Page 42 of Darling

Fyodor was the first to face him. He had another unlit cigarette in his hand. “Peter. You have light?” he asked.

To Wendy’s surprise, Peter’s eyes actually looked a little glazed, like he’d just woken up or something. The boy shook his head for a second as if to snap it out of something. “No…,” he said finally. “And you should stop smoking. You too, Tinkerbelle, and yes, a pipe counts.”

Tinkerbelle stuck her tongue out at him cheekily, but Wendy could see her hand shaking in Curly’s grip.

“Hey, Darling,” Peter said, body still half outside the train car. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

The tension in the train car spiked. Wendy saw Tinkerbelle’s head twitch in her direction, but Tinkerbelle successfully kept herself from turning all the way. Instead she laughed and slapped Curly’s knee, and Curly mocked being hurt by the gesture. Charles, the farthest from Peter, was openly staring at Wendy, so horrified that Wendy could see the whites around his brown doe-eyes. Minsu said something about drinks being expensive, but dug his fingers into the side of Charles’s leg in panic. Charles snapped out of it and jumped back into the fake conversation, promising to buy Curly’s drink on Minsu’s behalf.

Wendy had never been more terrified in her life.

“Go,” Ominotago whispered. She was blocked from Peter’s view by the divider by the door, her lips barely moving. “You have to.”

Wendy forced a smile onto her face. “I’ll be right back,” she said to the group.

“Don’t get lost,” Curly teased with an answering grin, his eyes haunted like he was never going to see her again.

“I won’t,” Wendy replied flirtingly, and made her legs carry her across the train car.

Peter was waiting for her patiently. As she got closer, Wendy could see that his cheeks were red and his nose was a bit pink, as if he’d been crying. Unlike last time, she still saw the ghost of Charles’s terror, and her heart did not move.

CHAPTER 11

Peter held the door open for her, forcing their proximity as she ducked under his arm into the space between the train cars. To her surprise, James wasn’t there, and she couldn’t see him in the other car, either, though it was hard to see through the dirt encrusted windows.

The train was going significantly slower than it had earlier in the evening and it was quieter, but that didn’t make Wendy feel any safer.

Peter leaned against the door and pushed his hair back from his face with a shaking hand. “Things haven’t been going very well tonight, have they?” he asked quietly, not meeting her gaze.

Wendy wasn’t sure of the safest way to answer that question. She wrapped both hands around the railing chains and squared her feet for better balance, then she shrugged. “Things could have gone worse,” she said finally.

To her great relief, Peter laughed. “They definitely could have.”

He mirrored her gesture, curling his hands around the chains and sighed. “I didn’t want any of this to happen. I had been hoping to just show you a good time.” The moonlight illuminated his handsome face in a soft glow. “I was thinking that you and Tinkerbelle would become fast friends because you seemed so similar. I was going to introduce you to Slightly and Curly and Nibs, and show off the art Curly had made in our space. Then we were going to go to the Mermaid’s Lagoon together, and Bella was going to dance for you. She’d been practicing for weeks … She’s an icon and I was so excited to show it to you.”

Peter looked genuinely sad, and it was hard for Wendy to focus on remembering how scared and upset the others had been only minutes ago, but she was trying. Peter was so very talented at this. She couldn’t even put her finger on exactly what he did to create these situations. It was some combination of forcing you to feel his body heat through proximity, projecting insecurity, and shifting the way he used his voice. No hard edges; instead, all vulnerability and open body language. Letting Wendy control how close they were, physically cowering like she was the thing he should be afraid of—not the other way around. And then there was his beauty. If Minsu and Fyodor were pretty, Peter Pan was radiant. He literally looked like an angel as the wind blew his curls around his face and the starlight made his clear skin gleam.

As if he could tell she was appraising him, Peter tucked his bottom lip under his straight white teeth and let his auburn lashes flutter down to his freckled cheeks. “All I wanted,” he said in a very small voice, “was to make sure you had a nice time. I didn’t know my brothers would freak out and drag you to our house. I couldn’t predict the police would be harassing my friends. And the Crocodile … and Detective Hook?” Peter shook his head. “You should never have had to see them at all. That’s not anything you should ever have to deal with. Those are my problems, not yours.”

Peter rubbed at one of his eyes and looked out toward the moon. “I’m not having the best night, either,” he said sadly.

As if he were a victim of these circumstances and not at all the source of them.

Then he dug around in his bag and pulled out some sort of stick. “I hope you don’t mind, but it’s a bit too dark for me to see,” he said sheepishly as he dug out a lighter and lit the tip of the stick.

Wendy flinched as it burst into light, throwing sparks in every direction. Peter held the sparkler in between them, the golden light illuminating the leftover dampness beneath his eyes and the soft blush on his cheeks.

“You don’t have to forgive me,” Peter said firmly.

Wendy thought about how Tinkerbelle had looked hours ago, right after they’d first met, when Peter had spoken harshly to her and she’d clammed up as if Peter had been about to hit her.

“You’re right,” Wendy lied. “No one could have predicted that. Don’t worry about it. We’re almost to the party, and from what Minsu and Fyodor were saying, it sounds like it’s going to be a great time.”

She let go of one of the chains and wrapped her hand around the sparkler. Peter let go of it, something in him relaxing at Wendy’s words. Wendy took the sparkler in her own hand and held it up high, so the sparks didn’t ignite their clothing.

“Thank you,” Peter said. “God, I’m so sorry about everything. Thank you for giving this another chance.” He slumped against the door and looked out toward the moon again. “I don’t want to unload on you or anything, but doing this is so hard.”

“Doing what?” Wendy asked.