it to live a full adult life. I think you need a break from these environs and thoughts.”
“Father, what are you—”
“The Rennets have a cousin with a country house in Conaught. Their governess had to take a leave of absence on account of her mother passing away,” Mrs. Darling said quietly, almost musically. Like delivering the news in operetta format somehow made it less unappealing. “You will join them for several months and care for their five boys.”
“Ireland?” Wendy cried. “It’s…a long way off.”
It was the first, the only thing she could think to say: she had been looking at a map of the British Isles just the other day to help fill in some descriptive passages of Never Land, and had been drawn to the county’s green meadows and hills.
“I know, darling, and I will miss you terribly—” her mother started.
“Now stop there.” Mr. Darling held up his hand to silence her. “Brave heart. We’re doing this for her own good.”
“You’re sending me to Ireland. You are exiling me. To care for a bunch of…of…nasty little boys I don’t even know!”
“Think of it as an adventure! Like in your stories!” Mrs. Darling said brightly. “They could be your Misplaced Boys!”
“Lost Boys, Mother. And no, they can’t.”
“Well, think of it as a nice little excursion from London, then. A vacation, really…”
“You’re hiring me out to complete strangers hundreds of miles away just because I write stories about Peter Pan?”
It wasn’t really a question. It was a reaffirming of the facts as presented to her.
“It’s not just about the stories,” Mr. Darling said, looking desperately at his wife.
Mrs. Darling raised an eyebrow. She may have been soft in many ways, but Wendy’s mother never, ever lied.
“All right, it is just about the stories,” Mr. Darling sighed. “And I think you could do with a break from each other for a while.”
“We will keep the notebook safe here with us while you go,” Mrs. Darling said soothingly.
“But they’re my stories. They’re mine. They belong to me!”
Mr. Darling threw up his hands. “Wendy, they are not the product of a happy, normal girl!”
“No, I suppose not,” Wendy cried, and she fled upstairs, the basket with the dog still swinging from her arm.
This at least could be said about Snowball: the little thing curled up on Wendy’s neck and breathed his soft wet breath on her cheek while she lay on her bed, dry-eyed and insensate. Nana sat loyally on the floor nearby, perhaps withholding her disdain for the new interloper in view of her mistress’s distress.
“Ireland…” Wendy finally whispered. “I don’t want to go to Ireland.
“Unless…maybe I would if I got to go in an airship.
“Or if I went by regular ship, while chasing pirates.
“Or if I wasn’t alone. If I was brought there by…
“Peter Pan.”
This time hearing her voice aloud didn’t make her braver at all.
“Peter Pan,” she repeated bitterly.
“Peter Pan, who only visited when I couldn’t see him. Peter Pan, who left his shadow and never came back for it. Who never came back for me.”
She turned her head to look out the window, but all she saw was gray. The same gray that was inside her head; the two reached out to each other, like sensing like. Wendy closed her eyes, severing the connection. But it was still gray behind her closed lids.
What had happened?
Somehow her life had gone from heady days of playing games with Michael and John and telling stories about pirates to…passing time until they came home. And then there were no more pirates anyway. Something had slipped out of her hands. There would be no pirates of any sort in her future. No fairies, no Peter Pan, no Never Land. Just banishment to another family in another drearily real country. And there? And then back home? The same: social mistakes, misery in a crowd, boys who probably didn’t like her anyway.
She sighed and looked at Snowball. “Pretty doggy,” she said, giving him a pet. “When they gave you to me they were only trying to make me happy. They really do think this nannying abroad, this.…gothic situation, would be good for me. But I don’t like gothic novels, Snowball. They’re dreary.
“I suppose it could have been worse, like an arranged marriage. All right, perhaps that’s going a bit far. It’s really a bit more Charlotte than Emily. ‘A serious introduction to a proper boy,’ then.”
She carefully moved Snowball so she could give Nana a good petting too.
“I thought Peter Pan was the proper boy for me.