Chapter 7 When Shadows Speak #2
He drags a hand through his hair, expression unreadable. “In truth, Wendy… I broke when you left. And Neverland—” his voice falters, “—it fractured with me.”
I blink at him, unsure what he means. How could a place break?
He keeps talking, quieter now. “I missed you. It was empty here with just me and the Lost Boys. The magic lost its taste. Youth lost its meaning. I tried to fill the hole you left by bringing other girls here…”
The words hit like a blow. My heart clenches painfully. Other girls. I can’t stop the hurt that blooms razor-edged and immediate in my chest.
“How many?” I ask before I can stop myself.
The question hangs between us, brittle as glass.
Peter glances sideways at me, his tone deceptively calm. “Enough to realize none of them could compare to you.” His eyes soften slightly. “So I made a choice. I sent the Lost Boys back to the mortal world. And I decided to grow up too. For you.”
The words burn through me. He grew up for me?
And yet… he still hasn’t answered the question. How many was enough?
“Peter—”
“I became your shadow,” he says, cutting me off. “Every night you dreamed of me—and I know you did, Wendy.” His voice roughens, almost tender. “I heard you calling my name to the stars.”
His green eyes lock onto mine, unrelenting, daring me to deny it.
I don’t. Because he’s right. But I don’t tell him that in my dreams, he wasn’t the same Peter Pan.
He was a monster.
“I was there,” he continues, voice low and fervent. “Feeding on your longing just to keep myself sane. Waiting for that ache to consume you. To turn into desire.”
A shiver runs through me. “I knew I felt you,” I whisper. A fleeting relief flares first, before something darker takes its place. For so long, I’d wondered if I was losing my mind. And all that time, he was there. Watching. Letting me doubt myself.
“Sometimes it was me,” he says. “Sometimes only my shadow.” He pauses, a faint, knowing grimace ghosting across his lips. “Or Tink.”
My chest tightens.
Tinker Bell.
An involuntary shiver rolls through me. How many times had I woken in the night, feeling watched, never realizing who it was? How many near-death moments had brushed past me, her jealousy flickering just beyond the corner of my eye?
He watches me, gaze sharp, like he knows exactly where my thoughts have gone.
“She was on her best behavior, Wendy,” he says softly. “And besides, I can’t stray too far from Neverland for long. I didn’t have a choice.”
My brows draw together. “But then… how did you grow up? I thought Neverland is what keeps you from aging.”
Peter shrugs, looking away. “I willed it.”
I blink. “You willed it?”
He runs a hand through his tousled hair, still avoiding my gaze. “It got harder to stay away from you once the mortal boys started noticing how beautiful you were becoming,” he says, dodging the question again.
Beneath his words thrums something dark—jealousy—possessive and unrepentant. A sickening realization curls in my gut.
“You hurt them,” I whisper. “Didn’t you?”
Peter smiles, slow and feral. No shame. Not even a flicker of regret. “You were mine the moment you set foot in Neverland,” he says. “Did you really think I’d let anyone else touch you?”
A slow burn of hurt and anger coils beneath my ribs, rising until it scalds. “You hospitalized some of them,” I say. “They said I was cursed. Boys avoided me like I carried the plague.”
His eyes harden, that vivid green darkening to forest shadow. “I did what needed to be done.”
“You’re insane, Peter!” The words tear from my throat before I can stop them. I don’t care what he’ll do, I want him to feel it. My anger.
Betrayal festers, thorned and twisting, wrapping tight around my ribs. He abandoned me, yet he admits he heard me whispering his name in the dark like a prayer—and still decided no one else could touch me?
In an instant, he’s on me, shoving me down onto the blanket. The air leaves my lungs in a rush.
“If I’m insane,” he snarls, “you made me this way.” His face is inches from mine, twisted with fury.
“I was happy. Carefree. Before you.” His voice breaks, low and ragged.
“Don’t you think I know I’m sick, Wendy?
You live under my skin like a poison. You haunt me.
Every thought, every dream—there you are. ”
He exhales, the anger faltering just enough to reveal something else beneath it—regret, maybe. Shame.
“Even my shadow…” He stops, the words dying in his throat. His jaw tightens, and he glares down at me.
I don’t flinch. I meet his rage with my own. “How dare you blame me?” I spit, my voice trembling with something beyond anger. “You brought me here. You made me feel alive. And then you abandoned me.”
“You told me you wanted to grow up,” he fires back. “Did you forget?”
“Yes, but…” The words crumble, fury giving way to grief. “I missed you,” I choke out. “I called for you. And now you tell me you were there the whole time? Watching? Ignoring me?”
The truth cuts deeper than any blade. My chest aches, my cursed heart splintering down the middle. Because in that moment, I see him clearly—the boy I love and the man he’s become. Cruel. Possessive. Broken.
And still, I love him.
I know how this story ends. Because love like this doesn’t heal. It devours.
And loving Peter Pan will destroy me.
I can feel it already—that inevitable ending to our story.
Tragedy.
Tears spill hot down my cheeks. The anger fades from Peter’s eyes in an instant. He leans down slowly, the predator changing tactics, and licks a tear from my skin.
“I told you,” he murmurs against my cheek. “Your tears only make me want to taste them.”
I shudder in his arms, a sob catching in my throat. I feel wrecked—emotionally gutted, mentally frayed from everything I’ve endured in barely twenty-four hours.
I shove Peter away from me, and miraculously, he lets me. Trembling, I rise to my feet, breath shuddering in my chest.
“Can I still fly, Peter?” I ask, voice barely more than a rasp.
He watches me like I’m something wild, an animal cornered, unpredictable. His shoulders are tense, his expression unreadable.
“Wendy—” he begins.
“Can I still fly?” I scream.
Something in him falters. His shoulders sag, and for a moment, he almost looks human. Defeated.
“I doubt it,” he says quietly. “You grew up.”
The words hit like a fist to the sternum.
You grew up.
They echo in my head, cruel and final. Everything inside me goes still.
All my life, I dreamed of coming back here, to Neverland, where time couldn’t touch me.
Where magic waited at the edge of every heartbeat.
But standing here now, I understand the truth: nothing stays untouched by time.
Not even this place. The Neverland I remember was bright and wild and full of promise.
But now it feels older. Sadder. The stars don’t sing like they used to.
Even the air seems heavier, as if the island itself mourns what it lost when I left. And I mourn with it.
I take a step back. Then another. The cliff’s edge looms behind me, wind tugging at my hair.
“Wendy, stop,” Peter warns, his voice tight.
I shake my head, tears streaming freely now. “I have to try. I have to know.”
My heel finds open air. I hesitate only a heartbeat—then I fall.
Wind roars past my ears, tangling my hair into a wild halo. I spread my arms, trying to remember the feeling, the rush, the weightlessness, the joy that used to lift me. I reach for it. For the laughter, the sunlight, a wish granted by the stars.
But it’s harder now than when I was young. My happy thoughts have shadows. Every memory that once glowed with magic now carries the ache of what followed—my parents’ worry, my loneliness, Peter’s absence.
I think of him, and even that hurts.
Peter was right.
I can’t fly.
His arms come around me, catching me midair. The impact knocks the breath from my lungs. We’re flying again—no, he’s flying—hauling me back toward the cliff. But my heart is still plummeting even as my body rises.
He sets me down hard on the blanket, his body braced over mine, chest heaving, anger rolling off him in waves.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” he roars. “Are you insane?”
I stare up at him, strangely calm. The fury, the grief, the fear—they’ve all burned out. What’s left feels hollow, scorched clean.
“I had to see for myself,” I whisper.
He lets out a disbelieving laugh, harsh and humorless. “I swear, Wendy, if you ever pull something like that again, I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” I cut in softly, holding his gaze. Even I’m startled by the steel in my voice.
Peter doesn’t answer. He just glares down at me, breathing hard, his fury unraveling into something quieter—confusion, maybe. Hurt. For a long moment, there’s only the hollow echo of our rage and the pounding of our hearts.
And then—something shifts.
The emptiness inside me begins to twist, to take shape. What fills its place isn’t grief or anger. It’s heat.
A slow, unforgiving fire.
My body doesn’t seem to know the difference between fear and desire, not when he’s this close, not when his scent and warmth and presence press in around me, suffocating in a way I crave.
Desire burns through me, cruel and molten, flooding my veins. I clutch the blanket like a lifeline to keep from reaching for him. To keep from dragging him down and crushing my mouth to his.
The air goes still. A beat of unbearable tension crackles between us.
And then—he devours me.
His mouth crashes into mine, swallowing my gasp.
He drinks it in like he’s been starving, and maybe he has.
There’s no tenderness. No restraint. Just a violent clashing of mouths and hunger.
His teeth catch my lower lip and bite down, hard enough to sting.
I cry into him, but he doesn’t pull away.
He licks the blood from my lip like honey, then plunders deeper.
His tongue claims me with a relentless possessiveness that has me moaning. He kisses me with the same rhythm I know he’ll use when he finally takes my virginity: dominant, demanding, unyielding. I try to keep up, but he overwhelms me, drowns me in sensation.
My hands find his shoulders, then his hair, fisting the copper strands as I open to him, shamelessly kissing him back like it’s the last breath I’ll ever take.
My legs part without thought, body arching toward his, wordlessly begging for more.
I hate him. I crave him. I want to belong to him.
I know this will ruin me.
And still—
I love him.