The Fall of Never(116)

Shaking, she hugged herself and backed up a step, catching her breath.

“I’m here,” the boy muttered. “Real or not, I’m here. And another thing—I don’t like being called ‘Simple Simon’ anymore. It’s stupid. It’s for children. Like you.”

“I…don’t call you that anymore.”

“No, but that’s how you think of me. Stop it.”

Leave, her mind suddenly said. He doesn’t want you here anymore so just leave, run, get away. Maybe Glenda was right after all—there’s no perfect fairy tale world. Sooner or later, everything comes crumbling down.

“What are you going to run from?” He could read her thoughts. He was her thoughts. “Why would you want to run from me?”

She was backing away slowly. She watched as Simple Simon—Simon—backed around a cluster of bushes, his own eyes narrowed, never leaving her face.

“You don’t have to get upset,” he said…but she didn’t like the look on his face. Something was swimming below the surface there, like a corpse submerged in swamp water. He crept along the guard with a slight bend to his posture, as if his head had suddenly become too heavy to carry. “You can just blink me away. Do it. After all…what’s the sense of having an imaginary friend if you’re going to be afraid of him?”

And that was it—she’d just needed to hear the word. She was suddenly afraid of him. He wasn’t natural; he was a monster.

“You’re not real,” she breathed, her voice shaking, her heart racing. “You’re not. You’re in my head.”

“That stone was pretty real, wouldn’t you say?”

“What stone?”

“The one you flung at Ugly-Girl,” he snickered. “It seemed pretty real to her, didn’t it? Or did you forget about that again so quickly? Why is it your mind keeps trying to block out the scary stuff, Kellerella? Why can’t you just accept the truth for what it is?”

But he was talking over her head now and she didn’t fully understand where he was headed, what he meant by his words. Confused and frightened, she turned to run…and screamed, suddenly accosted by a web of sharp, jutting tree branches. Yet she didn’t stop, and pushed through them. She felt a stinging tear at her forehead, was aware of wetness running down into her eyes, but she didn’t stop until she passed through the thicket and broke out into a shade-covered clearing.

Out of breath, she bent at the waist and gripped her knees with her hands. Her throat felt like dry burlap. Her breath pushed from her throat in hot wheezes.

None of this is real, none of it exists, she tried to convince herself. There is no Never-Never Land. There never was. It was all in my head. It was never real…Never never existed.

Yet she was here, trapped in the middle of Never.

Wary, she looked over her shoulder for Simon but he hadn’t followed her. Around her, the woods stood like a corral, closing her off from the rest of the world. And was this really what she’d wanted? To be closed off, to be alone? No—she’d wanted someone. And that’s how this all started in the first place…

She started heading in the direction of the brook, to follow it back up to the house instead of along the path. Half-dazed, she stumbled through the woods, her mind and body still shaken. Frightened and not quite certain why, she passed through a stand of firs and broke out along the bank of the brook just as she caught the sound of someone sobbing quietly. A boy. Could it be Simon? Had he tried following her through the forest, weeping? Kelly paused just below the embankment that ran toward the brook, and noticed a boy her own age fighting off tears further down the brook. Stunned, she only stood there and stared at him. She’d never seen anyone else in these woods before. It was almost surreal.

She stepped closer and crunched a branch on the ground. The boy jerked his head up in surprise and they both froze, staring at each other.

He was slight and fragile, with square glasses covering his face, and shoulders like two little knobs poking from beneath his shirt. The knees of his corduroys were shredded, the skin beneath cut and bleeding. His face was pale, but bright flowers of red had blossomed across his cheeks and neck. His chest hitched the slightest bit, as if he’d been fighting off tears for some time now.

Seeing him, she felt intrusive, as if she’d walked into a part of this boy’s own personal world and interrupted him. “Hello,” she whispered. Uncertain what to say, she found her eyes skirting back over his injured knees. “Did you get hurt?”

“I fell,” the boy said. His throat sounded choked and frightened. He turned and pointed to a makeshift swing hanging from a rope tied to a high branch on one of the trees.

“You’re hurt.” She moved along the brook, following her reflection in the ripple of the water.

“It’s not a big deal,” he said, suddenly trying to sound both tough and casual. In his hands he held a piece of wet cloth. He held it out and wrung it over the water.

“Did you tie that swing up in that tree?”

The boy nodded.

“How did you get it all the way up there?”

“I climbed.”

“That whole tree?”

“Just up to the branch.” He pointed. “See?”

“That’s pretty high up.”

“It’s not so high,” he told her, now exuding confidence. His birdlike chest seemed to puff out before her eyes and she fought back a grin. “I can climb higher.”