Chapter 13
Chapter
Thirteen
Fairies have to be one thing or the other, because being so small they unfortunately have room for only one feeling at a time.
Isit at the kitchen table, my usual plate full of neverberries in front of me.
The men bustle around and claim to be making waffles.
The berries are great, but I’d absolutely do a murder for a waffle right now.
My clothes are warm and dry, and I don’t seem to have any negative effects from being out in the rain yesterday.
Even so, I have another pounding headache that feels like someone’s chiseling the bone between my eyes.
And I had dreams, bad ones. I woke several times to find the fire still stoked and crackling beside me, but each time I fell back asleep, I dreamed of dark forms rising from the ground, all of them trying to drag me down with them.
“You all right?” Coy asks, his tone apologetic, as the table chatter dies down.
He hadn’t met my eyes last night, and he’d left the room as soon as my story was done.
“I’m okay. Are you?”
“All good. I’m sorry about yesterday. I never should’ve taken you to town.” He shakes his head.
“I liked town. It was just the Guardians we didn’t plan on.”
“He knows to never risk you like that again.” Peter’s voice falls between us like a guillotine. “Isn’t that right, Coy?”
“Yes, of course.” Coy drops his gaze.
Foy leans over and whispers something in his brother’s ear, and the chatter at the table starts up again.
I rub my forehead and wonder how long I’ve been here.
Technically, I think it’s only been a few days, but with no sun, I have no solid number to go by.
I wonder if anyone at school has even missed me.
Then again, if time works strangely in Neverland, does that mean I’ve only been gone for a short time?
Or maybe it means I’ve been gone for even longer than it seems.
“Waffles are up!” Slightly hands Tootles a plate.
“Hey. Why can’t I see the food? I mean, seriously.
I want food.” I stare at Slightly as he pours invisible batter into a crude waffle iron.
I could swear I smell the faintest whiff of it cooking, but that must be my imagination.
Wishful thinking. Though I don’t make a wish.
I glance at Peter who’s speaking quietly with Curly. Much too quietly, in fact.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
Peter turns to me, his eyes narrowing. “Why do you think something is wrong?”
“Because not a single one of you is ever quiet. So, if I see two of you being quiet together, something is definitely wrong.” I pop a neverberry into my mouth and chew dutifully.
He raises a brow. “Observant.”
In fact, ever since I rolled out of the pallet by the fire, got dressed, and came to the kitchen, I’ve sensed that something’s off. There’s a tension in the air. “I mean, I don’t like to brag, but I’m pretty clever.”
Coy snorts.
“Hey!” I smack his leg. “I totally am.”
He gives me a sarcastic nod. “Very much so.”
“I don’t appreciate your tone.”
“Well, I don’t—”
“I’ve been thinking about the food,” Nibs interrupts.
“Yours is coming up, Nibs. Give me a minute. Sheesh.” Slightly casts him a dark glance.
“No.” Nibs rolls his eyes. “I’ve been thinking about why she can’t see it.”
I lean forward. This is definitely important information. I need those waffles, damnit! “Okay, hit me.” My hands stray to my temples, and I rub them in slow circles.
“Headache?” Peter asks.
“It’s fine. I think maybe I got tense or ground my teeth or something in my sleep. And don’t think I’ve forgotten about your whispering over there, but I have bigger fish to fry at the moment.” I keep rubbing and look back at Nibs. “How do I get the food, Nibs? Tell me.”
“You don’t believe.” Nibs points to his plate. “You don’t believe there’s a stack of waffles right there, dripping with syrup and—”
“Oh, I want to believe.” I stare at his plate and do my best to will the waffles into existence. “I want to believe so bad I can nearly taste it.” I lick my lips and imagine sweet syrup and deliciously warm waffles. Even so, nothing appears on the plate.
“Ugh!” I slap my palm on the table. “I want waffles! I believe in waffles. Waffles are pretty much my god at the moment, so where are the damn waffles?”
Coy hides his grin behind his hand, and Foy pretends to be inspecting something on the granite wall.
“Interesting.” Nibs sits back. “Maybe it’s because you’re a grownup.”
My mouth drops open at that. “Have you looked at yourself lately, Nibs? You’re older than I am!”
“Island time isn’t the same as mainland time, Moira, especially not since Hook began siphoning off its magic.
” He takes off his round glasses and polishes them on his shirt.
“My point is that I came to Neverland when I was still a boy, so I already believed in magic. Maybe because you came to Neverland when you were already a grownup, you’re sort of … stunted in that area of—”
“Stunted?” I can’t believe this guy.
“Nibs.” Peter waves a hand at him, trying to shush him.
It doesn’t work.
“No, I’m simply saying that once you become a grownup, it’s as if you’re immune to believing in things that would’ve been as easy as breathing for you when you were a child. You came to Neverland outside of—let’s call it the ‘window of magic’—so it’s more difficult for you to see the waffles.”
“But I can see Tinker Bell,” I counter. “And the island. And all sorts of things that are magical—like the mermaid.”
“She has a point,” Peter chimes in.
Nibs settles his glasses on his nose and loops them behind his ears. “Certainly. But all those things have their own intrinsic magic. Waffles are just … well, they’re just waffles.”
Utterly confused, I can only stare at him. If I didn’t already think I was nuts, this would be the last straw.
“I think you broke her, Nibs.” Curly takes a bite of nothing.
“I think you broke me.” Coy scratches his neck.
Nibs sighs. “Think of Tink and Quenith like they’re lit candles. Easy to see, easy to believe. But the waffles are an unlit candle. Nothing to light them up except the spark of your own belief.”
“But I believe! I totally, one hundred percent believe that delicious waffles are sitting in front of me waiting to be eaten, even if they aren’t real.”
“There it is.” Peter stands and comes around the table, then puts his hands over my eyes.
“There what is? Hey!” His touch is light, his scent hitting my nose and making me think of forest floors with trees soaring high above.
“Close your eyes. Imagine the waffles,” he orders. “But don’t imagine Slightly is over there pretending to make waffles. Real waffles, all right? In your mind, just accept that all of this is real, including the waffles.”
I swallow hard, my throat suddenly going tight.
If I accept all of this is real—like real real—then where does that leave me?
In a mental hospital like my mother? I was fourteen the first time she went away.
I still remember the smell of the hallways, the disinfectant mixed with something even harsher.
My visits were always the same one-sided agony.
She’d sit at the barred window and stare, only lifting her hand every now and again to yank at her light brown hair, the same shade as mine.
All because she believed in a world that wasn’t real, because she locked herself inside her head and refused to come out. Not even for me.
I can’t let that happen. No matter how much this feels like it’s happening, like I’m here at a table surrounded by Lost Boys and lurking pirates, I can’t go all in.
If I do, I’m risking the same fate as my mother’s.
I won’t become her. I promised myself that my fantasies would never consume me the way hers did.
I’d write them. I’d send them outside of myself instead of letting them devour me.
In the last days, it was as if my mother had cannibalized herself, allowing whatever was playing out in her mind to take precedence over the hell she wrought on her body.
My memories try to take me back to my last visit with her before she died, but I push them down deep, locking them back up in the filigreed case where I keep them.
Pretty on the outside, deadly on the inside.
No, I can’t go all in on Neverland. I won’t, because if I do, I’ll lose myself.
Taking Peter’s wrists, I pull his hands away from my eyes. “I’m good with neverberries.”
“Oh, come on.” Slightly grumbles at the stove. “I just made you a fresh waffle.”
Peter leans down, his lips brushing against my ear. “It’s okay to let it be real, Moira. You don’t have to be scared.” Then he rises and returns to his side of the table as goosebumps flow out from where he touched me.
He gets back into hushed conversation with Curly.
“Now that we’ve all heard about me being ‘stunted.’” I shoot Nibs a reproachful look. “Maybe we can talk about whatever secrets you’re keeping over there—hang on, what’s that smell?” I stand so fast I get dizzy.
“Hey.” Coy takes my elbow.
“I smell it. It’s real! Is it real?” I don’t care if I sound insane.
“This?” Tootles backs away from the stove, and that’s when I see it. Not waffles. Something far, far better.
I dash to him and stare down at the dark liquid. “Oh my god.”
“The stuff got all wet, but I dried it out as much as I could. Tootles remembered seeing someone pour hot water over it to make the coffee?” Coy speaks over my shoulder as I watch the last of the dark nectar drip down through a strainer made of some sort of reeds.
“This is it. This …” I gently take the small cup from beneath the strainer, careful not to spill it, and bring it to my lips. When I take a sip, I finally have an idea of what heaven is like—bitter, a little stale, and absolutely perfect.
I hold the cup tightly and return to the table. It’s like a wakeup call straight from the universe. I take another drink and moan. So good.
When I look up, seven sets of eyes are on me.