Disclaimer: same as in chapter 1 – characters aside from the maid aren't mine *g*

No Island Paradise

A Small Change

With Abby safely in the maid Cassandra's care – Jennifer trusted the woman, though she couldn't quite say why – Jennifer and Peter headed outside, making their way down to the beach. It wasn't the romantic outing onlookers might have assumed, if there had been onlookers, but the reality was that they were married, no matter how much it pained Jennifer to admit it.

He reached out and took her hand, and she let it lie there in his large one, limply. She never really held his hand – only let him hold hers. In a way this was more effective than yanking it away, as she had done for a long time in the beginning, because it let him think she felt nothing at all for him, and was not affected by his touch.

While in reality she did feel something for him – hatred, disgust – she preferred to make him think that her feelings towards him were completely neutral. She could see in his eyes sometimes that he did see this – he was disappointed, but eternally desirous. He never seemed to give up hope that she would love him someday, though he seemed less adamant these days, after years of failure to win her over. None of this comforted her.

"You're quiet tonight," Peter said softly, and she glanced at him. He wasn't looking at her. He was staring at the ground as he walked, looking pensive. She set her jaw as he squeezed her hand. She let it remain there limply. She said nothing.

"What'd you do today?" he asked, clearly not ready to tackle the really important issues yet. He wanted to beat around the bush a little. She'd seen this before, and no doubt the evening would end with no progress whatsoever between them. As usual, she would go to sleep with an overcrowded mind and an aching heart, subconsciously longing for what she had long ago decided she could never have. As usual she would awake the next morning with no reason to drag herself out of bed but her daughter.

"I stared into the distance," Jennifer said dully, her steps dragging a little more as each moment passed. "I stared at the wall. I played with Abby a little." She was not going to give him an easy time of it. She was not going to make him see hope where there was none. She now lived to prove him wrong.

"Jenn, please," Peter murmured, his voice cracking. He stopped in his tracks when they were quite near the end of the sandy path and turned her to face him. "Please don't be like this. You know I'd do anything for you. Why are you being like this?"

She stared at him, letting him see the complete lack of love in her eyes, and the sadness. Her hating him had never done much good, but when he saw her sad he really got stung. She tried to show him her sadness as often as she could these days.

"I miss the old days, Jenn…when we'd talk and talk…and laugh… When we'd just look at one another and know we'd share our love forever."

"Those days were a lifetime ago, Peter," Jennifer said lifelessly. "We can't get them back, no matter what you do. Particularly not when only one of us wants them back. What we had is gone forever."

"It can exist again!" Peter said vehemently, eyes shining with a passion that made her skin crawl. He was almost on fire with it – with what he perceived as his love for her. "You just have to give me a chance, Jenn. We've been here so long…I was sure it would've changed by now. I don't understand why you aren't giving us a chance."

She sighed in frustration, letting her emotions get the better of her in spite of how hard she'd tried to keep her cool. "Peter, why can't you see?" she exclaimed, her eyes begging him to do so. "I will never love you. I never could, after all that you did to my family and I. "Don't you understand? Time won't change the way I feel. We've been here years, Peter, and not once have I been truly happy!"

That brought him up short. He was looking at her in disbelief, handsome in a way she could never find appealing – he was the most repulsive man she had ever met, taking after his adoptive father in too many ways for comfort. She could not believe she had once loved him, given her heart to him. Then again, she reasoned, it wasn't him I fell in love with back then. It was someone who didn't exist…or at least someone who doesn't exist now. Peter tried hard to be a good man, but in the end he couldn't run far enough from the Dimera curse.

She had begun walking and now padded across the sand, gazing out on a black sea. Sometimes she found small moments of serenity as she walked along the beach, but not this night. No matter what she said to Peter, he still clung to his desperate dreams. Every day she grew more convinced that she would be here forever, and every day it grew less easy to tolerate the notion of spending her life here.

"Jenn, what is it you want?" Peter asked out of the darkness, and it was the first she realised he had stayed with her as she walked. But of course he had – he never left her side if he could help it, at least not when she was outdoors. "Tell me what you wish for and I'll grant it in a second."

"You're a liar," Jennifer said softly, her voice trembling with an unexpected threat of tears. "You just lie and lie…but why should that surprise me? It doesn't disappoint me either, since I never expected more of you."

She was speaking so softly that she wasn't sure he had heard. But when he pulled her around to face him, once again dictating her actions, he leaned closer and repeated his question. "Tell me what you want. Please."

She stared at him for a long time, at a man she'd once thought she knew, and for a moment in time lost the will to make use of every little opportunity to show him her misery. For once all she wanted was to collapse in the sand and weep. Yet she stayed silent as she formulated her answer for him.

"I want to go home," she whispered, but she knew he heard. "I want to see my family again. I want to see my mother, my grandmother… She's growing old, Peter. What if I never see her again? What if the last time I saw her was that night I left her place and we both thought everything would be fine? And Abby… She needs her grandmother, her aunts and uncles and cousins…" Jennifer blinked back tears and said more strongly, "These are things I fear every single day. Losing more of the precious time I have on this earth with my family… Seeing Abby grow up alone and isolated, stunted. I want to go home, Peter, because this isn't home to me."

He was hurt, as the look in his eyes showed, but she didn't let him break her gaze. He would have to be mentally retarded not to realise at this moment how fervently she meant what she said – how much of a fact her unhappiness was. While she had long ago given up thinking that one day her pleas would make a difference, she now got some small satisfaction in knowing she had done all she could.

Eventually he sighed, and half turned away. He contemplated the sand for a moment before saying wearily, "I wish things could've been different. I wish you had given it a chance. I could've made you so happy…"

Her pulse quickened at this strange turn of events. He had never before reacted this way to her words – it could mean many things that he did so now, but she wasn't sure whether it was bad or good. She feared to find out, and yet she knew she had to.

"Let's go back," Peter said suddenly, clearly changing the subject. "I want to put Abby to bed."

The fine hairs on Jennifer's skin rose in apprehension.