Chapter 7. Crickets

CHAPTER 7

Crickets

The first thing Wendy noticed was the sound of snapping wood. It cut through her ears and dragged her back to consciousness. The air smelled like damp wood and musty earth. Smoke stung her nose. She was warm and there was something hard poking into the middle of her back. Wendy shifted and groaned as a pain in her temple throbbed. She rolled onto her side, eliciting a symphony of metallic squeaks from under her.

This wasn’t her bed.

Wendy opened her eyes to find a blue pair watching her from less than a foot above. Images of the woods, the hospital, her parents, and the detectives flashed through her mind.

Peter’s lips tipped into a grin, pressing dimples into his cheeks. His eyes sparked with amusement. “Hi.”

Wendy punched him square in the face.

Peter let out a shout and stumbled back. He careened into a table, knocking an empty mason jar to the floor.

Wendy tried to scramble away, but the limp mattress slipped out from under her, throwing her back against the wall. Her right leg fell through the metal coils of the cot. She tugged, but the springs tangled painfully around her ankle.

“Don’t touch me!” Wendy snarled, trying her best to be intimidating even as terror gripped her.

It seemed to do the trick, because Peter stood far back, looking downright shocked and even a little frightened. “You hit me!” he spluttered, rubbing his jaw.

She tried to shake her leg free so she could escape, but the springs only tightened, causing her to hiss in pain. “Where did you take me?” she demanded. “Where am I?” Her mind went wild with endless scenarios, each more terrible than the last, in the seconds it took him to respond.

“I didn’t take you, you knocked yourself out on that swing set, so I brought you here!” He poked along the side of his face, one eye closed in a grimace.

Wendy’s eyes darted around the small room, trying to take in her surroundings while keeping an eye on him.

It was only lit by a dented oil lantern hanging from a hook. Her eyes swung to the crooked window carved out of the wall. Through the grime-covered glass, she could see it was completely dark outside.

Nighttime.

She was in a small structure made of mud-chinked logs. It had a drooping roof and another dirty cot across the room like the one she was currently trapped in. Dust-covered beer bottles spilled across the wood plank floor. A deteriorating buck head was mounted above an old, empty gun rack.

“Hunting shack,” Wendy suddenly realized with a groan. Kidnapped. She had been kidnapped and taken to a hunting shack in the middle of the woods. Was he—

“You really got better at fighting,” Peter told her matter-of-factly, fists on his hips. “Who taught you to hit like that?”

Standing in the middle of a scene straight from a horror novel, Peter looked oddly … normal.

She’d half expected him to be flying and brandishing a pirate sword when she saw him next. It made her feel all the more ridiculous now, seeing him again. Of course he wasn’t Peter Pan. He was just a normal boy, not some magical being from a bedtime story.

The fact that he was wearing cargo shorts and a faded blue T-shirt wasn’t strange, but the shorts were way too big and they were held up by a knotted length of rope. The shirt hung loosely from his shoulders, the neckline frayed and unraveling. They were both covered in dirt.

Wendy gave her head a shake. She refused to be lured into a false sense of security by this boy who had taken her to a hunting shack in the middle of the woods.

“Are you going to kill me?” Wendy blurted out.

He blinked. “What?”

“Are you going to kill me?” she repeated. Hot, sticky blood trickled down her calf. She’d seen this same scene play out in at least a dozen different movies. She would go missing, her face would be plastered all over the news, her parents would have to go through the same torture all over again—

Peter laughed, but his eyebrows were still drawn in confusion. “I— What— Wendy, why would I want to kill you?” he asked, taking a step forward.

“STOP!” Her hand shot out, fingers splayed as if she could hold him back while she was stuck in a decrepit old cot. Wendy was surprised when he did actually stop, looking all the more confused.

He didn’t look particularly large, but ropes of muscle still wound their way around his lithe build. Wendy’s free hand went to her forehead, trying to steady herself. “Please, just stop.”

“Stop what?” Peter’s hand went up to touch his cheek again. “I’m not doing anything! Wendy—”

“Stop—stop calling me Wendy!” Her eyes darted around the room again. The only way out was through the door, and on the other side of it was the woods. Who knew how deep he had taken her or how far she was from home.

Peter cocked an eyebrow at her. “You … don’t want me calling you your name?” he said slowly.

“No.” He shouldn’t even know her name to begin with!

Peter frowned and scratched the back of his neck. “That doesn’t make sense,” he said, his hand dropping to his side in defeat.

“Did you kidnap Benjamin Lane and Ashley Ford?” Wendy demanded.

“Kidnap?” He gave her a bewildered look, blue eyes going wide. “What—”

Frustration growled in the back of her throat. “Who are you? What do you want with me?”

He leaned closer to her and pointed to himself. “I’m Peter,” he said slowly, as if he were trying to explain something very simple to a small child. She couldn’t tell if he was being serious or making fun of her.

Either way, Wendy glared. “No. I mean, who are you?”

Peter scratched the back of his head again. There were pine needles stuck in his messy auburn hair. “You’re acting really weird. Is this some kind of game I’m not getting?”

A manic laugh shotgunned out of her. “I’m weird?” Wendy demanded. “You kidnapped me and are holding me hostage in a hunting shack in the middle of the woods!”

“Kidnapped? I didn’t kidnap you, you fainted—”

“I got knocked out because you—”

“Fainted,” he corrected. Wendy spluttered—was he serious?—but he continued on. “You fainted, I brought you here so you weren’t just lying out on the grass all night”—he paused in counting on his fingers to slant her a look—“you’re welcome, by the way. And you’re only being held ‘hostage’ by that mess of springs you got yourself caught in,” Peter added, pointing at her leg.

Wendy teetered on her good foot. She didn’t have a leg to stand on, metaphorically—or literally—speaking. This all sounded semi-rational, but Wendy still didn’t trust him. She squinted at him.

The fact that he stood there, looking both triumphant and amused, didn’t help her mood.

It was maddening because she did recognize him, but for reasons that didn’t make any logical sense. It was all things she had imagined about Peter Pan. The small chip in the corner of his front tooth. The confidence in his voice. That damn charming smile. And those eyes that felt like she was looking at stars.

Wendy forced herself to focus, to think practically. She needed to get somewhere safe because being with him felt dangerous. It was the sort of danger you felt before jumping off a cliff into water: a low rush in the pit of her stomach that made her fingers tingle.

“Why didn’t you just take me into my house instead of dragging me out here?” Wendy ventured.

She could see him chew on the inside of his cheek. The muscles in his jaw flexed and relaxed, accentuating the curve of his freckle-peppered cheekbones. “I didn’t want to run into your parents,” he said, scuffing the floor with his bare heel. “I mean, it’d look pretty weird if I just showed up at your house with you unconscious.”

Wendy tried to judge whether or not he was lying. She still didn’t know how he knew her name.

“You look pale,” Peter cut in, giving her a worried look. He moved to take a step closer, but seemed to think better of it and stopped.

Maybe he was some sort of stalker, but that didn’t feel right, either. She was terrified of him, but Peter also looked very wary of her. It was hard to keep up this idea that he was a threat when he kept dipping his chin and peering at her carefully. He squinted slightly.

Was he trying to study her face, too?

Wendy licked her lips. She wanted to ask him how he knew her, to get a real answer, but she couldn’t work up the courage.

“So…” Peter rocked back and forth on the balls of his feet, his hands stuffed into his pockets. “Do you want me to help you out of there?” he asked. His mouth twitched with a suppressed grin.

Wendy’s jeans were ruined. The metal springs had pushed them up her leg and the denim was torn. The cuts weren’t deep, but they stung like hell. A thin red line of blood trailed down her ankle and into her shoe. She glanced back up at Peter. She didn’t trust him, not by a long shot. But standing there, barefoot and apprehensive, he didn’t seem like much of a threat. And the sooner she got out of here—and out of the woods—the better.

“Yes,” she finally agreed, but not without shame.

Peter took a cautious step forward. “Do you promise not to punch me again?”

Wendy shot him a seething glare. “No.”

Peter’s lips broke into a smile. Dimples cut deep into his cheeks. Peter shrugged. “Fair enough.”

He knelt down next to the cot. Lingering fear made Wendy lean away from him, pressing herself against the wall. The metal tugged at her leg. “You need to stop fighting against it or you won’t be able to get out,” Peter said, looking up at her.

His nearness was overwhelming. She couldn’t tell if she wanted to shove him away again or reach out and touch him, just to see if he was real.

Wendy let out a half-irritated, half-pained growl. “Fine,” she said through clenched teeth.

He was still watching her with those startling blue eyes.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she told him. He quickly looked down, but she could just see the corner of his smile.

Carefully, she shifted her weight to her good leg, letting the other drop a bit and relax. Peter worked his fingers between the knots of spirals and gave them a quick tug, and suddenly her leg was free. Wendy’s foot dropped to the wooden floor and she let out a surprised yelp.

As she toppled forward, she snatched Peter’s hand to brace herself. His palm was rough but very warm. Wendy quickly retreated, causing her to lose balance again. She did an odd dance on one foot until she limped free of the ruined cot.

Peter stood and there was a wide grin on his face.

Wendy scowled. “What?”

“That looked funny,” he said with a shrug.

“Shut up.”

He made no effort to hide his amusement. “Does it feel okay?”

“It feels like I got my leg caught in a bear trap,” she said tersely as she put her foot down and tried resting her weight on it. The cuts stung, but there didn’t seem to be any other damage.

But at least she could move now, even if she was seconds away from falling through the half-rotted floorboards. “What are you doing here?” she asked him. She heard the harshness in her own voice begin to slip away.

“Well, I just got you unstuck from the bed springs—”

“No, I mean what are you doing here?”

Peter groaned and tipped his head back. “Not this again.”

Wendy closed her eyes for a moment to rein in her frustration. “I mean,” she started again, “why are you in this old hunting shack?”

Peter glanced around and shrugged his shoulders. “’Cause I’m staying here?” he said slowly, as if to judge whether or not he was answering her question right.

It didn’t make sense. Why on earth would someone willingly decide to stay in a place like this? The woods had at least a dozen hunting shacks tucked into the logging roads. There was no sign of anyone other than Peter being here in the last several years.

“Where are your parents?” she asked. There was no way he was of legal age. He was much older than the magical boy, Peter Pan, that Wendy knew from her stories, but he definitely wasn’t eighteen.

“Haven’t got any.” He said it so simply, and with such lack of importance, that it took a moment for it to register.

He didn’t have any parents? So he was an orphan? Was he homeless?

“Are—are there other people in the woods?”

He shrugged. “Not that I’ve seen.”

“So what are you doing in the woods?” Wendy swallowed past a lump in her throat. A question was bubbling up that she needed to ask, but she was frightened of the answer. “Did someone … bring you here? Were you kidnapped?”

But Peter laughed. “What? No! Jeez, what is it with you and kidnapping?”

And the frustration was back.

“If that’s not it, then what are you doing here?” Wendy snapped. “Why were you in the middle of the road? Why did you come to my house?”

“Because…” His eyes dropped to the floor. “I need your help.”

“What do you need my help with?” Wendy asked slowly. A chill ran across her skin. The flame of the oil lantern flickered behind the dirty glass.

Peter frowned. “I need you to help me find my shadow.”

Wendy stared at him.

Again, he had said it so simply, as if this weren’t a completely bizarre thing to say to her. She forced a laugh, not knowing how else to respond.

Seriously? Was he messing with her? “Uh, did you try looking on the floor?”

Peter tipped his head to the side, an eyebrow cocked like that was a ridiculous question. “You’re kidding, right?”

Wendy let out a huff and rolled her eyes. “It’s right th—”

She pointed to the floor where his shadow was. Or rather, where his shadow was supposed to be.

The ground below him had no shadow. It was just his feet—his very dirty, bare feet—and then the weather-worn planks. It was such a small thing to be so very wrong to the point that it was unsettling. It was like a Photoshop fail, but in person.

“That’s not—” Wendy glanced up and Peter looked expectant. Her eyes went to the walls around them, searching for some indication, some smudge in the firelight that indicated Peter’s shadow, but there was nothing.

Wendy examined her own shadow. It flickered and shifted below her, mimicking her movement across the wall.

Her shadow was there, but where was his?

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Wendy fixed Peter with a glare. Surely, this was some kind of weird trick. “That’s not possible.”

“I told you so,” Peter said. He just stood there, looking infuriatingly placid.

“How did you do that?” she demanded. “You have to have a shadow—everything has a shadow!” Not in the dark, of course, but there was enough firelight in the shack for her to have one, and the cots, and the small pile of firewood in the corner.

“It must be a trick of the light or something,” Wendy tried to reason with herself. She could probably search shadow magic tricks on YouTube and find an explanation. Wendy stepped closer to him, thinking maybe he was just standing in the perfect spot for all the light to bounce off him and not create a shadow—she wasn’t entirely sure how that worked.

But when she moved next to him, her shadow followed, and his was still nowhere to be found. “I— What the—” Wendy stammered unintelligibly as she stared at him, bewildered.

“It got away somehow,” Peter told her. All traces of a smile quickly fell from his face.

Wendy felt like she was in a very strange dream. One time, she’d had a dream where everything was normal, except there were three suns. This felt exactly like that.

But she was awake, not dreaming. She could feel the stinging of the scrapes on her leg, and she could see Peter in front of her, clear as day. Not an apparition, not a daydream, not make-believe.

And yet Peter himself radiated the fantastical. A boy plucked from her dreams and her mother’s stories, and set before her. He was something else altogether. He was stardust and the smell of summer.

“I get glimpses of it now and then,” Peter continued to explain as if Wendy weren’t about to have an existential crisis. “In corners, under beds.” He glanced at the cot and his shoulders crept up to his ears. “But I haven’t been able to catch it. The longer it’s gone, the worse it gets.” The firelight caught the worry lines on his forehead. He looked so tired. “I figured since you helped me find it before, you would be able to help me find it again.” Peter chewed on his bottom lip, his eyes large and hopeful.

Wendy pushed back. “What do you mean, ‘before’?” she asked, feeling all the more frustrated. “We’d never met before last night!”

Peter frowned as he inched a step closer. “Do you really not remember?”

She felt the urge to shout at him. To tell him no, there was no way she could remember him, because this was all impossible and Peter Pan wasn’t real. But then, he was standing in front of her, as if he’d leapt from the pages and pages of drawings hidden in her truck. A few years older than she’d imagined, but still. He was flesh and bone, and he didn’t have a shadow.

When she didn’t respond, Peter pressed on. “I used to visit and listen to you tell stories about me, just outside your window.” Wendy’s eyes bulged and Peter was quick to continue. “I know, I know! That sounds weird, but—” He shrugged his shoulders, sheepish and at a loss for words and unable explain himself. “We didn’t officially meet until one night, when I’d come to listen, but you guys were asleep already.” Peter twisted his fingers together. “But before I could take off, somehow my shadow got loose in your room, and I had to chase it around—”

The slightest spark of a memory flickered in Wendy’s mind.

“You woke me up,” she heard herself say before she could stop herself. It felt more like a dream than a memory, but Wendy could perfectly picture it—waking up in her bed to a strange sound and finding Peter Pan, the young boy, probably about eleven years old, just like her, wrestling on the floor with something dark but translucent.

Peter looked just as surprised, but his face, instead of echoing the dread that Wendy felt, lit up with excitement. “Yes! I caught it, but I couldn’t get it to stick back on—”

“So I sewed it…” she murmured to herself. Like with most dreams, she couldn’t remember the details, just faded, splotchy images.

The large smile splitting Peter’s face did little to make her feel better. “That’s right! You helped me get it back on!” A relieved laugh shook his shoulders. “John and Michael slept right through it somehow—”

A sharp pang struck Wendy. She sucked in a breath.

Peter didn’t notice and continued on. “But they’re always heavy sleepers.”

He knew Wendy. He remembered things she couldn’t—things she’d thought were just dreams, because they were impossible, weren’t they? But so was not having a shadow. And he did know her brothers. What else did he know? What else did he remember that Wendy didn’t?

Wendy felt like she’d been dropped into freezing-cold water. Her skin tingled and she was dangerously lightheaded.

“Wendy?” Peter’s voice called her back and she forced herself to focus on it, to ground herself back in reality. At some point, he’d moved closer. Peter watched her warily, his eyebrows pulled together and hands held out like he was readying himself to catch her. “Are you okay? You don’t look so good…”

Wendy dragged her hand across her sweaty forehead. The shack suddenly felt uncomfortably hot, suffocating. This was too much to process at once. “Please take me home now.”

“But—”

“Please?” She hated how pathetic she sounded and how her eyes were starting to prickle. She needed to get out of the woods. She needed to go home. “We can sort all this out—this shadow stuff or whatever—but I really need to go home first.” Wendy knew she wasn’t being very truthful, but right now she’d have said anything to get out of that shack.

Peter paused and for a second she feared he would object. She could see him thinking and watched as the muscle in his jaw worked anxiously. But then he nodded. “Yeah, okay.” He crossed the room and opened the warped wooden door.

Outside, Wendy saw a small clearing in the light that spilled from the shack. Beyond that, everything was swallowed up by the darkness of the woods.

Wendy’s body stiffened in the doorway.

“Are you all right?” Peter asked.

She could feel him just behind her shoulder.

Wendy wrung her sweaty hands together and nodded. “Y-yes, I’m fine. Just a little afraid of the … dark.” It was only half a lie. She was afraid of the woods, but especially afraid of them at night.

Peter laughed. It came so easily to him.

“That’s a strange thing to be scared of.” He grabbed the lantern from a hook on the wall and pressed it into her hand. “There,” he said, chin tilted proudly. “Problem solved.”

Wendy gripped the metal handle. “Right.”

Peter hopped through the doorway and leisurely strolled toward the woods.

Begrudgingly, Wendy followed.

“Since when are you afraid of the dark, anyway?” Peter asked, glancing back at her over his shoulder.

Wendy almost stopped, wanting to pull back from the familiar way he kept talking to her. He stared at her, so open and unabashed. Meanwhile, her own cheeks felt hot under his gaze.

Wendy’s hands shook so fiercely that the metal handle of the lantern clattered. Peter frowned at it. She gripped it tighter in an attempt to stop the shaking. The strain made the dry, cracked skin of her knuckles sting.

Peter continued leading the way through the woods. His bare feet easily traversed rocks and tree roots. “I mean, lions, quicksand, nasty-tasting medicine: Those are all valid things to be afraid of,” he said, leaping onto a fallen tree, his arms out at his sides as he walked along it. He seemed perfectly at home. “But the dark?” he asked. Peter jumped down and fell back into step next to Wendy. “Really?” There was a teasing note in his voice as he ducked to avoid a low-hanging branch.

Wendy only needed to dip her head a bit to clear the same branch.

She scowled at him. Her sense of pride tried to bubble its way to the surface through the sour fear in her belly. “I’m not afraid of the dark,” Wendy said, correcting her previous statement. “I’m cautious of what’s in the dark that I can’t see.” She lifted the lantern a bit higher in an attempt to get a better view of the woods ahead. Her shadow caught her eye as it walked along the tree to their right, unaccompanied. Peter’s shadow was still nowhere in sight. It was just so … odd. “Something that could hurt me,” she mumbled, more to herself than Peter. The cut on her leg ached, and it was hard to keep branches and leaves in the underbrush from slapping it.

Peter stopped walking and stared at her for a moment, his head tilted to the side. It reminded her of her old dog, Nana, when Wendy used to speak to her—confused and trying to understand. It was an innocent and kind of stupid expression. Despite present circumstances, Wendy felt a laugh rise in her throat.

But then Peter started walking again. “I think people are more frightening than the dark,” he said. “A person can stand right in front of you and be dangerous without you even knowing it.”

His back continued to retreat into the darkness, but Wendy remained where she stood. That was … surprisingly insightful.

Jogging a bit to catch up, Wendy fell into step next to Peter. Against all logic, she felt better being in the woods with him by her side. It was almost like he emitted his own light that kept the darkness of the woods at bay.

“So that’s what you’re afraid of?” Wendy asked. “People?”

“What?” Peter snorted and gave a fierce shake of his head. “No. I’m not afraid of anything.”

Wendy rolled her eyes. What a childish response. “Everyone’s afraid of something,” she insisted.

“Everyone but me,” Peter corrected.

She fought the urge to give him a shove.

Wendy concentrated on his face, trying to read his expression as the light danced across his features. She wetted her lips, tasting the questions that were demanding to be asked.

“How old are you?” she finally asked.

“How old are you?” he countered evasively, lifting an eyebrow.

Wendy had to bite back a petulant reply of I asked you first.

“I’m eighteen,” Wendy told him.

Peter looked like he’d just been slapped. He jerked back with a blink before scrunching up his face. “You’re eighteen?”

Wendy felt very exposed as he blatantly looked her up and down. Indignant, even. She knew she was short, but she thought she at least looked her age.

Wendy smoothed a hand through her short hair and cleared her throat. “It was actually my birthday when we—when…” When I almost hit you with my car? When you freaked me and half the hospital out? When you came crashing into my life? “Yesterday. My birthday was yesterday.”

“Oh.” His stare was unfocused as he looked ahead, lost in thought. Still, he walked through the woods with ease while Wendy tripped along behind him. “I’m nineteen,” Peter said, coming out of his daze and tilting his chin up. Even the smallest grin pulled deep dimples into his cheeks.

Wendy was starting to get a headache from frowning so much. “Nineteen? There’s no way you’re nineteen,” she said flatly. “You look like you’re fifteen.”

His face still had a childlike roundness to it—his nose turned up at the end and was a little too small for his face. Even though he had muscles, they were still lean and sinewy. He could easily fit in with the crowds of lanky freshmen at her school.

He was looking smug now, his hands clasped behind his back as he grinned at her. “I’m taller than you,” Peter pointed out, as if that was cold hard evidence for his case.

Okay, he was a tall fifteen-year-old, but still a fifteen- year-old.

“Barely!” she shot back. “And that doesn’t mean anything, anyway.”

Snap.

A twig cracked in the distance.

The lantern clanked loudly as a violent jump ripped through her. Wendy tripped, her back colliding with Peter’s shoulder. He stumbled but caught her upper arms, steadying them both.

“What was that?” Wendy asked, the words tumbling from her lips. Was there something hiding in the trees? A person? Were they being watched? Wendy swallowed hard. She just wanted to get out of these damn woods.

“I was going to ask you the same thing.” He loosened his hold on her, but Wendy backed up again, pressing into him.

“I heard something in the trees.” Even though her whole body shook, she could feel his warmth radiating through his shirt.

“It’s okay,” Peter said. His tone was gentle. She wanted to believe him. “Here.” He took the lantern from her and she automatically wrapped her arms around her middle. Peter raised the light above her head to get a better look. “There’s nothing there,” he told her. “Probably just an owl or something.”

As if on cue, a faint hoot echoed from the trees.

Wendy let out a heavy sigh of relief.

But then a much louder hooting came from just behind her and Wendy jumped away from Peter. She whirled around to see his lips pressed into a small O. The owl in the woods hooted again and Peter responded.

Wendy pressed her fingers to her chest and felt her heart fluttering under them. “How did you do that?” she asked. He matched the owl’s call perfectly. Jordan could whistle pretty decently to match the pitch and tune of a bird, but Peter sounded exactly like a real owl.

Peter grinned and rolled his shoulders in a shrug. “Practice, I guess.” He started to walk again and Wendy stayed close to his side. Her arm brushed against his with each step.

“You must’ve had a lot of practice, then,” Wendy said, lacking her usual sarcastic tone.

“I’m just good at imitating things,” Peter said. “Animals. People.”

“People?” Did he imitate their voices like stand-up comedians did sometimes, or walk around pretending to be a pirate? She was about to ask when Peter knocked the lantern into a branch, producing a clatter of glass and metal. Wendy jumped again, wincing at the sound.

“Oops. Sorry,” said Peter.

She didn’t know how much more of this she could take. “Are we almost to my house?” she asked, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment. Every nerve in her body was on edge, rippling anxiously under her skin.

“I think so.”

“You think so?” Wendy groaned. “If we—”

“Want to hear what else I can do?” he asked.

No, she didn’t. She wanted to get out of here and back to her house.

But before Wendy could say anything, Peter handed back the lantern and cupped his hands around his mouth, producing a light, warbling tune. It was another birdcall. Wendy knew she’d heard it before, but she couldn’t place it. A swallow? Or maybe a nightingale? She didn’t really know anything about birds.

Peter dropped his hands, tucked his bottom lip under his front teeth, and produced the quiet thrum of cricket chirps.

It sounded just like the crickets that lived outside her window. Wendy fell asleep to that sound every night during the summer. The edges of his lips quirked up and the lantern’s light sparked in his eyes. Peter continued to make the gentle chirps. The sound melted the knotted muscles in her shoulders.

Memories of catching crickets at night with her brothers danced in the back of her mind. John quietly waiting in one spot with a paper cup in his hand, listening hard to find one of the musical insects. Michael careening through the bushes when he caught one, scaring the rest off. John always threw a fit. They were never able to catch more than one at a time. They would put it in a jar, turn off the lights in their bedroom, and sit in silence—after Wendy told Michael to shut up at least three times—until the cricket felt safe enough to start singing for them. Even in the dark, she could always tell that John and Michael were smiling just as much as she was.

It was one of her favorite sounds.

“You’re really good at that,” she said softly as she stared up at Peter. They weren’t walking anymore.

He gazed down at her, no longer chirping. The way his eyes searched hers made her want to look away, but it seemed impossible to manage right now.

“You really don’t remember me?” he asked quietly, tension caught in the lines of his face.

“How could I remember you? We just met…” She lied because the truth just didn’t make any sense, no matter how much she wanted to believe it.

“What about your dreams? Do you not dream about me anymore?” he pressed.

Wendy squinted. “My dreams?”

Sadness, almost a sort of hurt, fell across his face.

“You can’t dream about someone you don’t know…” Could you? The sound of the crickets floated back to her even though Peter’s lips were completely still.

Peter’s chest rose and fell in a sigh. “It’s me, Wendy. Peter. Peter Pan.” His blue eyes bored earnestly into hers. He closed his hands around both of hers. “I know you remember me, you have to…”

Wendy felt like she wanted to cry, laugh, and run away all at the same time. She shook her head quickly. “That’s not possible. Peter Pan isn’t real,” she told him. Even as she said it, she felt herself doubting her own words. A part of her wanted to believe, as silly as it felt.

One thing was certain: He knew who Peter Pan was. So, even though she fought against it, the truth was that he’d heard the stories before. At some point, she had told him.

“Wendy Moira Angela Darling!”

Her father’s voice cut through the night. Wendy looked around. They were at the edge of the woods. The crooked white fence of her backyard was no more than twenty feet ahead.

She could see the back door to her house through the sparse trees. The kitchen lit up her father’s bulky silhouette.

“Where have you been? It’s the middle of the night! I’ve been calling you for hours!”

Wendy knew her phone was in her pocket and on silent, as always. The ringer always made her jump, and she found the vibration setting just as jarring.

“I—” Wendy turned, but Peter was gone, leaving her to stand alone at the edge of the woods, her hands cold, the lantern gone with him. “Peter?” she hissed into the darkness. She stood on her tiptoes and tried to peer deeper into the trees. “Where are you?”

But no one was there.

Wendy swallowed and faced the house. Behind her, the breeze through the woods tickled the back of her neck. They were only slightly more terrifying than her father waiting for her at the door.

She half ran to the fence, clumsily climbed over, and steeled herself against her father’s angry glares and shouts as she crossed the backyard.

He stood there, red-faced, his large fingers gripping the doorframe. Wendy wouldn’t have been surprised if he ripped it right off. “Were you in the woods?!” he demanded. Spittle flew from his lips as he yelled.

Wendy tried to think up some reasonable excuse, but her mind was back in the woods with Peter. “No, I thought I saw something, so I was just looking—”

“Don’t you dare lie to me, Wendy!” he said.

Wendy’s face turned red. She didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t tell him the truth. If he knew she had been in the woods with the boy from the hospital—who the police thought might be connected to her and her brothers’ disappearance—well, Wendy had no idea what he would do, but it wouldn’t be good.

She felt guilty and, to her surprise, scared for Peter. He was out there alone with only the hunting shack as shelter. For the second time in the past twenty-four hours, she wondered if she would ever see him again.

“I—”

“And what happened to you?” His chest swelled and his face darkened from red to purple.

Wendy looked down at her torn pant leg, felt the throb of her head. Luckily, the pain had subsided to a dull ache. “I was sitting on the fence and fell off by accident,” she said.

“I forbid you from going into those woods.” His eyes glared into hers, but they had a glassy sheen. “I thought you were smart enough to know better after what happened!”

Wendy winced.

No, she couldn’t tell him the truth. Not until she figured out what to do about Peter. But this also wasn’t a situation she could lie her way out of.

“I’m sorry, Dad,” she said quietly.

Her father breathed heavily through flared nostrils. Wendy braced herself for more shouting, but his shoulders sank. “Just go to bed,” he told her, his voice now a low rumble. She almost preferred the yelling. The defeated tone just made her feel worse.

He moved out of the doorway to let her pass. As she did, he lifted his hand. Wendy thought he was going to place it on her shoulder, but he hesitated and let it drop back to his side. “Stay out of there,” he repeated.

Wendy nodded and crossed her arms over her chest. “I will.” She didn’t blame him for being mad at her.

She wasn’t the only one who’d lost something in those woods.