Shades of Neverland (16 page)

CHAPTER
17

The Riddle of Existence

Hook!

Wendy bolted straight up in bed clutching at her chest. The dream had been so real that the shadow of pain lingered even after waking. She gasped as her hand came away from her breast wet and red. Looking down she examined the bloom of a scarlet flower on the bodice of her white nightgown. With a rising panic, she struggled to get the garment off fearing what she would find underneath.

Instead of the fatal wound from her dreams, there was a long superficial scratch diagonally across her heart. Frowning she traced the length of the injury with her finger.
Surely it had been self-inflected…hadn’t it?

As she moved to don her dressing gown, she became aware of the little thimble half still clenched in her hand. The thimble recalled to her the strange events of the previous night—Peter’s mysterious visit and even more puzzling exit. Again, she wondered what had brought him to her bedchamber in the middle of the night. If there were only some way to make a respectable inquiry after him—however, there was not a bit of propriety to be found in asking after another man mere hours before she was to be wed.

The sound of Maimie’s motorcar in the street below roused Wendy from her scheming. She reminded herself of her pledge to put away childish things, in both the literal and figurative senses, and hurried to her treasure box. She would return to the box her dear thimble and place right alongside it her girlish fancy for Peter Neverland. Then she would shut the box and embrace her duty.

This was how Maimie found Wendy. Standing over her treasure box in her dressing gown, mouth agape, gravely pale and holding a tiny porcelain thimble half in each hand.

“Dearest,” Maimie exclaimed as she hastened to her friend’s side, “are you ill?”

Wendy slowly shook her head back and forth.

“Scared? Oh, don’t worry, Wendy. It will soon be over. Marriage isn’t all bad and I have prepared you for your wedding night, which is more than was done for me. Call Old Liza and we shall start the preparations. Look, I brought quite a lovely blue garter for you to borrow—” The merry young lady paused at Wendy’s lack of response. Then inspecting her friend more closely, she grasped the significance of the thimble pieces.

“Isn’t that your mysterious sixteenth birthday present? Where on earth did you find the other half?”

Wendy shivered, whispering in an almost inaudible voice, “Peter.”

“What?” Maimie grabbed Wendy’s shoulders and turned her around to better question her. “What do you mean Peter?”

Still grave, Wendy met her friend’s narrowed eyes with her huge unblinking ones. Holding out her left hand, she explained, “Peter left this for me. I suspect he’s had it all along.”

“Where did he leave it?”

“Here. In my room.”

Maimie gasped at the shocking revelation. “Peter was in
your
bedroom? When?”

“Last night—or early this morning—I am not sure. I thought I was dreaming again. I yelled at him and he fled. He left this behind.” Wendy sank to the floor cradling both trinket halves. “Oh, Maimie, I drove him away again. I didn’t let him explain. Now I have no idea what he wanted or why he came or what
this
means.” She held up the thimble in resignation.

Deep in concentration, Maimie held out her hands for the thimble halves.
 
Wendy watched as Maimie frowned first over one, then the other, and then finally held them together. They were a perfect fit. “Call Liza!” she whispered excitedly. “You will need some writing paper and glue right away!”

Wendy felt slightly annoyed at the agitation in her friend’s demeanor. After all, she was just hours from her wedding and had every right to expect Maimie to be the calm voice of reason amidst the insanity. “Why?” she asked.

“Because, dearest, you are going to write a letter to Peter, straightaway.”

“What is the use, Maimie? To torment him? Or give myself false hopes? You said yourself all will be over soon. Today I am to be married.”

“Over my dead body!” Maimie vehemently cried. “For someone with a proclivity for the poetic, you are being frustratingly obtuse. Don’t you see it?” She held up the thimble half in her right hand. “This, Wendy, is you—ragged, incomplete, useless—and this,” She raised her left hand and the other thimble piece, “this is Peter.
He
is your other half! Together you are whole and beautiful!”

Despite the improbability of Maimie’s words, Wendy trembled with hope as their truth resonated deep inside her heart. “What if it is too late?”

“It cannot be. Don’t you see Wendy? I need to believe! I desperately need to clap my hands together and believe that love does not die. You have a chance at true bliss and you have to try for it! For all of us!”

Wendy squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her lip together as she tried to make her choice. As torn as she was between her obligation and her secret hopes, she was most afraid that upon giving in to those hopes, they would be sorely disappointed. Then she would have sacrificed her obligation for nothing. Could she risk her heart and her world for Maimie, for Peter, most of all, for herself? With a terse nod, she made her decision. “Send for the writing paper and glue, Maimie. I shall send Peter an olive branch. And then I shall prepare for my duty.”

Tick, tick, tick, tick.

The sound was steady at first.

Tick, tick, tick, tick.

Then the noise began to stutter.

Tick…t-tick…t-
ti
-
ck

Like a clock running down and coming to a halt, it stopped. He could no longer hear it coming. Peter was filled with dread then. Something was about to get them—something predatory and silent. No more warning. And time was running out...

Peter awkwardly awoke on the bench in Victoria Station with the most acute sense of foreboding. He hadn’t meant to doze much less dream. In actuality, dreaming would have been a relief; the relentless nightmares that visited him instead were terrifying.

Still smarting from the night’s folly, he had crept home like a thief in the night to pack his bag and pen a quick letter to Griffin. Then he had slunk off to the railway station, to hide and await the morning train to Wales. Sometime near daybreak, he must have drifted off to sleep.

This is how Griffin found Peter. Stomach in knots, slumped over on a bench with his head in his hands. Fear for Wendy’s safety blanketing his body in a cold sweat.

“Peter,” Griffin gasped. Out of breath from running, he was unable to say more.

“I’m sorry Griffin,” Peter said instantly chagrined. “I did something foolish and I snuck away in the middle of the night because I was embarrassed to face you. Can you forgive me?”

“No, Peter—” Griffin paused again to raggedly draw in air.

Misunderstanding his brother’s haste, Peter answered, “I don’t blame you, brother. There is nothing that can excuse how badly I have behaved. It is better for all if I just go.”

“No, Peter.” Griffin held out a small package. “This—came—for—you.”

Peter took the package from his brother frowning at his name scrawled across the front in elegant script. He was used to the admiration of females and the lavish gifts they would sometimes send to gain his notice, but his brother, understandably, was not. “Griffin, really. You came all the way here for this?”

“I came—for you—Peter. The messenger said—it was—from—Miss—Wendy Darling.”

Peter froze. His eyes were huge and his hands trembled slightly as he slowly opened the parcel. Inside were an envelope and a small object in wrapping tissue. As he opened the letter and read the few lines, his face turned white as a sheet. Then he edged open the tissue with a soft groan. His eyes conveyed the agony of a thousand tragedies as he held the object out for his brother to examine.

Peter saw the recognition on his brother’s face. “Your talisman—restored—what does it mean Peter?”

“Don’t you see Griffin? She is my other half. Wendy is the riddle of my existence!”

Just then, a clock chimed, startling Peter and recalling to him his nightmare.
Time is running out
, he thought. Then he remembered Wendy was to be married. “I have to get to Wendy! Do you know from which church she marries today?”

“Aye Peter, but we may already be too late.”

“No.” He shook his head back and forth, his jaw hard set in determination. Something about the talisman made whole allowed the arrogant Peter of old to reunite with his more mature doubt-riddled self. Peter’s lost boy, now resurfaced, gave him the confidence needed to pursue a single and reckless course of action. “If I have to, I will forbid the banns.”

“Peter.” His brother took him by the shoulders to better face him. “Don’t be rash. Think of Wendy’s place in society. It will not do for you to make a scene—for you or her.”

Peter waved the thimble at him. “I
have
to believe we are meant for happiness in this life—that we are destined to find our other half and be made whole. Don’t you see brother? I have to
believe
!” His words, so genuine and spoken with such passion, swayed the elder brother instantly.

“Come on then,” Griffin replied, “We must hurry.”

“No, Griffin,” Peter cried breaking into a full-fledged run. “We have to fly!”

CHAPTER
18

The Neverland Breaks Through

If Peter comes and gives me a kiss, I will not go through with it!

This is what Wendy told Maimie in her bedroom then repeated to herself only minutes before her father had walked her down the aisle. She repeated it again now—like a mantra.

The hideous nightmare from the previous night—the one where James turned into the horrible hook-handed pirate captain, the one where he claimed her as his own despite her protests—seemed to be a bad omen. However, she had also had the other dream—the lovely one with boy, her salvation, in her room beckoning…
Come away, come away!

She pinched herself to be sure she was not dreaming still. Dressed in white with a pink sash, standing most solemnly atop the holy altar, the sharp pain inflicted by her own hand convinced her that the wedding was, indeed, happening.

How she wished she were still in her bed!

She thought of the thimble halves again. What had they been trying to tell her?
At Maimie’s urging she had repentantly glued the halves together and sent them by messenger back to Peter with a note that simply said
you will always have my heart!
Her olive branch. James might have her obligation, her duty, but the keeping of her heart she entrusted to Peter alone.

While the vicar spoke most eloquently, extolling the virtues of marriage, Wendy made a miserable attempt of convincing herself that marriage to James was her first choice and, indeed, something she wanted. She had tried to grow up, to make the correct decisions and appease those around her. But when she examined her heart, the tiny seed of Peter that had taken residence there was impossible to uproot. It would always live inside of her, sheltered and waiting to blossom with the merest of encouragement.

A slight commotion at the back of the chapel caught Wendy’s straying attention. As she turned to look, hope began thumping wildly in her chest. At the far end of the aisle stood a solemn, vaguely familiar looking dark-haired man and coming purposefully down the aisle, his burning emerald eyes fastened on her, was Peter Neverland.

She felt her throat tighten and the color rise to her cheeks. So far he had escaped the notice of the congregation but as he approached the front, she knew for certain that would change.
Guide me
, she prayed not to God or the Heavens, but to her inner self.

Wendy fought to control the blush that threatened to engulf her. What should she do? She had her family to think of, her duty as a daughter, and her obligation to society.

Halfway down the aisle Aunt Mildred stood, inserting herself between Peter and the ceremony at front. They exchanged words in low tones. Anger at the old woman’s interference caused Wendy to burn. How dare the old woman presume to speak to him on her behalf?

Act Wendy!

The voice was at first low, then growing in pitch and urgency from deep inside of her until it would not be ignored.
Act!
In a last desperate attempt, the brave Wendy was trying to make herself heard. Suddenly desperate to hear what was being said, it became more important to Wendy than any impropriety on her part and before she knew it, her choice was made.

Slowing moving up the aisle toward her heart’s desire, she stopped just short of her meddlesome aunt. “Aunt Mildred?” she inquired.

“Wendy,” the old woman gasped. “Really you shouldn’t have troubled yourself. The boy just wanted to give you a wedding gift. Go back to James,” she hissed quietly. “I will take care of it for you.”

But with the brave Wendy at her side, she didn’t budge. “I think you have taken care of quite enough. Please stand aside so that I can hear what Mr. Neverland has come to say.”

Knowing all eyes were on her, Wendy glared until the old woman retreated with a fish-like frown. Then, there was only Peter, standing in front of her, his intense eyes boring two holes into her soul. He looked at her expectantly.

Wendy felt the color in her cheeks deepen and spread under his agonizing stare. She looked down. “You have a gift for me?” she asked shyly, dipping her head.

“A thimble,” Peter said gravely holding out his little hand to show her the recently restored porcelain trinket. “Now shall I give it to you?”

“If you wish to,” said Wendy keeping her head erect this time.

Peter stepped forward to close the gap between them. His one hand held out the gift while the other brushed her hip on its way to the small of her back so that he could pull her close to him.

Peter
thimbled
her.

Never in history was there a sweeter, tenderer “thimble”. The caress of his lips across hers was electric. Her mouth began to dance with his and she opened to him without thinking. He deepened their kiss, and the chapel with all of its onlookers disappeared as the Neverland broke through.
 
In all truth, the island was looking for them as a million golden arrows flashed pointing the way. Not at all like a dream, details came rushing back with certain clarity as adventure quickened their veins.

At once Wendy recalled who Peter was and what she had once been to him.

Wendy’s mouth was full of thimbles. As Peter took every one of them, the Neverland again woke into life. The seething island came surging back in vivid images. He knew it all then, the lagoon, Hook, the lost boys,
Tink
and most of all his own Wendy. Taking her sweet face between his hands, he murmured, “My Wendy—my own.”

Her surprised eyes fastened on his and he knew his Wendy remembered him as well. “Oh, Peter!” she exclaimed. “You’ve come back!”

His finger traced a line down the tip of her nose. “You’ve forgotten how to fly,” he admonished.

“And you, Peter—” She ran her fingers along the shadow of his jaw feeling the stubble of his whiskers. “You’ve become a man.”

His chest thumped as he remembered that fateful night in the garden. “You promised me you wouldn’t grow up.”

“I couldn’t help it.” She was smiling at it all, but they were wet smiles.

Giving a single anguished nod, Peter pressed his lips together, confessing, “I became a man because of you, Wendy.”

Her eyes widened and she gasped with feeling at some recrimination he did not intend. “No, Peter!”

“
Shhh
, dearest,” he soothed, caressing her downy cheek.
 
“I wanted to grow up—to become a man for you. You are my own… I love you, Wendy.”

“I love you, too, Peter. I always have.”

The conversation would have continued as such except for a peculiar noise that cut through the moment. Clearing his throat, Mr. Darling stood behind them looking quite cross.
 
At his side, although not quite so formidable, stood his lovely wife, Mrs. Darling.
 

As Wendy turned to face them, Peter’s hands moved to encircle her waist in a protective embrace. “Mother, Father,” she said looking from one to the other. “This is Peter.”

Mr. Darling was red-faced. “Now see here—” he upbraided.

Mrs. Darling, however, stayed her husband with a gentle hand on his forearm. There was something in the right-hand corner of her mouth that wanted her not to call Peter names. “Your Peter?” she asked in surprise.

Wendy nodded happily. “You see, I gave my heart to Peter so long ago that I had quite forgotten about it until this very moment. I am terribly sorry but I simply cannot marry James.”

Mr. Darling wanted to say something about that and would have, had not his clever wife intervened on the lovers’ behalf. “How romantic, George dear,” she remarked to her husband. Then, although it bore no resemblance, she observed, “It reminds me of the story of you and I. Surely you would not begrudge your only daughter the same happiness that we have known.”

Mrs. Darling’s skill of stroking her husband’s vanity and wrapping him around her little finger at the same time had only sharpened throughout their married life. She now played Mr. Darling like a virtuoso. Not wanting to offend his wife’s romantic sensibilities, he replied, “Not at all, my dear. Not at all.” He then offered his hand to Peter in a magnanimous gesture.

But what of Wendy’s husband to be? Where was the intended groom during these surprising developments?

James Christopher
Whitby
III, waited at the altar for the others to decide his fate. Being of blue blood, he was incapable of showing bad form, so rather than cause a scene, he placidly waited taking comfort in the thought that what was meant to happen would come to pass. When the dashing young stranger approached holding Wendy fast to his side, he stiffened his upper lip in anticipation. The stranger then said something terribly smart about destiny and true love and James could not help but agree.

With a nod he turned to regard his almost bride-to-be, his eyes soft as periwinkle. “Of course,” he muttered. “I see it now. That part of Wendy that I was missing. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t capture it. Now I understand that it was never meant for me.”

Then showing the very pinnacle of good form, James released Wendy of her obligation and wishing the couple well, took his leave with relatives in tow.

Mr. Darling, being an economical sort of fellow, remarked how it would be a shame to waste a perfectly good wedding which he had already expensed. So, with great joy and the slightest pretense of coercion, Peter and Wendy were married that same hour. Griffin cheered; Maimie wept; and even disagreeable Aunt Mildred, presumably to save face, toasted the couple’s good health.

Just like the thimble restored, Peter and Wendy slumbered that night as husband and wife, complete in each other’s embrace. Together at last in their dreams, they danced through the Neverland surrounded by the twinkling of a thousand fairies. They were a perfect fit and pen cannot adequately describe the happy scene, over which we now draw a veil.