Upstairs, Gwen and Jay had not known that anything was wrong until the music went off. Their moment of confusion was resolved when they heard the loud officer’s intimidating voice booming orders below. Although they could not hear what he was saying, the situation sent Jay’s attention straight away to the window. He saw the cop car was parked alongside the street, confirming his worst fears.
“Shit, shit, SHIT!” he swore. “It’s the goddamn cops.” He ran his hand over his head and then buried his face in it. “Shit,” he muttered once more.
Gwen had gotten used to impossible, dangerous things happening, but this seemed so beyond impossible. A surreal thought occurred to her. It wasn’t that long ago that she’d run into a couple of police officers. “What police?” she quietly asked.
“The police!” Jay sat back down on his bed. “The goddamn police.”
Gwen went to the window for herself, only to see a black-and-white patrol car that was strangely devoid of any local insignia.
Heavy footsteps came up the stairs. “Anybody up here? Everybody needs to get downstairs now,” an authoritative voice called.
Gwen realized her newsprint burn was nakedly exposed on her arm. “My sweater!” she gasped. Her head twisted as she searched her immediate vicinity for it. Where did she drop it when she took it off? “Where’s my sweater?”
Jay didn’t have an answer—his own concerns were weighing too heavily on his mind to consider Gwen’s chaos, and she was too flustered to realize the cardigan had simply slipped off his bed and fallen under.
There was a single, sharp rap immediately before the door began to open. Gwen grabbed a zippered sweatshirt off Jay’s chair and threw it on as quickly as she possibly could.
The officer opened the bedroom door to find a high school boy sitting on the bed and a girl hurriedly dressing. He stood in the doorway, hand still on the knob as he held the door open. His skin was only as dark as his light brown eyes, and the crease in his forehead was painfully deep as he angrily knit his brow.
“You two need to go downstairs now. Is there anybody else here?”
“No,” Jay answered.
Gwen felt her newsprint burn searing, as if her fear was manifesting into physical pain. The mark was safely hidden in the oversized sleeve of Jay’s grey sweatshirt.
“We’re looking for a missing child,” the officer told them.
Jay’s fear was broken briefly by his confusion. “There aren’t any kids here.”
“We know that there is one. Now get downstairs with the others.”
“Yes, sir.”
The officer stood over them menacingly as they walked out, and then left down the hall to check the other rooms.
As the two of them passed the family portrait at the top of the stairs, Gwen heard a groggy, muted buzzing. She saw Jay’s cup, still on the hall table, and tipsy Dillweed nearly passed out within. “Oh no,” she muttered. She stopped and grabbed the cup.
“What’s the matter?” Jay then added, “Aside from the obvious.”
“I’ll be right down,” Gwen told him. When he seemed reluctant to leave her, Gwen insisted, “Just go! Before you get in more trouble!”
Gwen knew she had to get Dillweed out of the house before one of the officers found him. Jay had no inclination of what was going on, and Gwen could not possibly explain it to him, even as he looked at her with those understanding, desiring blue eyes of his. He was in enough trouble as it was, and he did not try to reason with Gwen. “See you down there,” he said dismally, knowing she would end up lined up downstairs with the rest of them sooner or later.
“See you,” Gwen whispered as he turned his back to her and marched down the stairs.
She pulled Dillweed out of the cup, his body dripping with golden, reeking beer. He was limp in her hand, and his glow was nearly out. Whatever fruity drinks he indulged in at home could not compare to the raw, intoxicating force of hard liquor and beer. She couldn’t simply get him to the window: he wouldn’t be able to fly in this condition. Gwen didn’t have a plan as she rushed back to Jay’s room.
Before she could get the door open, she saw the officer’s shadow round the bend in the hall. Silently gasping, she froze and waited for him to catch her with a fairy in her palm.
But the officer never came.
The shadow slipped down off the wall and onto the floor. The officer was nowhere in sight. The disembodied shadow approached a locked door, moving of its own volition. Gwen didn’t move an inch, and the two-dimensional shadow did not seem to notice her. Flat as a sheet of paper and dark as the night, it seamlessly slipped under the door, exploring the other bedroom without ever unlocking it.
Terrified, Gwen finally opened Jay’s bedroom and slipped inside, her mind a hurried mess of thoughts. Everything else preoccupying her, she had forgotten that they had not closed the window, but rather left it open to the starry night and all that flew through it.
In the middle of the room, his dagger drawn, Peter stood with a truculent smile thin on his lips.
“Peter!”
“Gwenny!”
They spoke over each other, their exclamations pure chaos and surprise. Peter’s slight smile vanished, and he lowered his dagger. Gwen’s heart rose, and a flicker of hope ignited within her. Hollyhock was safe on his shoulder, trilling at the sight of unconscious Dillweed in Gwen’s hand.
“Dillweed!” Gwen exclaimed, unable to find words to explain his condition as she held him out for Peter to see.
Peter sheathed his dagger, taking the intoxicated fairy in both his hands. “I do believe in fairies,” he announced, his enthusiasm booming in a somber tone. “I do believe in fairies.”
“I do believe in fairies,” Gwen declared, before announcing it again, perfectly in time with Peter. “I do believe in fairies!”
Dillweed’s glow dimly returned. Hollyhock zipped over to take his hands and help pull him up. He got to his wings shakily, and his fellow fairy helped support him as his wings beat irregularly.
“There are police here! They’re looking for a lost chi—”
“Hollyhock told me they followed you here,” Peter interrupted. “I have to go.”
There was cold hurt in his eyes, and Gwen burned with guilt. Hollyhock and Dillweed found this peril by following her to the party. She was the reason that Peter himself was now in this house, magic-hunting officers in the rooms below and beside him. It was all her fault, and she was embarrassed to be found here. What she had abandoned Neverland for was now on display. Peter could see clearly what she was trading him for, and she wanted to scream that it couldn’t compare, that she didn’t want to be at some drunken party with synthesized music and girls in tiny, sequined dresses. It was just where she belonged. It had nothing to do with… everything. Everything else that she loved and enjoyed and wanted to wrap herself up in, the same way he did.
“Watch out!” Peter yelled, pushing Gwen back and stepping in front of her protectively as someone else entered the room.
But the door had not opened. She gasped and tripped backward, landing on the bed, as the shadow slithered into the room from under the door.
Peter was already in the air. “Fly!” he furiously yelled. “It needs surfaces!”
Once again, Gwen was too panicked to find the happiness she needed to float her up to safety. The shadow saw this and darted liquidly toward her. Gwen yelped and pushed herself back further on the bed, afraid of the thin monster on the floor. The shadow slipped halfway up onto the bed and took hold of her ankle in a tight, opaque hold. She couldn’t wrestle herself out of its grip. She couldn’t flee a shadow.
Peter pulled his dagger out of its sheath with a courageous quickness. Rather than use it to attack the bodiless monster, Peter threw it up into the air and stepped aside. It twirled up into the air and fell back down, driving its sharp point into the carpet, but not before Peter had snatched its shadow off the wall.
The shady shape of a dagger in his hand, Peter drove it with all his force onto the fo
ot of the shadow, nailing it down to the carpet. The black creature recoiled in pain, letting go of Gwen’s foot. Peter grabbed his shadow-less dagger and put it away before sweeping Gwen up into his arms so they could hover safely away from the trapped blackness.
A moment of clarity struck Gwen. All feeling, all fear, left her as she looked into Peter’s forest-green eyes. She felt his heart beating through his chest; it pounded as hard as hers.
“Can you fly now?” he asked.
Gwen held Peter’s gaze and felt herself growing light. She pushed away from him, but kept holding his hand for support. Flying was easy, he’d said. You just had to think of happy things. Looking into his eyes, Gwen had no shortage of happy thoughts. She felt that she could fly to the moon and beyond, to the stars and further, if Peter stayed beside her.
No one else gave her this lighthearted joy. Other people could fill her heart with wonderful feelings, maybe even better feelings, but no one else gave this childish joy that Peter did. Was this what she wanted?
The shadow thrashed below. Suddenly, someone pounded at the door. Gwen wasn’t sure she even had a choice anymore.
“Are you staying here?” Peter asked. He looked at her, and his eyes held a confusion that boarded on painful.
It was a question, but it demanded more than an answer. It demanded a decision. The conflicted and melancholy organ she called a heart was of no use to her. It was trying to pull her down two radically different paths at the same time. Gwen felt herself coming apart at the seams that she thought defined her. Her wide eyes begged direction from Peter, but as magical as he was, he couldn't give her an answer. Like so much of Neverland, he could only pose a question.
The shadow twisted itself free from the shadow-dagger that had impaled it. Peter jerked his hand out of Gwen’s as he watched it vanish. In a flash, the dark silhouette was across the floor and rising up onto the door. With its dark fingers, it twisted the lock, and then slipped back under the crack beneath it. The officer burst in, shadow and all.
The room was empty. All that remained was the shadow of a dagger stuck in the floor. His suspects had already flown off, hand in hand, to hide themselves somewhere beyond horizons. They were happily lost in the magical impossibility of the night.
He went to the window, but all he saw were the stars twinkling with victorious laughter.
Rosie La Puma, for being the best first reader I could hope to have. Margaret May Hubert, for the use of her most beautiful and adventurous name. My parents, for making sure that if I had to grow up, at least I came out weird. Craig Franklin, for being a phenomenal critique partner. Grant Faulkner and the NaNoWriMo team of 2013, for a wonderful month and first draft. Andrew Todhunter and the Stanford Creative Writing Society, for all the advice and encouragement. Mr. Rockwood, for turning me into a lean, mean, dream-chasing machine. And Alison Leonard, for fifteen years of friendship and first lending me her copy of Peter Pan.
Audrey Greathouse is a lost child in a perpetual and footloose quest for her own post-adolescent Neverland. Originally from Seattle, she earned her English B.A. from Southern New Hampshire University’s online program while backpacking around the west coast and pretending to be a student at Stanford. A pianist, circus artist, fire-eater, street mime, swing dancer, and novelist, Audrey wears many hats wherever she is. She has grand hopes for the future which include publishing more books and owning a crockpot. You can find her at audreygreathouse.com
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If you've enjoyed The Neverland Wars we recommend you also check out Nora & Kettle by Lauren Nicolle Taylor. Enjoy this exclusive excerpt here.
1. WINGS
NORA
If I had wings, they would be black, thin, and feathered. Not a flat color… but iridescent. Shining with hues of purple, green, and blue. Catching the light with the barest fingertips. And when I needed, I could fold into the darkest shadows and hide.
This time between the dark and the dawn is mine.
I roll from my bed and slip quietly across the floor, avoiding the creaks in a shadowy dance no one will ever see. My ears tune to the nonexistent noises around me and I sigh, ghostlike, with relief. Because in this time, he sleeps.
A snap of a memory flashes through my mind and body as I feel the sharp, short cracks delivered this time. This time.
I ease the dresser drawer out, holding my breath as tiny splinters catch the sides, and reach underneath the lace and silk to the boys’ pants hidden beneath. Quickly, I slide them on, my bruises objecting as I bend to fasten them. Tucking the ends of my nightdress into the waist, I pad to the window.
Across from our brownstone, one light shines dimly through a dirty window. Someone leaving for or returning from a shift; a refrigerator light; something simple and easy. I crinkle my nose and think, Of all the hundreds of people who live in that apartment building, how is it that only one solitary light shines? I quirk my lips into an unsure smile, a new split stinging as it stretches apart. This is why it is my time.
Bending and flexing my legs, I take a deep breath and push the window ajar. It protests, groaning as I push my torso out and use my back to push it up. Settling on the windowsill, I close it down, pulling a small comb from my pocket and wedging it in the gap so I can get back in.
Perched like a bat ready to launch into the night, my eyes dart to the corner of the building, to the rickety fire escape that would be much easier to climb. A car light bends over the gaps in the iron and fans out like the punch in a comic book. Wham! I snigger to myself, the laugh seeming foreign, jarring. I’m not supposed to laugh. I’m a sad girl, with a sad life.
But it is my life, and tonight… I’m going to fly.
I face my window and grasp the drainpipe that runs the length of the building. Staring up at the sky for a moment, I search out my destination. The one error in the building, which grates on him, invites me. One beam they forgot to trim sits out from the wall like a pirate ship plank. I dig my bare toes into the worn spaces between the bricks and climb.
I’m a shadow taped to the wall, scaling the pipe in solid but fast movements. Breathing hard and forgetting everything. The sky and the stars hang around just for me. They cling to the fading darkness, and I let them spark my senses. The night air closes in like the wings of a crow, folding over, protecting and gifting me something I lack. I pass the window of our sleeping neighbors and shake my head. They won’t hear me.
I breathe in deeply. Car exhaust films the air but it lightens, sweetens, as I climb. Overhead, the plank casts a cool shadow over the building, lengthening as the moon starts to dip away and the sun coaxes the sky into pinks and oranges. My time is only minutes. My mind is only on the hands pulling me up and the legs stabilizing me.
I dig my toes into the brackets holding the pipe. It cuts in, but my skin is toughening through scars crisscrossing over other scars. I throw my head back, my hair wisping and sticking to my cheeks. Sweat makes my grip slippery. It takes more concentration, more strength to hold on, but that’s why I like it. This risk sends flickers through my heart; pinprick lights like the points of a star. It keeps something beating that could be dead, should be dead. But I can’t let it.
I won’t.
The pipe trembles under my weight, the screws wriggle in their brackets, and I hold tighter. Moving faster up, up, up, until I reach the beam. I link my hands together around the plank, the dry wood soaking up some of my sweat.
This part, the upside-down part… I love.
I hug the beam and creep my feet up the wall until I can wrap my legs around it, swinging like a raccoon on a telephone wire. My head drops down and I stare out at the inverted city, the skyscrapers hanging from the earth like stalactites, dripping their lights into the clouds and piercing the sky. One shake and the people would spill from their locked-in positions, sprinkling like pepper into the atmosphere.
Just float away.
Light as air… I want to be a speck carried by the wind.
I push back to sitting, my legs dangling, my chest filled to bursting with cleaner air, the flames of sunrise singeing the top of my head.
If I had wings… They’d need to be strong enough…
Closing my eyes as the round edge of the sun pokes above the horizon, I spread my arms wide. I let the small breeze flutter under my limbs, cool my skin, and free my hair.
If I had wings, I could fly.
2. ACCIDENTS
NORA
Paths are usually stamped-out, well-defined things. They’re like that for a reason. They point toward a way through. They are hope in a lost place.
My path is patchy, indeterminate, and young. Thousands of feet have not walked this path. Although, sadly, I know some have.
The sun splits the willowy curtains into strands of green and cream, dancing over each other with the breeze. Groggily, I blink and watch the delicate performance, unwilling to move and waiting for the pain to set in. Branches tap out a Morse-code message on the window. I flinch, mistaking it for sharp knuckles rapping on my door. A dull ache courses through my stomach and pins itself to my back, wishing me good morning.
I carefully straighten under the covers, pointing my toes and testing my limbs. I’m okay. These wounds are ordinary. Nothing I haven’t dealt with before.
Through the narrow crack of my bedroom door sails the ordinary clatter of the morning—spoons rattling in empty bowls as they are thrown in the sink and a copper kettle whistling, high-pitched and impatient. That new Perry Como song plays on the radio, my mother’s humming sounding like nails on a chalkboard in my sore head. I wait. Sure enough, halfway through the song, his controlled, sharp-as-icepicks footsteps cross the kitchen and the radio squeals across the bands to classical music. I clasp my head with both hands at the squeal and then the twanging violins.
The Neverland Wars Page 24