CHAPTER SEVEN: A Hidden Kiss
He feared the day that somebody would notice that he was missing his right hand's shadow. He had known it had somehow left London with the fairy that night almost a year ago, as if it was his own desperate attempt to somehow get to Never Land.
Yes, he knew the name of That Wonderful Place now, for that very night that Tinker Bell left, when he once again dreamed of that place, it had proudly re-introduced itself to him. The show-off had even taken the trouble of making the leaves of its jungles ever greener as they rustled, its seas ever more treacherous as its waves crashed against the ever more forbidding rocks, the pirates ever more fearsome and the mermaids ever more mysterious. The entire place behaved as if it had donned a new dress as it flaunted its new name, and so the boy had never seen the place so beautiful as it was that time.
But as time passed he visited Never Land less and less often in his dreams, as he came to dream more and more often of something entirely new, but just as wonderful, only in a different way.
It happened a few days before that fateful Saturday almost a year ago, that Saturday that the fairy bade him farewell. As he was walking on his way home from school in his usual daydreaming state, his foot slipped on the icy pavement. He landed on his back with a dull thud and a pained "oof," and he lay stunned for many moments. As he stared at the grey sky, a face loomed in his view.
"Are you alright?" the upside-down face asked in a girl's voice.
He immediately sat up, and the girl helped him to his feet, and even dusted off the shoulders of his coat.
"Thank you," he said. "I am fine now."
"Good," she nodded. "I'm Mary Cullen." She stuck out her hand to him in a brisk but friendly manner.
"Hello," he said as he shook her hand. "My name's George Darling. Pleased to meet you."
He was startled when Mary Cullen cried out, "Oh! You've hurt yourself!"
And it was true. On the back of his hand was a nasty scratch, and there was a little blood in it. He had not felt its presence until the girl pointed it out. He was even more startled when the girl suddenly lifted up his hand, which still held her own, to her lips and placed a kiss on it. And then the girl gasped as if she had surprised herself with her own impulsive action.
"Oh, I am so very sorry!" she stammered, pulling her hand from his. "It's just that – I mean… my mother always told me that a kiss was the best cure for any ailment – ah –" Her cheeks were red with with embarrassment, and his were even more so.
That was when he truly looked at her. He recognized her as the girl who lived a few houses down from his own house, but had always seen her only from a distance. Upon closer inspection he saw that her eyes were a very warm brown, her nose ending in the daintiest point, her lips a smiling pink arc. Why, she was quite a pretty thing!
That last realization was accompanied by the funniest little tug on his stomach, as if something had jumped inside it.
And what was that playing around the corner of her mouth?
As he looked at it, the funny tugs in his stomach increased in strength and frequency, as if the jumps had evolved into a full-blown game of hopscotch. He stared at the elusive something for the longest time, until the girl "ehem"-ed not-so-subtly.
"Well, I have to go now," she said as George shook his head to clear it.
"Ah… it was nice to meet you, Mary Cullen," he grinned sheepishly.
"Mary will do… George." She smiled again, ever so sweetly.
"Alright… Mary." And the two parted ways.
That night, he sat in his room examining his injured hand by the light of the candle, hoping that even a smidgen of Mary's kiss remained that he may study it more thoroughly. But not a trace of it remained, and he was disappointed.
And so for the first of many, many times, as he fell asleep, he dreamt not of That Wonderful Place, but of Mary Cullen's Hidden Kiss.
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The night that Tinker Bell went away, he sat by his bed and brooded. He thought he had heard something tear as the fairy flew out the window earlier, and the sound was accompanied by a strange pulling sensation in his hand, the very hand that Mary Cullen had kissed three days ago. When he examined it once again by the candlelight, he saw that the scratch had healed, and he was pleased. But his pleasure was overcome entirely by a feeling of horror as he saw that against the wall, only the shadow of his sleeve was outlined. He panicked and ran to his mother, but when he got to the first-floor sitting room he saw that his father was there with her, and the two were conversing in low, strained voices.
"Why do you encourage that boy with those fancies of his? Can you not see how detached he becomes from the world?" his father was saying. George hid himself by the doorjamb as he listened.
"Oh, Morgan, he is just a boy! Let him have his fun." Mrs. Darling flicked her hand carelessly.
"Yes, he is just a boy now, but do we not raise our children to become sensible adults?" He lifted his cup of coffee to his lips and drank heartily.
"Sensibility, my foot!" his mother sniffed. "He'll have enough of that when he grows up, I'm sure." Indeed, she sounded like she was.
Mr. Darling was about to say something more, but Annie Darling raised her hand and said, "Say no more, Father. I believe you have had too much coffee. It is the coffee talking, I just know it." George heard the clink of china as his mother started to clear up the coffee cups, and then there were footsteps coming toward him. As quickly and as quietly as he could, he climbed up the stairs and went back to his room.
And then he slept, and he dreamed that That Wonderful Place had gotten itself a new name.