  Looking behind me at the log, though, I figured that it had actually happened.  What an interesting thing.  I slowly walked away from the place, resolving that I was going to do better and try and fit back into the wolf pelt once again.  There was a restless stirring inside of me that sort of questioned how long that resolution would last.  I buried it by wondering exactly what cave under what meadow the elf had been talking about.

I got to the Woodland Elves village and went into the cottage where they provided us Lost Boys with our pelts, skins or whatever. I fished through my pockets and after pulling out an amazing collection of stuff finally found the ticket I was looking for. I handed the slightly soaked, very muddy, almost legible ticket to the elf behind the counter. He took it gingerly and looked at it with more than a little distaste. “If you did this to the ticket, it’s no wonder you had to have this thing redone,” the elf said as he slid a brown wrapped parcel across the counter.

I tried looking suitably chastised but failed miserably and simply grinned and thanked him as he shook his head and made some comment in what sounded like Brooklyn accented Hebrew under his breath. I started off towards Hangman’s Tree and then paused as I passed The Bucking Star. I dug into my pockets again and another grin lit up my face as I dug out a couple of shillings. I went inside to get a mug of hot chocolate.

I gave the barista my usual order of sugar free hot chocolate without any flavouring and then he asked if I wanted whipped cream and marshmallows with it. “How ridiculous to ask someone who just ordered a sugar free cocoa if they wanted whipped cream and marshmallows,” I thought to myself. Unfortunately I was spending too much time thinking, because while I was doing that, my mouth cheerfully said yes and ordered a bear claw to boot, much to my horror. The barista smirked at me as he put my order on the bar in front of me. “One doubloon, 2 shillings and 7p, or $11.22 US the barista said.

Great, what could I possibly have been thinking? I dug through my pockets yet again and finally came up with 6p and my lucky shooter which he decided to accept with a long drawn out sigh. I took the stuff to one of the tables in the back and sat down. This was nuts. There was probably enough calories in this stuff to feed me for a month, not to mention enough sugar to cause major problems with the big ‘D’. If Roo were here he’d have told me this stuff would kill me right before performing the task himself. The best thing to do would be to simply walk away before I ate or drank any of this stuff and simply call it an expensive lesson. Yeah, that was it.

Unfortunately I discovered that I had absently polished off both cocoa and bear claw while such noble thoughts were wandering around in my mind. What was wrong with me? I grabbed the package and fled the coffee house to go back to Hangman’s Tree. I spent the time on the way back rationalizing my behaviour. It wasn’t like it was so much and it probably wouldn’t do any real harm, right? It was only once… well, more or less.

I quit thinking about it as I lumbered up the final hill before the Tree.  It took awhile, but I finally made it up there.  I struggled through my trap door and fell in a heap on the floor of the common room.  No one else was around, so I went ahead and unwrapped the parcel with the wolf pelt in it.  I shook the pelt out and marveled at how good it looked.  It was hard to tell I had been wearing it for awhile.  I shucked out of the bearskin and put on the wolf pelt.  That is, I tried to put on the wolf pelt.  There was something wrong with it, obviously, because I couldn't get it on.  It didn't fit.  The arms and legs were the proper length and fit fine, but there was something about the middle.  It simply didn't cover mine anymore.

I slowly took it off and put the bearskin back on, which I noticed once again fit a lot better than it should have--it wasn't nearly as loose as it had been when I gave it up.  I sat at the common table and carefully examined the wolf pelt as the sudden flare of hope arose that maybe Cat had gotten to the elves' village before I had and tampered with it.   Since Cat had arrived, I had gotten pretty good at examining stuff like this.  That hope died as I saw, if anything, the pelt had been let out a tiny bit.

"What's up Cub?"  I looked up to see Reynard wander into the room carrying a box of something.  "Finally got the wolf skin back, huh?  Something wrong with it?  You sure are studying it awful hard."

"Nope, nothing wrong.  I just, you know, was looking at what a good job they did with that stuff that was in it. Yeah, they did a really good job on it."

"So throw it on then.  I keep confusing you and Ursa when you're in the bear rug."

"I might later, I'm just not ready to yet."

"Oh brother, I'll turn my back if that's what you're worried about."  I shook my head no.  "Well why wouldn't you?  After all, you're a wolf... wait a second."  I cringed inside.  "You can't put it on, can you?  You've gotten too big for it haven't you?"  He laughed.  "No wonder I can't tell you and Ursa apart.  Too much stew and wandering into the Bucking Star and maybe gorging on strawberries and blueberries and a few other things?"

I muttered something, grabbed the pelt, and tried to leave, but Reynard blocked me.  "Cub, it's okay dude.  I shouldn't have said anything.  I'm sorry.  Sometimes I guess I say stuff before I think about it. You're always making a joke out of everything, even when it happens to you, and I figured this was one of those times."

"Yeah, I suppose," I said.  "I guess I didn't pay as much attention to what I was doing after I lost all that.  It just doesn't seem fair," I sighed.  "I guess I just like to indulge and I figured I could do it and did it more than I really was able to.  Now I gotta pay the price.  No more sweets or cocoa for awhile, no snow cream, nothing except waybread and stew I suppose."  Silly as it was, I thought about crying for a moment there.  I really, really, really didn't want to go through this whole thing again, which naturally was why I was going to get to go through it.  The sooner I realized it was going to be a forever thing, the better off I would be.

"Well don't go overboard, Cub.  Remember you can have a bunch of stuff, you just have to, you know, not have as much of it."

"I know, but sometimes it can be hard.  Insanely hard.  It's like losing something which I really want to do.  I know it's stupid to think that way.  There's a lot of other things in the world besides eating chocolate, but there are times that's the only thing I want to do.  One piece never seems like it'll be enough either."

Reynard shook his head.  "I'm not sure what to tell you, but I'll help you any way I can.  All of us will.  Just let us know what we can do."

I thanked him, took the wolf pelt and put it away and decided the first thing to do was to go out and take a brisk walk to the sea cliffs and back.  I was pretty sure I could do this again, even though I knew I was going to hate it.