Darling Girl: A Novel of Peter Pan(60)

He gives a small smile, one that lasts barely a second. But he does help carry the plates out to the kitchen. Since dinner was only the three of them, cleanup is relatively quick. Holly is sudsing the last plate when he finally speaks.

“What was she like?”

She knows immediately what he means, and extends him the courtesy of not pretending.

“Eden? Brilliant. Mercurial. Quick as a hummingbird,” Holly says. She rinses the plate, careful to keep her eyes on it, as if all her energy must go toward not dropping it. “Devoted to you.”

“What happened to her?” He reaches for the plate, but she shakes her head and takes the cloth from him. She needs something to do.

“Eden was born with a rare condition. It caused her to grow rapidly, probably more rapidly than her body could sustain,” she says. “And then she had an accident. She hit her head. The doctors think her body, which was already stressed, couldn’t handle the damage. She’s spent the last decade in a coma. Her brain couldn’t wake up.”

She’s surprised by how easily the truth rolls off her tongue. Almost as easily as all her lies have lately.

“What type of accident?”

“She fell. She was climbing a tree and lost her balance.”

“I remember that.” He screws up his face. “Ever since we left the house in Cornwall, I’ve been having bits and pieces of memories. I thought I was going crazy.”

She wants, so badly, to ask what he remembers. But she doesn’t. That line of questioning could lead to other memories, and she’s not ready for them. Not now. Maybe not ever. She doesn’t think Jack is ready, either, although she’s not certain. But he’s blocked them for years, leaving his twin brother no more than a shadow at his heels—what good will remembering do now?

“It was a long time ago,” she says instead. She takes her time drying the dish.

“I was in the tree. She reached out to me. I think I’d lost my balance and she was trying to save me.”

“It’s not your fault,” Holly says. “It was an accident. Eden fell. That’s all.”

“I think we were trying to fly,” he says, as if she hasn’t spoken. “That’s crazy, right? Little-kid stuff. Like the stories Grandma used to tell. But I don’t remember what happened after.”

Holly polishes the dish, concentrating on the gold rim. She doesn’t look up. “There’s really nothing else. After she fell, Eden went to hospital. She never recovered. She never woke up.”

“She was smart. I remember how smart she was,” Jack says. “And her laugh. I remember it was like bubbles. It would rise and rise and rise until it exploded.”

She turns to him, surprised. “Exactly.” She can hear the pleasure in her own voice. It’s been such a long time since she’s had the chance to talk about Eden with someone who knew her before. She longs to recall aloud the stubborn curl that always stood up on the back of Eden’s head. Her funny little baby voice, unexpectedly raspy. The greedy way she ate raspberries straight from the box, popping them in her mouth so quickly the berries were gone before they got home from market. Holly’s heart aches with the weight of all the memories she’s locked away.

She sets the plate down carefully. It’s so fragile it could shatter in her hands. Jack will think she’s a monster if he knows the truth—that she pursued a job that took them away from Eden, all the while using Eden’s blood, experimenting with it. He might freak out, and that’s the last thing he needs. So it’s easier not to encourage the conversation, not to tell the truth.

Unless he asks. She won’t lie directly to him. Not anymore. The risk that he won’t forgive her again is too great.

She crosses the kitchen. Tentatively hugs him. His heartbeat through his shirt is so rapid it frightens her. She wants to ask how he feels, what he’s thinking, but she knows if she does he’ll close down.

“I’m sorry,” she says instead. For everything, she thinks but does not say.

He doesn’t respond. Instead he yawns so widely she almost believes it’s real as he shrugs out of her embrace. “I’m tired. I’m going to bed.”

His face is still pale. She decides it’s because he’s upset, because he’s exhausted. There’s nothing wrong.

“What are your plans for tomorrow? It’s supposed to rain. Typical weekend.”

He shrugs. “I dunno. I might hang with Ed. If the weather’s good, we’re going back to the park.”

The bloody hell you are, she thinks but does not say. Instead she kisses him on the cheek. “Sleep well.”

She wipes down the table and the counters. Checks the clock, surprises herself when she thinks of calling Christopher. She tells herself it’s to see if he has anything to report, but she knows his silence is its own answer and resolves against it. Hands off—in every sense of the word—is the smart path there.

At last she settles by the edge of the nursery window. If Peter truly is an emotional vampire, he’ll sense the uproar in the house and come now. But there’s nothing: no rush of movement through the air, no tiny light that signifies his presence.

The first two nights Peter had visited, he’d shut the window behind him, locking that light out. It has taken Holly years to wonder why. Perhaps his motives had been less than pure from the beginning. The last night, he hadn’t bothered to close the window, but no light had followed him, beating against the glass.