Ch. 4 To Dream the Impossible Dream
Peter felt like all of the old scars Jane had made when she had gone had been ripped open and left to bleed afresh. Jane was his eldest child. She was almost a mirror image of her mother, the only difference being her impatience with hair curlers. Well that and their contradicting attitudes. As she had grown up Peter had told both of his daughters stories about Neverland and his adventures there. He had painted images with the words that would remain with them forever. Unfortunately for him Jane had believed his every word. She had believed in Neverland and Tinkerbell; in the Crocodile and the Neverbird. And even in Hook's dark, somehow threatening, mane of curls. She was of course correct in this thinking. But she had made up her mind that she was going to find her father's stories and bring them back to life. So one day she simply left, went searching for the land of dreams. Without warning, without a plan of action or forethought. (Peter winced at the similarities between this and his early escapades.) They had not seen or heard from her since. After this Peter decided that it was simply too dangerous to tell Moira fairy stories. And so in an effort to protect her he began to dismiss fairy stories as poppycock or hogwash. Stopped telling the tales that reminded him too much of Jane. And now the irony stung, like a paper cut generously doused in lemon juice. In trying to keep Moira safe and at home he had driven her away.
Peter assumed that she had followed in the footsteps of her sister. He did not know about Tink's reappearance in the nursery and the situation on Neverland. He only knew that every night he left the window open in the hope that one of his children at least would return. Then how his building hopes were crushed when he and Wendy woke to their children's empty beds.
Wendy also was deeply hurt by her children leaving her. She blamed herself. After all was it not she who had banned magic in the house? Was it not she who had tried to instill in her daughters a sense a "propriety" concerning the M word? And was it not she who had come up with the idea to send Moira to boarding school? She had also tried, in her own way, to protect their girls. She had tried to keep them as far away as possible from magic so that they would not have to go through the pain it left behind when it went away. The incessant longing to fly again or at least see a fairy just one more time; the constant struggle of reaching for the stars only to discover that you do not have a ladder. She did not want her daughters chasing after rainbows, which have a nasty habit of moving just when you've caught up with them. She felt like that which she had longed for since her own childhood, motherhood, was her greatest failure. She loved caring for people. It gave her purpose. And now looking out the nursery window, her husband by her side, Wendy wondered if she could have prevented all of this merely by sharing her story with her children. As she looked up at the sky her eyes scanned the heavens, looking for a particular star. An otherwise insignificant pin prick of light that was the gate way to a place where dreams are reality and reality seems to be a dream, a place that both she and Peter had once known quite well. She looked to the right and hoped beyond hope that her daughters were safe and happy. And had ultimately found what they were looking for, the place that they belonged. Wendy felt the tears rolling down her cheeks and looked to Peter for strength. But instead of his usual controlled, calm demeanor she found him crying. This was the third time Wendy could ever remember him crying. The first time was the night they had met and she had lectured him about mothers. To this day he claimed that he hadn't been crying, although his opinions on mothers had been altered by having children of his own. The second time was when their eldest had torn their family apart. And now Peter was crying not for himself any longer, but for the pain his daughters would have to endure. They had tasted the forbidden fruit and would have to learn to live with the consequences.