Straight On Till Morning

by Liz Braswell

  Michael ran forward to look in.

  “It’s not there!” he said in awe, rustling around the drawer, ignoring the pin and needle pricks from the untidy pincushion. John rose up behind him without the usual complaints that should have come from such a pratfall enacted on his serious, scholarly body. He, too, poked around, albeit more hesitantly. But there were no extra shadows to be found—nor even the silken bag and wrapper she sometimes kept it in.

  “Was it ever really there?” Michael finally asked, in perfect innocence.

  “I don’t know,” John admitted.

  On the one hand, Mr. Darling didn’t want a scandal that could jeopardize his position in society or at the firm. On the other hand, neither he nor Mrs. Darling was entirely immune to the stories of Spring-Heeled Jack and the dreary, mysterious gray fogs of a London spring. The police were quietly notified, though the Darlings were quietly notified back that young unwed girls had a tendency to show up again hale and hearty, if often wed, or at least with child. Since there were no signs of violence, no known enemies, and no bodies floating Ophelia-like down the Thames recently, the police weren’t concerned.

  Mrs. Darling didn’t believe it was a boy, at least a boy they knew; whether or not she was the best mother (as John and Michael and Wendy believed), she was good enough to know her daughter. Wendy, being a strange kitten, was not interested in any boys that way, except for maybe the bookstore owner’s nephew.

  “She’ll come back. It’s all probably just to avoid being sent to Ire—” Mr. Darling began.

  Too late he saw Mrs. Darling’s panicked eyes and shaking head.

  “Sent to—to Ireland?” John asked sharply. “You were going to send Wendy to Ireland?”

  “Why? For how long?” Michael demanded.

  “We just felt like your sister needed a little break,” their mother said gently.

  “Rid her head of fairy stories, the nonsense she continually writes down in that notebook of hers,” Mr. Darling blustered, angry at being caught out, angry that he ever had to hide anything.

  “You wanted to send her to Ireland to rid her head of fairy stories,” John said. “Let me just get this straight: the land of the daoine sídhe and the bean sídthe and the pookah?”

  “Now look here, John—”

  “You’re sending Wendy away because of her stories?” Michael shouted. “Did you take her notebook? Did you read it?”

  “Michael, we’re her parents. We have every right to read—”

  “But then you know! You know she’s ever so much better than Beatrix Potter and Robert Louis Stevenson!”

  “But those are…” Mrs. Darling began. Maybe even she wasn’t sure what those were.

  Something went out of Mr. Darling.

  He collapsed onto a chair, head in his hands.

  And so the Darling house continued on in a state of uncertainty and gloom. No one would admit a mistake or a problem, but the problem presented itself readily whenever there was a button to be mended, or Nana sighed, or meal after meal was silent and somehow unsatisfying. Despite the cook and the scullery maid the house seemed darker and dirtier. Groceries weren’t bought, objects were misplaced, clothing grew ugly. No one hugged Mr. Darling in that special way daughters did; no one fell speechless at Mrs. Darling’s dress or asked to use her perfume.

  And no one wrote stories anymore.

  There, you see? Everyone was perfectly miserable, and for each day that passed in the real world, a day passed in Never Land, more or less. Though you probably have guessed that already because of the business of Peter’s shadow going missing for so long. But tell me this, since you’re such a clever reader: If Wendy ever does arrive back home, changed or unchanged from her adventures, will life go on as before? Do you really think that’s possible?

  The Darlings were beginning to think not.

  Night slowly rolled into morning as the boat drifted down the last length of the new river. The sun was warm, the rain was gone, there were no maniacal mermaids, tyrannical pirates, unknowable gods, crystalline guards, or tricksy thysolits.…Despite their pressing quest, Wendy found herself relishing the quietude. If life back in London were as fraught and dangerous as in Never Land, she shouldn’t have minded the quiet in-between days so much. A giant house with nothing to do seemed almost inviting after such travails.

  Tinker Bell did not seem to be enjoying the lull in action. She had grabbed the prow of the boat and flew hard, trying to drag it through the water faster. Wendy laughed not unkindly at the look of fierce determination on the fairy’s face and the tiny muscles popping out along her arms and base of her wings. A few sparkles of fairy dust sweated off.

  The water grew shallow and spread into a silver delta, sculpting the soft sand into a thousand scales. The banks on either side became dunes. Once again Wendy was on a beach facing the sea.

  Tinker Bell flew high up to get a better view, letting the boat go. It continued on, neither slower nor faster without her help.

  “I wish you wouldn’t get your hopes up about Peter,” Wendy began carefully. “We still have no idea at all where he is, nor any way to find him. Hook should be our main concern now. We’ll have to—”

  But Tinker Bell dove down and grabbed her hand violently. She pointed across the sand. The fairy’s eyes were the widest Wendy had ever seen, so wide they threatened to consume her face.

  There, lying nonchalantly in the curve of a coconut tree, was Peter Pan.

  “Oh,” Wendy said, her mouth making the perfect shape of the letter she spoke.

  He was unmistakable. Slender, clad in bright leafy green. Soft shoes with pointed tips. Soft hat with a red feather sticking jauntily out the back. Swooping nose. Auburn hair and extremely distinctive eyebrows. Dagger dangling from a thin belt.

  He let one hand trail languorously toward the ground and seemed to be conducting some sort of invisible orchestra with the other. His eyes were closed.

  He was so Peter Pan it was ridiculous. He was realer than real. In brighter colors than Wendy ever imagined and far greater detail. Just like a dream but more.

  “But how… ?”

  They had been chasing his ghost all over Never Land and he wound up exactly where they were headed?

  Tinker Bell was smiling devilishly.

  Part of your magic. The stories. Part of his magic. Peter Pan.

  Then she zoomed off to see him, abandoning Wendy and the boat.

  Wendy struggled with a foot that was asleep and a boat that was tippy, only clumsily managing to disembark.

  She started to haul the boat onto the beach—and then thought better of it. In Never Land one seemed to be stripped of everything: bags, modern possessions, decent clothing, ideas. Nothing material remained with anyone for long.

  “Just look at what the Lost Boys wore and sat on, and what happened with Luna,” she murmured.

  Found and then lost again. Even her own shadow.

  If they needed transport someplace else, they would improvise. Wasn’t that what Peter always did in her stories?

  Wendy pushed the boat back into the slow current and slapped it playfully on what would have been its flank.

  “You go and help someone else now. You’re free—of me, at least.”

  She watched it float away, so pretty and blue and gold like a toy, until it was safely far out in the sea.…

  And pretended she wasn’t trying to delay meeting her hero.

  With a sigh she turned and began to head for him (and Tink). She watched the prints her feet made in the sand and the trailing threads and tatters of her dress dancing around her freckled legs. Not the way she had imagined she would be dressed when she met Peter. Not that she really ever had imagined clothing in the adventures. Only the accessories: a stylish cap, a sharp sword. Everything else was ignored or assumed to be the usual; Wendy in a light blue dress, probably.

  A shadow—her shadow!—danced over the sand to her feet, daintily touching them with her own toes. Wendy felt a surge of completeness, of wa
rmth and solidity. Some exhaustion faded away.

  She kicked her feet, spraying sand and shadow sand at her shade.

  Her shadow sputtered in surprise.

  “Oh, you’re back. Lovely to see you again,” Wendy said dryly.

  The shadow pointed at Peter excitedly.

  “Yes, I know. We found him. Ourselves. No thanks to you. You didn’t even come get us once you found him. Fat lot of good you are.”

  And with that, Wendy ignored her shadow, walking with great dignity toward the palms where her friends were.

  (I’m afraid, dear reader, you can’t see how the shadow reacted to this, for Wendy very steadfastly ignored her—literally refusing to see her. And since we are living this story in Wendy’s point of view, you shall have to resort to your own imagination to decide what the shadow did.)

  Peter Pan sat up and looked at Wendy.

  The time had come to admit her wrongdoing and take her comeuppance. To begin the next part of her quest, where together the three of them would save Never Land.

  She stuck her chin out and marched up to him.

  Upon closer inspection she realized how small the boy was. Not tiny, but slender and no taller than she. Maybe even shorter. His face was very boyish—he hadn’t lost all the baby fat from his cheekbones yet, and his teeth were suspiciously small…like his adult teeth hadn’t come in yet.

  Wendy swallowed, remembering the near-romantic thoughts she used to have of him. The eager young lad looking up at her now couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen in London years. His eyes, though feral and dark, seemed somehow younger than John’s.

  “Hello, you must be Peter Pan.” Wendy covered her mixed feelings and nervousness with accent and politeness. She did not curtsy.

  “Tink here was just telling me you were going to help me find my shadow!” Peter said with a grin of undiluted happiness. His teeth sparkled and his eyes crinkled in joy.

  All misgivings and reluctance disappeared. Wendy was immediately swept up by his energy. She would do anything with him—she could tell he was the most fun person in the whole world. His games would be the best.

  “I can see you’re having trouble with your shadow, too,” he went on to say, smirking at Wendy’s. She risked a look—the shadow was pouting, arms crossed.

  “Well…wolves and shadows,” Wendy said nonchalantly. “They have their own minds and motives. What can you do?”

  “Ain’t that the truth,” Peter said with a sigh. Wendy felt her heart skip. He was commiserating with her! They were bonding! “ ’Cause say what you want about them, but it’s hard not having a shadow, you know. It really tires you right out. I was just taking a lie down here, on account of my continual exhaustion and the pains.”

  “Pains?”

  Tinker Bell and Wendy looked at each other, worried.

  “Oh, stomachaches and heart aches, like I’ve eaten too much from the snacky tree,” Peter said airily, dismissing it. “But ha, Wendy! I can’t believe it! I used to come and hear your stories…and here you are, helping me! On this beach, no less!”

  “Of course. But…what are you doing on this beach?” Wendy asked, curiosity getting the better of her—and her apology.

  “Looking for my shadow, silly! Didn’t I just say I was missing it?” he said with disgust.

  It was approaching noon, and they were close enough to whatever passed for an equator that nothing had a shadow, except for the puffed heads of the palms directly over their roots.

  And Wendy, of course, whose shadow sulked away from her on a sandy mound.

  “But…there aren’t any shadows here at all.…”

  “Exactly! So mine would stand out, right? I’d see him immediately!” Peter crowed in triumph.

  Wendy looked helplessly at Tinker Bell, unable to think of a response to this lunacy. The fairy, who had been looking up at Peter with wide eyes a moment before, a delicate hand on his, gave her a little shrug: what can you do?

  “Peter, I know where your shadow is,” Wendy said quickly, before something else stopped her from admitting the truth. “I had it. In London. I traded it for passage to Never Land.”

  And Peter Pan, for perhaps the first time in his existence, was silenced.

  Tinker Bell gave Wendy a nod and a tiny smile, pleased at her friend’s brave admission.

  “You…had it?” he finally said, trying to work it out. “In…London?”

  Wendy nodded. “You left it there. The last time you came, I suppose you surprised or upset Nana, our dog. She tried to bite you but grabbed your shadow instead, and I’m afraid she rather ripped it off of you. She didn’t mean to, really. She’s a good dog. She was just trying to protect us. I kept it all these years—folded carefully in a drawer, waiting for you to come back and fetch it.”

  “I remember now!” Peter leapt up, twirling, laughing and crowing. “That was the last place I saw him! Gosh, I haven’t been back to London at all since then! I haven’t gone back at all, not even to look! That’s strange, I searched everywhere else. I should have looked there. But Tink kept telling me…Tink kept telling me…”

  He frowned.

  Tinker Bell swallowed.

  Wendy bit her lip.

  “Tink,” Peter said, eyes glowing with rage and suspicion. “Why did you keep telling me it wasn’t there? That I shouldn’t bother looking in London, or ever going back? Didn’t you want me to find my shadow?”

  Tinker Bell wrung her hands and swayed back and forth miserably.

  I didn’t want you seeing Wendy again.

  “Wendy?” Peter demanded, confused out of his anger. “Why? What’s wrong with Wendy? Is she—is she evil?”

  No! She—I was jealous.

  “What? Jealous? Of some silly girl?”

  “I beg your pardon,” Wendy said, her eyebrows rising.

  Tinker Bell nodded woefully.

  “And you were so jealous that you were all right with me going without a shadow for the rest of my life? What kind of friend are you, Tink?”

  “She didn’t know I had the shadow,” Wendy interrupted quickly, seeing the flames in his eyes. “Not really. In fact, she came to London of her own accord to look for it, but I had already left for Never Land.”

  “Well, thank you for that,” he spat, looking wrathfully at the fairy. “It’s been like…hundreds of moons since I lost it! You’re the worst, Tink.”

  The little fairy collapsed into a crumpled ball of wings and arms and legs and began to weep.

  “Oh!” Wendy cried, scooping her up. “She made a mistake, Peter. She’s trying to make up for it. She did it because she loves you. And didn’t want to lose you.”

  “Loves… ?” Peter asked, sounding sick.

  He stuck his head close to the teary-eyed fairy.

  “Is this true, Tinker Bell? Do you…love me?”

  The fairy nodded, sparkling tears still spilling out of her eyes.

  “Well, that’s all nuts,” he swore, sitting back on his heels.

  “Shh, don’t cry, it’s all right,” Wendy murmured. The fairy tears stung and burned. For only a moment, but it was still a little unnerving. “Just give him a few minutes.”

  “And I don’t mean nuts just about the love—blech—business,” Peter continued, stomping up the beach, then spinning around and stomping back. “It’s nuts and bananas that you say that you care about me and then wait forever to go get my shadow!

  “Tinker Bell, you’re banished! For treason!”

  “Oh no, stop it! She did the wrong thing for the right reasons,” Wendy snapped. Which was incredibly strange, because here was the hero of her dreams and she was talking to him like she would Michael or John when they were being silly. “Don’t go about banishing her or whatever. Accept her apology and move on—we’re wasting precious time. There are other things going on besides reuniting you with your shadow.

  “Hook is planning to destroy Never Land as some sort of doomsday farewell gesture—he was just waiting to capture you before he carri
ed it out.”

  “Oh? All of Never Land? Destroyed?” Peter asked, surprised. “That’s huge. All right then. Tink, you’re forgiven.”

  His switch from red-faced anger to forgiveness was so abrupt—and apparently free from reflection—that Wendy felt seasick.

  I’m sorry, Tinker Bell jingled through a gap in Wendy’s fingers. Golden light spilled out around her apologetic face. She looked like a tiny Renaissance saint.

  “Apology accepted,” Peter said, nodding officiously. “Don’t do it again.”

  I never will. She said it with such warmth Wendy could feel it on her fingers.

  “Now then, what’s this about Hook wanting to destroy Never Land?” Peter asked. “I mean, he’s evil, but he’s not insane. Well, all right. He’s insane. But not that insane. If he destroys Never Land, where will he go?”

  “Right out of my stories forever,” Wendy said. “Along with the rest of you.”

  Tinker Bell shivered.

  “Well, it all seems crazy to me. So how does he plan on doing it?”

  “I don’t know—I don’t have any of the details beyond the fact that it has something to do with getting you first, maybe by using your shadow to lure you in. It’s like he wants to punish you and erase his past at the same time. And,” she added quickly, making herself say it again, clearly and aloud, “it’s my fault he has the shadow. Because as I said, I traded it to him to come here.”

  “Hm.” Peter looked her up and down as if seeing her for the first time. Reevaluating. “Yes, you are a bit old to come to Never Land the normal way. Plus, you’re a girl.”

  “A silly one, I’m told,” she said archly.

  “Exactly. At least, you were when I first started visiting you. Now you’re like…a silly young woman. Pretty clever, using my shadow as payment for passage. Even if it wasn’t yours.”

  “Thank you?” Wendy said uncertainly.

  “So wait—let me get this straight. You gave the shadow I left behind to my enemy? Crazy old codfish whose hand I took, who’s been after me ever since?”

  “Ah…yes? Yes. I did. I did that.” She cleared her throat. “I did the worst possible thing, and I’m so sorry, Peter, you don’t know how—”